A Conversation for h2g2 Philosopher's Guild Members Page

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Post 641

Sneaky

'If God has no body but perceives then He can't exist'

What of the idea that the body of god is the physical reality we are trying to define? Wouldn't that make the answer to the question of what is real, god? Unfortunately (as I skewer my own arguement) that boils down to religious faith, and that's just not gonna cut it.

So, hmmm, what is real? My answer has already been that what is real is what is percieved to be so. What is real can also be defined as what is believed to be so, where belief is defined as faith in knowledge. I'm going to leave the definition of both 'knowledge' and 'is' alone for the time being.

So, where are the holes?

smiley - aliensmile


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Post 642

Recumbentman

There is a necessary tension between language and reality.


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Post 643

toxxin - ¡umop apisdn w,I 'aw dlaH

RMan. Brave try, but your definition makes mirages real. On the belief criterion, the visions and voices of the schizophrenic are real. OK, they're real subjective phenomena, but not real in the sense of intersubjectively observable (hey, is that a better definition?!).

toxx


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Post 644

toxxin - ¡umop apisdn w,I 'aw dlaH

Sorry RMan. That last message should have been addressed to Sneaky.

Sorry Sneaky. Hey, if you believe 'X exists' and I believe 'X does not exists', what does your definition tell us about whether X is real? You know the answer ............ nothing. The definition crashes and burns.

toxx


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Post 645

toxxin - ¡umop apisdn w,I 'aw dlaH

RMan. I like it without totally agreeing. Is it a quote? It seems to me to sum up the subject matter of at least one school of philosophy: the Wittgensteinian.

toxx


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Post 646

Recumbentman

On the nail. I wanted to quote W but couldn't find the source to check, so I just put it up anon. It is a big part of Wittgenstein's treatment of language and games.

Anyway mirages are real. Like A954759 rainbows smiley - rainbow


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Post 647

Male Researcher, Philosopher, Marxist-Leninist, Epistemologist, Sociologist, Idealist, Free Thinker 217777

what do i have to do to become a member?


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Post 648

Recumbentman

Haven't you been around before? I recognise your name . . . anyway, just post a pithy quote and you're in!


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Post 649

Noggin the Nog

Just join in the discussion, MR. Unfortunately the members' page can only be updated by its original author, who doesn't seem to be about at the moment, but that's just a formality smiley - ok.

I think consciousness and all its synonyms and near synonyms have to be taken as semantic primitives, because they couldn't possibly be explained to someone who had never experienced them. Time and space, too, I'd guess, for the same reason.

Noggin


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Post 650

toxxin - ¡umop apisdn w,I 'aw dlaH

Oh sure, Nogg. Consciousness is difficult to subdivide. It is totally separate from perception though. One example is 'blindsight' and the role of the superior colliculus.

toxx


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Post 651

toxxin - ¡umop apisdn w,I 'aw dlaH

RMan. That word 'real' is being forced to do a lot of work there. Mirages are real optical phenomena, which is not to say that the apparent oasis is where it appears to be. Going down that route will lead to taking psychotic delusions to be 'real'. We see stars that haven't really been there for many years. You wouldn't care to do a guide on reality would you? I'll provide some peer review. smiley - winkeye

toxx


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Post 652

Sneaky

Toxxin, isn't perception directly linked to belief? At least in the sense that a person would have to believe what they percieve in order to classify it as real? Also, mirages are real, they consist of light particles rather than more solid matter, just like Recumbentman's rainbow example. So, if I believe that X is real, due to my perceptions telling me that it is, then it is real for me whether or not you agree with me. Your perceptions could (potentially) be skewed for any number of reasons, so I must always rely upon my own perceptions to define, for me, what is real and what is not.

smiley - aliensmile


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Post 653

Sneaky

I think I was a bit vague on the mirage issue. I was trying to agree with Toxxin's and Recumbentman's definitions, as they seem to say the same thing. I was using it as a lead in to my perceptual difference idea of a singular reality. Sorry 'bout that.

smiley - aliensmile


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Post 654

toxxin - ¡umop apisdn w,I 'aw dlaH

Sneaky. I have objected elsewhere to expressions like real or true *for me*. That is only a comment about your own thinking rather than what is actually the case in the world.

So let's get back to perception and belief. You can believe something without ever having perceived it. 'The moon is made of green cheese', 'The Earth is flat and supported by elephants standing on the back of a tortoise - the great A'Tuin.' For example.

You can also perceive something without believing it. People with certain types of brain damage think they are blind. If, however, they are asked to 'guess' and point at where a spot might be projected on a screen, they are correct more than 90% of the time. Clearly this is perception without belief. Google 'blindsight' for tons of links.

toxx


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Post 655

Male Researcher, Philosopher, Marxist-Leninist, Epistemologist, Sociologist, Idealist, Free Thinker 217777

So, if noggin perceives a rainbow, to him it exists, and if say toxxin's eye are attuned to a different set of light wavelengths, then to him it would not exist, so "reality" is relative to the perceiver.

But could there be a definitive reality, in which that which is there, is there, and that which is not, is not?


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Post 656

Noggin the Nog

Well, interestingly enough, this is probably the case, as I'm partially colour blind (not enough in this case, but the possibility is there). So the lightwaves and the perceived rainbow are different facets of reality.

Does blindsight count as perception? Does my computer "perceive" which keys I'm pressing?

Noggin


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Post 657

toxxin - ¡umop apisdn w,I 'aw dlaH

Noggin. So define perception without including blindsight. Convince me that animals which have a superior colliculus but not a visual cortex don't perceive anything visually. Oddly, I can't think of any other sensory modality in which this kind of thing occurs! Possibly we are aware of more our surroundings by a sort of 'echo location' than we are consciously notice. By definition, these things won't be apparent to us. Nevertheless, I would want to put them in the perception category unless you can make a persuasive case to the contrary.

Cheers, toxx


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Post 658

Noggin the Nog

Definition is easy, toxx. I would simply have to insist it be accompanied by conscious awareness of the thing perceived. If I only insist on appropriate response to a stimulus lots of things we *don't* count as perceptions would have to be included.

But I agree this won't do; by the first criterion I don't know that anyone else perceives anything. But is there a clear cut boundary between perception and non perception?

Noggin


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Post 659

Male Researcher, Philosopher, Marxist-Leninist, Epistemologist, Sociologist, Idealist, Free Thinker 217777

perseption is our bodys reaction to different "stimulus", and this can be virtualy anything, so therefor the boundry is limitless.


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Post 660

toxxin - ¡umop apisdn w,I 'aw dlaH

Nogg. I don't think you can build 'conscious' into the definition of 'perception'. You deprive most of the planet's animal life of perception.

A definition doesn't fall just because you don't know to what it applies. 'Spherical' is easily defined, but does not automatically let you know whether it applies to the Sun and all stars!

No, the boundary doesn't appear to be clear. What do we want to say about what appears to be 100% accurate intuition? How about Leibniz's monads being gifted with perception, or even Moth's particles of consciousness? Mere reaction won't do. That would cover many physical forces such as magnetism and gravitation.

I wonder whether the sheer difficulty of defining it points us towards some very important point that might be revealed along with the 'correct' definition.

toxx


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