This is really interesting, I've been contemplating about how consciousness relates to existence and its seeming duality. I'm planning a post about such a thing right now, maybe the Tao Te Ching would have more to say about it. — QuixoticAgnostic

This is how I got involved with Taoism from the beginning. I’m an engineer and consider myself pragmatic. I am also introspective and reasonably intelligent—intellectual. Thinking is what I do.

I couldn’t get away from the intuition that reality is half human. Taoism gave me the words to talk about that. As the passage I quoted indicates, naming, conceptualization, categorization is what separates our reality into the individual things that make up our everyday world. Naming is something that humans do. We create the world.

Here's a new paradigm I recently read about: On biological and artificial consciousness: A case for biological computationalism. This one isn't phenomenologically informed, per se, other than the fact that it reflects openness to a somewhat fresh start. — Relativist

Thanks. Seems interesting. I sent the article to Kindle and I'll take a look.

My main point was that there is no incoherence or inconsistency in thinking that the physical world existed prior to the advent of consciousness. Science informs us that it did. The fact that such judgement is only possible where there is consciousness (and language for that matter) I see as a mere truism. — Janus

This lays the issue out well. I would add one thing--there is no incoherence or inconsistency in thinking that the physical world did not exist prior to the advent of consciousness. That is the essence of the Taoist way of thinking as I understand it. There is no reason both those ways of thinking may not be useful depending on the context.

I've been thinking about this discussion, wanting to take it further. As I wrote in one of my posts in this thread:

Maybe I'll start a thread with lists of statements I consider metaphysical by my standard and ask people to describe how they fit into their own understanding of the term. — T Clark

I started to try to start on something like that when I remembered I had started a somewhat similar discussion four years ago. Here's the OP from that discussion--"The Metaphysics of Materialism." I've hidden it so it won't clutter up this post.



That discussion ended up being successful from my point of view, but I had to struggle to keep it from devolving into the usual arguments about what metaphysics is and isn't. As I was rereading this I had an epiphany. The primary subject of the thread was not metaphysics, it was the enumeration of the underlying assumptions of pre-quantum mechanics physics. I could have raised that question without ever mentioning metaphysics at all. I've edited my OP to take out stuff that wasn't strictly needed to allow discussing the issues I was interested in. I don't think it's exactly the same thing, but in a sense I've drawn the joints of the discussion in different places.

So... I guess you were right. I've gone back and looked at some of my other comments and discussions on similar subjects. In some cases, I could have made them simpler and less open to confusion by focusing on the specific issue at hand and ignoring the broader metaphysical context.

I don’t see that passage as advancing a metaphysical position. It doesn’t make claims about what exists in itself, but about what scientific objectification leaves out by design. That’s a methodological and epistemological point about the conditions under which scientific knowledge is produced, not a thesis about the ultimate nature of reality. — Wayfarer

We've been down this path before. Your and my understandings of what metaphysics is are not compatible.

subjectivity is not a possible object of perception, as it is that to which or whom experience occurs. — Wayfarer

I can take a picture of my camera. I can see my eye reflected in a still puddle of water. I can think about your and my minds. I don't understand why people see this as difficult.

Interestingly then, based on that thread, it seems that the question and the three answers I give in the OP is almost a moot point; any of the answers might be correct according to some way of thinking about the question, and trying to claim any one of them most accurately answers the question along its terms is just trying to claim language rather than discuss the concepts.

That said, part of me posting this in the first place was an excuse to propose a way of viewing existence such that the third answer is valid, although I don't know if I succeeded there. — QuixoticAgnostic

Here's your third answer from the OP:

One might say, existence and non-existence are two sides of the same coin, so where we say a thing exists, we also introduce the possibility of that thing failing to exist. — QuixoticAgnostic

This is from Verse 2 of the Tao Te Ching, Stephen Mitchell's translation:

When people see some things as beautiful,
other things become ugly.
When people see some things as good,
other things become bad.

Being and non-being create each other.
Difficult and easy support each other.
Long and short define each other.
High and low depend on each other.
Before and after follow each other. — Tao Te Ching - Stephen Mitchell's translation

You could read the bolded line as "Something and nothing create each other." In the Taoist context, this could mean several things. First, just a simple matter of comparison, juxtaposition. How do you know something isn't there unless something you expect is missing. What is the background that somethingness stands out from. Second, If there is nothing we won't be here to know it. Third, many philosophies recognize reality can be thought of as one undifferentiated whole--the One, the monad. One way of thinking about that is to presuppose what we think of reality doesn't come into existence until consciousness becomes aware of it. This from Verse 1 of the Tao Te Ching:

The tao that can be told
is not the eternal Tao
The name that can be named
is not the eternal Name.

The unnamable is the eternally real.
Naming is the origin
of all particular things. — Tao Te Ching - Stephen Mitchell's translation

What 'metaphysical claim' do you think is being made? — Wayfarer

The following passage from your OP describes the metaphysical positions, claims of both the scientific and phenomenological approaches.

For Bitbol, phenomenology is the real starting point in the quest to understand consciousness, because it reveals something that scientific objectification systematically brackets out or ignores — namely the observer, the scientist, the one who makes observations, draws conclusions, and decides on the questions to be asked. Yet the point runs deeper than methodological oversight. Scientific objectivity does not merely forget the observer; it presupposes the observer as the one for whom objects appear, measurements make sense, and evidence is meaningful in the first place. Before there can be data, models, or theories, there must be a lived field of experience in which anything like a “fact” can show up at all. Phenomenology begins from this pre-objective dimension, revealing the conditions that make scientific inquiry possible but that science itself cannot capture because they are already assumed in every act of objectification. — Wayfarer

There's a categorical distinction you seem to be missing. Where in the world of apples and pogo sticks is your experience? — Wayfarer

Where are electrons? Where is dark matter? Where are the thoughts going on in your mind to me? Bitbol wrote consciousness is “not a something, but not a nothing either.” Does that mean consciousness does not exist, isn’t real?

At the heart of my understanding of how things work is the conviction that the foundation of philosophical thought is introspection and self-awareness. Believing that, an attraction to phenomenology would seem natural, but I've always been sceptical. The way phenomenology is discussed here on the forum and what I've read makes it seem a bit like new age spirituality wrapped up in philosophical jargon. At the same time, I've come to see that my own understanding of the relationship between humanity and the cosmos needs to be clarified. I have work to do. I'll try to be fair minded with what you've written.

Bitbol’s alternative is not a metaphysical theory — Wayfarer

This is one of my big problems with your presentation of what Bitbol believes--As I understand it, it is exactly a metaphysical claim. A valid and useful one, but still metaphysics. A failure to recognize that makes what you've written seem dogmatic and rigid, much as the philosophy of reductionist physics is. You have to have both. What brought me to my interest in Taoism, which is related to this question, is an understanding that reality is one half human. But there is another half. Writing that off as a delusion of some sort undermines the argument.

Phenomenology begins from a simple but far-reaching insight: the reality of first-person consciousness is ineliminable, and any account of the world must ultimately be grounded in the structures of experience as they appear to the subject. — Wayfarer

I would have no problem with this if it meant that both our internal experience and some sort of external reality are considered equally fundamental. I get the impression that's not the case, which leaves us with something close to solipsism.

At its core, phenomenology is the disciplined study of conscious experience from the first-person perspective...consciousness is not an object among objects, nor a property waiting to be discovered by neuroscience. It is not among the phenomena given to examination by sense–data or empirical observation. ... — Wayfarer

This is another problem for me. As I see it, conscious experience is not a metaphysical entity, it exists in the world of apples and pogo sticks--an object among objects. Ultimately, we can only know it empirically while acknowledging the special difficulties associated with limited access. This is where any possible compromise between positions seems to fall apart. Neither of us can understand why the other can't see what seems self-evident to us.

If we know what consciousness is, it is because we ourselves are conscious beings, not because it is something we encounter in the natural world. (We may infer that other sentient beings are conscious, but only our own consciousness is immediately given to us.) — Wayfarer

Here's one of the things I don't get. In what sense is our experience not part of the natural world? Why is there any problem with us learning about consciousness in others through inference? Much of scientific knowledge is gathered indirectly and without direct observation. Why is this situation any different? Speaking personally, I don't see that conscious experience is all that special. It's just one more thing for us to learn about. One more thing we encounter as we live our lives.

Bitbol considers consciousness to be “self-evidentially absolute” — Wayfarer

This is presumptuous. I'm a pretty smart guy. If it isn't evident to me, it probably isn't self-evident at all. Language I might be willing to accept in it's place would be "It is my understanding that considering consciousness absolute is the best way for us to gain a useful understanding of it's principles." That's not all that different from the position I find most useful.

From this perspective, the materialist project of locating consciousness in the brain or in neural processes is not just incomplete; it is conceptually incoherent. Like any empirical analysis, it rests on the presumption that what is real is what can be objectively measured and assessed. (Here I am referring specifically to the empirical sciences — physics, neuroscience, and biology — which construct their claims through measurement and intersubjective verification.)

However, the very notion of the objective world described by the empirical sciences is itself a product of selective abstraction — what Bitbol calls the end-product of the procedure of objectification. Why? Because science methodically brackets out the subjective pole of observation so as to arrive at an intersubjective consensus about the observer-independent attributes of the object. But when this methodology is applied to the question of the nature of consciousness, it turns around and tries to explain conscious experience in terms of that consensus. — Wayfarer

I don't understand the problem with applying tools and procedures developed by the mind on the mind itself. What's wrong with a little self-reference. Measurements of distance I made with a ruler in the good old days ultimately depended on comparing the ruler with the length of a bar of platinum in storage somewhere. One ruler measuring another. Calibration. Whatever problems there are with this are methodological, not fundamental.

The result is not only circular but, he says, will always culminate in the notorious “hard problem”: consciousness treated as if it were something that emerges from structural relations in objectively–existing matter, when in reality it is the precondition for identifying those relations in the first place. — Wayfarer

As I noted, it's not circular in any kind of problematic way. And the hard problem is only notorious to Bitbol et. al. To many of us here on the other side, it feels like a made up problem that seems to arise from an understanding that is spiritual. Spirituality, as I understand it, is focused self examination with the goal of improving self-awareness—another valid mode of knowledge. And this is where a failure to see Bitbol’s alternative as metaphysical runs us into a wall, because both the scientific approach and Bitbol’s approach are metaphysical. They’re not mutually exclusive. If you’ve paid any attention to the things I’ve written over the years you’ve seen I see self-awareness as essential to our understanding of the universe. That doesn’t tell us anything about whether standard scientific practices can contribute to our understanding of consciousness.

This is paricularly true of culturally influenced feelings and behaviors, like love and hate. Of course it is possible (even probable) that a trait or behavior that has become common has conferred advantages, but assuming it must have done so is an error — Ecurb

I’m mostly in agreement with your post, although I am a strong believer in a biological, genetic, neurological, psychological, sociological human nature.

Is hate an emotion, or is it more of an attitude, or a judgement? — Questioner

I think what we call hate is mostly anger, resentment, and judgment.

Is hate more irrational or logical? — Questioner

It’s definitely not logical. Is it irrational? I would say it certainly non-rational and destructive. Does that make it irrational?

Does hate serve a purpose? — Questioner

I suppose it serves an emotional purpose, but I also think it leads to ineffective actions.

Do love and hate always express themselves? — Questioner

Well, they affect things. Cause things. Even if they’re not recognized.

Why is it that both love and hate can result in both heroic and evil actions? — Questioner

I’m not sure I agree with the claim here. Besides that there’s no reason something can’t be both heroic and evil.

Which one has the wider radius of effect? — Questioner

I’m not sure what this means.

Is hate what happens when someone is not loved? — Questioner

I don’t think this question makes any sense.

Is hate a stronger force than love? — Questioner

I don’t think either love or hate is a force.

Are destruction and construction two sides of the same coin? — Questioner

I’m not sure what this means, especially in the context of the rest of this post

Is hate ever positive? Is love ever negative? — Questioner

Here’s the deal—the love created by natural selection that brings us together as a social species you discussed at the beginning is not the same love you talk about in the rest of the post. Our natural love is not the opposite of hate, it’s the opposite of indifference.

Eight months ago, I posted here I was reading “Infinite Jest” with my family 100 pages at a time. We’ve finished it now. Here’s what I said back at the beginning.

It’s hilarious. I rarely laugh out loud at books, but I do all the time with this one. It’s also difficult to follow, non-linear, and absurd. — T Clark

All of that is still true, but I’ll add now it is deeply, profoundly heartbreaking and moving. It’s a wonderful book, although it’s also frustrating and sometimes infuriating. There’s no doubt I would never have finished without my son, daughter, and I pushing each other.

Strongly recommend you read this electronically. There are numerous footnotes, some of them very long. Many of them set as footnotes for no reason I can figure out but important to the flow of the narrative, such as it is. I also found myself looking up words on just about every page many of which don’t exist in the real world of language.

I can't tell if you're being facetious or not, — QuixoticAgnostic

I’d like to think I’m being playful. There’s really no answer to your question unless we tie down the meaning of the words we’re using—“thing”, “exist”, “really.” I think it would be reasonable to say something that doesn’t exist isn’t a thing at all—one definition from the web says a thing is “a material object without life or consciousness; an inanimate object.” Other definitions specify it has to be an object, but don’t specify that it has to be material.

We are discussing exactly this issue in @J’s current discussion of reference magnetism.

So then what has more legs, no horse or no horse? — Patterner

There’s a country song that’s refrain is “When your phone don’t ring, that’ll be me.”

a horse has four legs, but no horse has five legs. — Patterner

This is wrong. It’s my understanding that no horse has 10 legs.

You are confusing yourself. — ToothyMaw

I’m not confused.

More likely, a sprawling, fragmentary landscape of overlapping , incompatible terminologies would result. It is not obvious at all that this would be an improvement over the current state of affairs. — hypericin

But then what is the value of any idea if it’s so amorphous we can’t actually use it for anything? Words, ideas, are meant to be used.

Or maybe it should be titled “Are there more things that are really things that exist or things that are really things that don’t exist?”

Are unicorns and goblins not things even though they don't really exist? — ToothyMaw

What’s the difference between “existing” and “really existing?” Maybe the title of this thread should be “Are there more things that really exist or things that don’t really exist?”

Anyway, of course goblins and unicorns exist. Or do only the ideas of goblins and unicorns exist? Or the words “goblin” and “unicorn?”

This is the most fun I've had with a discussion in a long time.

when a philosophical debate switches from what a term refers to, to whether it is the correct term to use, we are likely moving to something non-substantive. — J

And this has been my point all along, we just differ on the solution. We don't even disagree much on that.

I've sometimes wondered whether the Tao is the same idea as a perfectly noumenal world, a world that by definition is beyond human experience, just as Kant said. — J

I've make the point quite often that Kant's idea of noumena reflects the same insight as Lao Tzu's Tao, although there are significant differences. The idea of a primordial undifferentiated Oneness is found in many philosophies and religions under the general heading "monism." I asked AI (Gemini) for some examples and got a long list. I won't reproduce it in keeping with the forum's AI policy.

But we'd have to add a layer to Kant's thought and say that nonetheless we have a kind of intuition, or constant awareness, of the noumenal -- that we can know it in a way that is not rational. — J

This is something I've thought about--how can we interact with, experience, the Tao without being able to consciously, i.e. verbally, think about it? What is non-verbal consciousness? What is awareness without consciousness? I have a personal sense of what it feels like to do do it. It's nothing exotic. I think we all do it all the time without being aware of it. Or without being conscious of it. Or something.

Maybe "identicalness" is best considered from a mathematical perspective, which is not my specialty. — J

I think this is right. Physical things can only be identical metaphorically.

My point about grounding was definitely a conceptual one. We have a variety of terms we can use to describe the similarities and differences we observe in the world (and in our own conceptions). I think all of them may require the concept of "identity" in order to make sense. — J

Categorization is the concept we are talking about here. I'm in the middle of reading, by which I mean listening to, "Surfaces and Essences: Analogy as the Fuel and Fire of Thinking" by Douglas Hofstadter and Emmanuel Sander. The authors claim, to vastly oversimplify, Thought = Categorization = Analogy ⇒ Identity. I won't go into any detail, since I'm just getting started and it is on a bit of a tangent.

That would mean that in an important sense "identity" is structurally more fundamental that, say "being green". — J

Is identify a property? It seems more like a relationship to me. No need to take this any further unless you want to.

I could challenge (2) and point to many cases where making up new words (and logical relations) has been extremely helpful, — J

Yes, but there is a distinction between technical language and jargon.

("A brick shaped like metaphysics" is another good image for a reference magnet. It "pulls" us, in this metaphor, because we need it as a conceptual cornerstone.) — J

I'm very proud of that metaphor.

My conclusion - Just agree on a damn definition before you get started. Even if there is a way to get around that, philosophers and pseudo-philosophers won't let you have a discussion that doesn't devolve into an argument about terminology. It's what we do. It's what people think philosophy is.

Are there more things that exist or things that don’t exist? — QuixoticAgnostic

Oh, good, finally an easy one. If it doesn’t exist, it’s not a thing.

No further questions. I rest my case.

Your use of "everyday human life" is interesting. Is that what Sider has in mind when he counterposes it to a bizarre interpretation? — J

Yes, I think that's right. As I noted in my last post, I understand what he means and agree with the general sentiment--after all, two electrons and a cow makes kind of a bizarre grouping. But the claim this represents some sort of "actual ontological structure" rather than a reflection of our common humanity raises my hackles.

The pivotal question, as so often, is whether this extension beyond the everyday can ever take us completely out of ourselves, into some sort of "view from nowhere" that is deeply fundamental, so to speak. — J

My answer is "No."

"Ontological realism [is the view that] ontological questions are 'deep', 'about the world rather than language'." — J

Well, no... I mean yes... I guess we can call them "deep" if you want, but they are not just about the world. They are about us and the world as a single entity. And yes, they are also about language.

This leave open the possibility that "the world" doesn't have to be construed as something apart from how we experience it. I — J

I don't know how open you are to Taoist thought. Lao Tzu wrote "The Tao that can be spoken is not the eternal Tao." We might say "The world as expressed in words is not the same as your experience of the world.” I think that's a good response to Sider, although I'm not sure he would disagree with me.

So we have to ask, Is identicalness a property for us because it is a fundamental property of ontology? Does being identical ground the other ways we can understand similarity or communality of properties? — J

This seems a bit odd. I guess two examples of a particular subatomic particle really are identical, but few other pairs in the world are. Two apples from the same tree are not identical physically, only conceptually. Then again, I can make the case that an electron and a cow are conceptually identical. As a matter of fact I already did in a previous post when I pointed out they are both consist of matter rather than radiation.

But suppose we both agreed that there is a reference magnet in the vicinity which is joint-carving. You want to say that "metaphysics" is the best word to apply to one division of the resulting conceptual carving -- the division which includes Collingwood's "absolute presuppositions [that] have been made by this or that person or group of persons." Other divisions might, on your terms, be "derivative assumptions" and "meaningless non-human-world statements about an inaccessible 'fundamentality'," or words to that effect, yes? — J

My problem is that the way I use the idea of "metaphysics" is fundamental to how I understand how the world works--or more accurately, how I can talk and think about how the world works. There's no way around it. I need bricks shaped like "metaphysics" to help build the wall. If I use another shape, the wall will be less stable. I guess I can call the bricks something else, but 1) there are already smart, qualified, experienced people out there using the word the same way I do and 2) making up new words almost never makes things better.

For my part, I'm not as clear about the right terms, but let's say I held a different set of labels, but was willing to bracket them while acknowledging that what you mean by "metaphysics" is indeed a reference magnet, and an important one. Might we not be able to continue the discussion on that basis? — J

This kind of question is what lead to think about the different approach to the question I mentioned in my last post when I wrote "Maybe I'll start a thread with lists of statements I consider metaphysical by my standard and ask people to describe how they fit into their own understanding of the term."

Too bad. I liked Bob in spite of our serious differences. I’m not surprised by this and I’m certain he wasn't either.

whether 'reality' and 'existence' and be differentiated, — Wayfarer

They certainly feel different. "Reality" feels more objective, concrete, philosophical, external. "Existence" feels more abstract, subjective, personal, internal. The Tao Te Ching uses "existence" and "being" as more or less interchangeable depending on the verse and translator. This is the kind of thing I meant when I talked about connotation.

I'm trying to think of two synonymous words that have different moods, tones or implications associated with them. — Janus

After I wrote that post, I was doing the same thing— trying to think of a good example. I figured someone would ask. An obvious example is the different ways of describing sexual activity.

• Sexual intercourse
• Having sex
• Making love
• Marital relations
• Fucking
• Mating
• Fornication
• Copulation

On a level more appropriate for this particular discussion, I think you’re example of reality and existence is a good one. Here are some more that might be relevant.

• Being
• Existence
• Reality
• Everything
• The universe
• The world
• The Tao
• The ground of being
• Ontology
• Ontological structure

I have used all of these terms at various times to describe everything that is, although I admit, I’d never use the last one until this discussion.

What do you think "thickness" or "depth" of meaning are, if not either polysemy or ambiguity? — Janus

What about connotation? Two different words might be accurately called synonyms, but still have a different mood, tone, or implication associated with them.

To start, I'd like to put a frame on the discussion up to this point. All the issues we've put on the table so far--your existence, being, reality, causation, freedom, the good, truth, the ground of being--my metaphysics--are themselves metaphysical concepts. I recognize we are in danger of slipping down the slope and off the cliff we are currently discussing, but this idea is central to my understanding and my argument. R.G. Collingwood is my guru in these matters. He wrote:

Metaphysics is the attempt to find out what absolute presuppositions have been made by this or that person or group of persons, on this or that occasion or group of occasions, in the course of this or that piece of thinking. — R.G. Collingwood - An Essay on Metaphysics

The important aspect of this quote in the context of this discussion is that metaphysical, i.e. ontological, points of view don't, or at least don't have to, apply universally to all situations at all times. I can be a realist in the morning and an idealist in the afternoon. Digging a bit deeper, it is fundamental to my understanding that ontological perspectives are not inherent in the world out there--they are human cognitive artifacts.

If we could adopt the ultra-objective "view from nowhere/anywhere," would the same reference magnets exert their influence? Is that what we require in order to talk about "reality's fundamental structure"? Sider declares himself to be an ontological realist; he thinks the answer is Yes. — J

What I like about your phrasing here is the use of the word "adapt." In this context it refers to a choice by a philosopher. Something obviously human. If I really believe that, does it make any sense to talk about "reality's fundamental structure?" How can something be fundamental if it only applies from a certain specific viewpoint?

In Sider's favor: There is surely such a thing as a non-bizarre interpretation, in which the two electrons do "go together"; he isn't making that up. Your suggestion is that bizarre vs. ordinary is a referendum on human uses and contexts. And that too seems plausible. — J

Again--calling something "bizarre" is a human judgment. God or reality or the Tao don't think putting a cow in with electrons is bizarre. To be fair, I certainly know what Sider is talking about. I have made the case that it only really makes sense to talk about real or reality in the context of, or at least with a connection to, everyday human life. That's probably a good example of a "non-bizarre interpretation," or "right sort of basis."

The question, I think, is whether we can argue that our human uses are themselves not arbitrary, but reflect actual ontological structure of some kind. — J

My first response is "No!!! Of course there is no 'actual ontological structure' of some kind!!!" But now I'm just going in circles. I think this is a good example of a situation where our argument becomes pointless unless you are willing to accept my ideas about metaphysics or I am willing to abandon them.

Suppose . . . that there exist, in the fundamental sense, nothing but sub-atomic particles. Given such a sparse ontology, the most plausible view about natural language quantifiers might be that they do not carve at the joints. The best metaphysical semantics of an ordinary sentence like 'There is a table' might be . . . a tolerant semantics, which interprets it as making the true claim that there exist sub-atomic particles appropriately arranged. The English 'there is', according to such a semantics, would not express fundamental quantification. . . So even if there is a joint-carving sort of quantification, the quantifiers of ordinary language might not carve at the joints. — Sider, 171-72.

I deal with this metaphysical knot by applying the metaphysical sword I mentioned just above--In most cases, it makes no sense (to me) to talk about existence, reality, unless there is a connection to the human world. Hypothesizing reality without tables is silly. Where the joints are located depends on the specific point of view. In this particular situation, it depends on scale. The fact that I want to make joints around subatomic particles doesn't keep me from also making joints around tables made up of subatomic particles, or, to carry it further, to make joints around furniture in general including tables.

Let's move to a less austere term: "happiness". Philosopher A maintains that happiness refers to a state that's measured in terms of pleasures and pains. Thus, it's possible, though unusual, for a person to fail to seek their own happiness, due to some defect of the psyche. Philosopher B maintains that happiness is best understood as that state which all people do in fact seek, since we are egoistic hedonists, and cannot fail to act in our own behalf. — J

I think "happiness" is a different, simpler, case than the other concepts we've been discussing. It's a human emotion, a psychological entity, not abstract at all. Not interesting ontologically any more than an apple is.

I sympathize, and I think Sider has this sort of thing in mind. Is there a way to bracket your use of "metaphysics," so to speak, and instead specify the (joint-carving) way in which you use that term? It could be set out not as a definition of 'metaphysics', but as an interesting conceptual or structural category you've noticed. I dunno . . . people might still want to argue terms. — J

I've been thinking about something like this. Maybe I'll start a thread with lists of statements I consider metaphysical by my standard and ask people to describe how they fit into their own understanding of the term.

I wondered if beauty should be confined to visual images only. — Corvus

No, of course not. It’s not that other things can’t be beautiful, it’s just that wasn’t the purpose of this thread at the beginning. It was intended to focus on visual beauty. My preference would be to keep it that way.

A visual image itself cannot be beautiful, until you have perceived it, and came to a true judgement that it is beautiful. Hence the true judgement i.e.truth is, what you are finding as beauty. — Corvus

You talk about this in a way that doesn’t come naturally for me. Although you’re welcome to use this thread to have a discussion on this, I’m going to stick to my visual beauty only standard. If you start another thread on aesthetic philosophy, I will probably participate.

Isn't beauty in the eyes of beholder? An old cliche, but an undeniable truth.
Isn't truth more beautiful than some visual images? What eyes see might be just illusion in most cases. — Corvus

I started this thread a long time ago, at least on a forum scale. At that time, it was specifically intended as a showcase for visual beauty. The OP is specific about that. @javi2541997 has single-handedly kept the discussion alive by posting to it every now and then. It’s a thread I love and I think Javi feels the same way.

Now, after all these years, people can use it in whatever manner they want. That being said, no, I don’t think truth is beautiful, no matter what Keats said.

That is why students of kinds such as Goodman, George Lakoff or John Dupre say or imply that there are no natural kinds, — Pierre-Normand

I think there are natural kinds, but they are natural human kinds. They are manifestations of our human nature and, beyond that of our own specific personal natures.

But that’s kind of a pragmatic approach to the subject, which works well for me since I like to call myself a pragmatist. I don’t think the universe has a structure independent of us that allows it to be separated at the joints as @J discussed. I’ll bring a little Lao Tzu into the discussion. This is from the first verse of Steven Mitchell’s translation of the Tao Te Ching.

The tao that can be told
is not the eternal Tao
The name that can be named
is not the eternal Name.

The unnamable is the eternally real.
Naming is the origin
of all particular things.

Naming is the process that divides, categorizes, the universe, the Tao, into the multiplicity that we experience. Naming is something humans do.

Let's say you and I had quite different construals of how "exist" ought to be used. I'm sure that, being reasonable people, we could stipulate a meaning to employ in examining some given question. And we might learn quite a bit about this term -- call it E^. But neither of us really believes it means "exist"! We're clinging to the idea that there is some right way to use "exist", even as we agree to stipulate E^ for this discussion. — J

The problem with that for me is, again sticking with metaphysics as the example, I need the idea as formulated in my understanding of philosophy. The way I’ve dealt with that in discussions that I started is to specify in the OP exactly the definition of metaphysics I want to use for the purposes of that particular thread. As I noted, it’s often a struggle to keep other posters on that path.

But as we know, a lot of philosophy consists of people insisting that Great Philosopher X was right about Big Term A, and they're sure they can come up with the persuasive argument somehow. That said, I enjoy talking with people who tone this down a bit, and want to show me how a particular philosopher's construal can be helpful, insightful, creative, et al., without necessarily settling the question for all time. — J

I enjoy those kinds of discussions to. As I mentioned, I’m happy to participate, but, as I see it, that limits how substantive the discussion can be. You never get any further than what the term does or doesn’t mean

in Ontologese, quantifiers are stipulated to carve at the joints. In other words, they are attracted by the correct, eligible reference magnets. — J

Can you give an example of this?

An obvious obstacle would be to get some agreement about whether there are such things as joint-carving or ontologically privileged concepts. Some versions of post-modernism, for instance, would stop right here and ask for an account of this that makes sense in their tradition. Can we give one? Food for thought. — J

As I understand it, at the most fundamental levels, joints are established based on biological and neurological characteristics. Visually, the world gets broken up initially in the eye before it ever gets to the central nervous system. Some animals are most sensitive to motion while others are to shadows. Some see color and some don’t. Some have much better visual resolution than others. Tactually, it would make sense if there were a joint between things that caused pain and things that didn’t.

How those various very primitive conceptualizations, if they can even be called that, lead to the complex conceptual reality humans live with every day is a question to be answered by biology, neurology, psychology, and cognitive science.

The way one overcomes disagreements is first by understanding what the other person is saying. If there is a term that is being used differently between two interlocutors, then it can be helpful to disambiguate that equivocation for the sake of clarity and mutual understanding, but there is no magic bullet where one overcomes metaphysical impasse by coining new words. — Leontiskos

This is right, but what it leads to is that every discussion about a difficult or obscure concept ends up as an argument about the meaning of words, and we never get around to a substantive discussion of consequences.

This is a great OP--clear, well written, and, even more important, something I'm really interested about.

Certain big philosophical terms seem fundamental, yet cause big problems. Existence, being, real, cause, freedom, good, and true are a few examples. These terms have acquired meanings, and then more meanings, and then yet more meanings, resulting in camps of philosophy who seem to say opposite things using the same words.

Are these disputes non-substantive? True, they often revolve around terminological disagreements, but they are not about terms, or at any rate we don’t want them to be. We want them to be about the things to which they refer: about existence, reality, causation, the good, and what grounds what. The disagreements begin to look terminological when the debaters realize that they are talking past each other, using those fundamental terms in different ways. — J

Yes, this happens a lot. I have made the case many times that it's important to agree on the definition of a term at the beginning of the thread unless the discussion's specific purpose is to figure out what it means. I get lots of pushback on that position. In my particular case, the most troublesome concept is "metaphysics." That idea is right at the heart of my interest in and understanding of philosophy. I have my own understanding of what it means. If you've paid attention to my posts, you've heard me spout out about it numerous times.

The problem for me is that, sometimes, I don't want to talk about what metaphysics is, I want to talk about what the implications and consequences of my specific understanding are. I've had knock down drag out fights trying to keep my own discussions on subject. The moderators are often unsympathetic and unwilling to intervene. In my experience, every discussion of metaphysics turns into an argument about what the term really means. It never goes any deeper than that. I think the same thing is sometimes true of terms you identified--existence, being, real, cause, freedom, good, and true--and others.

One of the key concepts Sider has endorsed is “reference magnetism.” (He attributes the term to a 1984 paper by Harold Hodes, but it’s usually associated with David Lewis.) According to reference magnetism, we don’t simply assign words to things or concepts in such a way that our statements about them come out true. Truth on an interpretation isn’t enough. We also want the references of our words to have certain characteristics, certain external constraints on meaning. Here Sider’s preferred term is “joint-carving,” borrowed from Plato, by which he means “corresponding to actual ontological structure.” (I find the term disgusting, but it’s too central to Sider’s thought to be simply dropped.) — J

This is really interesting. For the record, I love the term "joint-carving." I think it gets right to the heart of the issue, although I'm not sure the idea there is some "actual ontological structure" makes any sense. This use of the term makes me think of a passage from Brook Ziporyn's translation of the Chuang Tzu. I'm going to hide it so it doesn't distract from the flow of my argument.

An example of joint-carving that Sider offers: Imagine two electrons, alike in every respect, plus a cow. We could find ways of grouping one of the electrons with the cow, forming the mereological item “electron-plus-cow,”and go on to say true things about it, and the remaining lone electron. Sider’s contention is that to do this is to carve reality very badly; it’s a “bizarre interpretation.” “The three objects should be divided into two groups, one containing the electrons, the other containing the cow. The electrons go together, and neither goes with the cow.” — J

The only reason electron-plus-cow seems like a bad way of carving reality is context--not any absolute ontological structure. I can think of not too goofy situations where two electrons and a cow belong together. An example--let's say I have one group containing two electrons and another containing sunlight, gravity, and gamma radiation. Which group does the cow belong in? To me, it's clear it belongs with the electrons--they're examples of matter while the other group includes only radiation. The so-called ontological structure in Sider's example is based on a narrow understanding of the context of human experience and thought. And that may be fine in a particular situation as long as it is recognized. It is not any kind of universal truth.

Sider is saying that the conceptual field has natural structural divisions, so when we try to match words with concepts we can be more or less perspicuous. A word like “exist” can be pulled toward one or more of these “reference magnets,” and made to refer to them. How does this happen? Through historical usage, primarily, which may evolve into ordinary language as well...

...The problem is, the “big” words are so encrusted with centuries of varying uses at the hands of varying philosophies, that they now get drawn to many different reference magnets. — J

I think you're exactly right. Usage of the big words leads to situations where Sider's scheme doesn't work because we don't seem to be able to agree on an appropriate ontological structure.

Sider (and I) would say that trying to argue for a single meaning for a word like “good” is a non-substantive debate. It really is a wrangle over terminology. But . . . the possible “magnets” are not themselves words, and the issue is not merely linguistic. It is as substantive as can be: ontology, what the world is like. Our problem is that we can’t settle on which of our big terms ought to be coupled with which magnet. — J

Again--exactly right. When every discussion ends up an argument about definitions, we never get anywhere with any substance.

That is, the ordinary, natural language question, phrased in terms of the ordinary, natural language expression E, would be non-substantive. But we could discard E and enter the metaphysics room, so to speak. We could replace the ordinary expression E with an improved expression E* that we stipulate is to stand for the joint-carving meaning in the vicinity. The question we ask in the metaphysics room, cast in terms of E* rather than E, is substantive. Indeed, it is superior to the original question, for it concerns reality’s fundamental structure, rather than its merely conventional or projected aspects. This is plan B. — Sider, 74.

How is this different from just agreeing on the definition of the word in question at the beginning of the discussion? There's already vastly to many "improved expressions E*" out there.

Now I want to depart from Sider on one point. (And I should emphasize that much of the above is my own interpretation of Sider.) I’m not convinced that “reality’s fundamental structure” is the best way to talk about what Sider wants to talk about. I don’t know how fundamental the various reference magnets may be, or whether it’s necessary to drag in “reality” (one of those very terms whose ambiguity causes so much trouble). This is a version of the same question raised about “natural” groupings. I certainly don’t know whether “naturalness” or “fundamentality” are properties we can treat the same way we treat things like “yellow” or “square”. I’d rather say that words map imperfectly onto concepts, and that the structure of concepts – their relations, groundings, logics – is something we can discern regardless of the words we use. Plan B is an attempt to help everyone concerned to find a way to stop disagreeing about words and get on with doing metaphysics. — J

I agree with this.

But we could enter the metaphysics room, and coin a new term, ‛cause*’, for the joint-carving relation in the vicinity of causation. ‛Cause*’ will stand for C – fundamental causation, we might call it – and our new debate about causation* will be substantive.
— Sider, 75-76.

In some ways, this approach is familiar, even truistic: Define your terms!...

Yes.

But there’s no need to enter your metaphysics room and come up with fancy terminology. Instead, I’ll keep working to convince you that my use of ‛exist’ has indeed trumped all the other reference magnets in the vicinity, just as ‛leopard’ did.” And so the terminological/historical bickering goes on . . . — J

Rather than trying to convince me, perhaps it makes more sense for you to say "You and I just see things too differently for this to be a fruitful discussion." Then you go find someone else to talk with. I end up doing that a lot. I just learned the meaning of the word "incommensurable" recently and I find myself using it often.

Another type of philosopher might respond, “I’m wary about this division between word and concept – between a term and its ‛reference magnet’. Are we really able to perceive structure (‛joint-carving’ or not) apart from the words we use to describe it? Does this depend on a special sort of intuition, and/or a multiplication of entities? Surely our challenge, if we’re going to do metaphysics at all, is to use the words we have in order to create the most plausible, parsimonious, and complete account we can. The words are the structure.” — J

I like this, even though I'm not sure I know what it means. I'll have to think about it more.

“using the words we have” does work well in some areas of philosophy, but we all appreciate the power of logical languages that can remove vagueness and allow us to clearly see what we’re talking about. — J

This is true. I believe we can express most of what we want to say without having to use highfalutin philosophical language. At the same time, I think some technical terms, for example "metaphysics," are important and refer to things that aren't easy to express in everyday language.

bizarre semantic values — Sider, 29.

If no definitive ontological structure exists, perhaps no bizarre semantic values do either. Or at least they're not likely to show up in a normal discussion.

I’m also interested in knowing whether the idea of reference magnetism sheds any light on what happens when “big” terms are employed in philosophy. — J

I think using the term might be trying too hard. Of course words take on multiple meanings, sometimes only differing in subtle ways. Of course this is confusing and distracts from substantive discussion. Of course it makes sense to recognize this and try to avoid it. Having discussions about the meaning or meanings of important terms can be useful and interesting, but there comes a time when you have to put your money down if you want to get anywhere. By which I mean--agree on the meaning of the concepts you're going to discuss.

Again--good OP.

The irony is that people like Philosophim don't come across to me as even necessarily right-wing on LGBTQ+ and yet people like @T Clark bash them anyways out of paranoia. — Bob Ross

Geez, now my feelings are hurt.

You know I can read this, right? — Questioner

I think he likes you better than he likes me.

What a disappointment that one of my favorite posters isn't any better than some fresh face single digit poster.
— Philosophim

If you mean me:

I have 168 posts (169 with this one) and my face is not as fresh as it used to be.

If you don't mean me, sorry for the misunderstanding.
— Questioner

No, not at all. I'm talking to T Clark. — Philosophim

I’m surprised you’re disappointed—we’ve been through all this before. I’m not disappointed, I’ve heard these arguments from you before.

Because you aren't even clearly reading my responses to you. See below. I am not trying to be purposefully rude - this is just extremely hard to be polite about. You are ignoring the key aspects of arguments against you (including sources), while presenting none of your own and riding coattails (in this specific thread, only). It doesn't really call for civility. It calls for ignoring you, for the most part. I'm trying to do neither. — AmadeusD

So, I’m at fault for not taking into account— searching for—arguments you made in a different thread. Is that right. And since I didn’t, I’m arguing in bad faith.

Anyway, we’re not getting anywhere. Let’s leave it there. Or at least until the next time.

You seem to have ignored (again, and along with with Questioner) have obviously, and unfortunately obviously on purpose, ignore the several sources (and quotes there from, along with explanations of how they link with the context we're talking in) I have provided. I sent you to them. You have not bothered to look. — AmadeusD

I went back and looked at all the posts you and Philosophim made in this thread. I have no idea what you’re talking about when you refer to quotes and sources and explanations.

So swallow the personal attack accusations and actually give a coherent argument that addresses the OP instead of basic trolling and passive aggressive sniping. — Philosophim

I went back and looked through all my comments on this thread. They were all civil. The only comment I found that was not philosophically appropriate was what I said about your obsession with transgender issues.

This is a controversial and provocative issue. If you’re going to mess around with it, you need to come up with better arguments. Something with substance. That’s what infuriates me about this, not your opinions, but the low quality of your arguments.