The Order Of Nature Refutes Realism

@Pythagorean,

kennethamy;147668 wrote:

Do you mean by "scientific realism" just plain old realism? If not, could you say what you mean? In contemporary philosophy, "scientific realism" means that what is real is what science says is real. And that might conflict with commonsense realism, of course.

As jeeprs pointed out, there are two definitions of realism that are directly conflicting. A super simple way to put it is: one kind of realism says the contents of the inner world are more real, and the outer world contains shadows of these things. The other, 20th century realism, says the opposite.

Then there's philosophers like Heidegger, who say the truth is neither and both. I posted a little run-down of his thoughts about that in the 20th century philosophers section.

I still have a lot to learn about positivism and modern realism. At this point, I'm operating on my respect for a former Princeton philosphy professor, Walter Kaufman, who said they represent our "intellectual conscience." Which means that when we start getting nutty, they're prepared to reign us in with expertise in the simple but rigorous art of noticing what we actually know.

@Pythagorean,

I can't help but add a footnote to Arjuna's comment.

It is important to reflect on the dualism of 'inner' and 'outer', 'self' and 'other', within which so much of the tradition of philosophical discourse is situated. I am not sure that Philosophy as a discipline has ever been self-consciously aware of this dualism. Certainly Heidegger, from what I know, did set out to overcome the dichotomy of 'inner' and 'outer', 'ideal' versus 'material'. He correctly identified a type of understanding which was much more grounded in the nature of actual experience, our 'being-in-the-world', as distinct from absorption in either the thinking self, or the world of 'brute fact'. In this, his approach was very much like that of Zen, which he acknowledged.

@Pythagorean,

Pythagorean;147928 wrote:

Because it is the singular substance out of which the final products are formed.

And I did not insist that it is more real, I more or less urbanely laid it out there as an open question. I learned of the kinship of philosophy and urbanity from reading Plato's dialogues in my early years.

--

Gold is a singular substance out of which rings are formed. Does that make gold more real than the rings formed from it?

@kennethamy,

kennethamy;148059 wrote:

Gold is a singular substance out of which rings are formed. Does that make gold more real than the rings formed from it?

Not more "real" just more "fundamental"?
Is not ontology the pursuit of the most fundamental or ultimate nature of reality or being? We can have gold without rings but can we have gold rings without gold?
Is not materialism the assertion that matter is more fundamental than mind?

@Pythagorean,

I'm a bit confused here, perhaps someone can help clarify.

I tend to be more of a philosophic realist, in that I believe that 'reality' exists independent of our perceptions of it. What we see, feel, touch, taste and feel may correspond precisely to that external, hard-cast reality or (more likely), we are simply receiving input from it that may or may not correspond directly. In either case, what we sense is just that: not necessary the entire "story" or perfectly-accurate correlate.

Yet I also believe, quite firmly, that we live in constant connection with the natural world; in a relationship that pits us directly as "one of the family". Our only difference being that our level of intelligence allows us to comprehend more, and in different ways, than most other living things. Subject and object are related, without any doubt; and whether or not we call subject Me (as I look at my cat) or my Cat (as he looks at me), "subject-object" relationship nomenclature exists only as a matter of who's doing the 'looking', so to speak.

So I suppose my question is this: While I'd agree, for the most part, with the order of nature statements in the OP, I also fit the definition of a philosophical realist. I've done some research on others' definitions of this Realism and still don't see the conflict.

Can someone assist?

Thanks

@Pythagorean,

Pythagorean;146657 wrote:

The moon didn't spring forth at once out of the infinities of time and space; and the very potential for the creation of human minds did not likewise spring out of an infinity of chaos. The natural potential for the creation of human minds is not purely accidental but must be related to the same natural processes as those that formed the moon. How could you distinguish between the two?

By "the two" - you mean the human mind and the moon, correct?

If it was a singular (same) natural process that formed the moon and the human mind there is no two to distinguish between.

Am I missing something here?

Lost1

---------- Post added 04-04-2010 at 09:34 AM ----------

Khethil;148175 wrote:

I tend to be more of a philosophic realist, in that I believe that 'reality' exists independent of our perceptions of it. What we see, feel, touch, taste and feel may correspond precisely to that external, hard-cast reality or (more likely), we are simply receiving input from it that may or may not correspond directly. In either case, what we sense is just that: not necessary the entire "story" or perfectly-accurate correlate.

Yet I also believe, quite firmly, that we live in constant connection with the natural world; in a relationship that pits us directly as "one of the family". Our only difference being that our level of intelligence allows us to comprehend more, and in different ways, than most other living things. Subject and object are related, without any doubt; and whether or not we call subject Me (as I look at my cat) or my Cat (as he looks at me), "subject-object" relationship nomenclature exists only as a matter of who's doing the 'looking', so to speak.

I totally agree with the above Smile

@Lost1 phil,

Lost1;148203 wrote:

By "the two" - you mean the human mind and the moon, correct?

If it was a singular (same) natural process that formed the moon and the human mind there is no two to distinguish between.

Am I missing something here?

Lost1

---------- Post added 04-04-2010 at 09:34 AM ----------

Even if the same process formed X and Y, then why are not X and Y different? The same natural process formed trees and flowers, but trees and flowers are different from each other. If a tree and a flower were in the same room, and you were asked, how many things are in the room, wouldn't your answer be, "two"?

@kennethamy,

kennethamy;148215 wrote:

Even if the same process formed X and Y, then why are not X and Y different? The same natural process formed trees and flowers, but trees and flowers are different from each other. If a tree and a flower were in the same room, and you were asked, how many things are in the room, wouldn't your answer be, "two"?

But is it as easy to separate Mind from reality as it is to separate trees and flowers? Shouldnt the answer be three the mind, the flower, and the tree?

@prothero,

prothero;148219 wrote:

But is it as easy to separate Mind from reality as it is to separate trees and flowers? Shouldnt the answer be three the mind, the flower, and the tree?

Its not being easy does not mean that is isn't true. In any case, we know that trees and flowers existed before mind existed. Just as we know that the Moon existed before mind existed.

@kennethamy,

kennethamy;148226 wrote:

Its not being easy does not mean that is isn't true. In any case, we know that trees and flowers existed before mind existed. Just as we know that the Moon existed before mind existed.

You know how the response will go.
Trees and flowers are concepts we impose on reality. We break reality up into objects with our minds. Reality itself is an integrated, interrelated, whole in which trees and flowers do not exist independent of their relationships to other objects, to each othe and to the rest of reality. There is something there we sense percept and label a tree or a flower but that notion of "tree" independent and separate from "flower" is not real. Objects exist in isolation and in neat little independent packages only in human minds?
There is a reality independent of human minds, yes but
our reality (as we perceive it) is mind dependent and operates according to imposed mental categories and sense perceptions.

Of course I still dont think the order of nature has anything to do with realism.

@kennethamy,

kennethamy;148215 wrote:

Even if the same process formed X and Y, then why are not X and Y different? The same natural process formed trees and flowers, but trees and flowers are different from each other. If a tree and a flower were in the same room, and you were asked, how many things are in the room, wouldn't your answer be, "two"?

Let's say that X is the singular substance 'gold,' and Y is the object or the gold 'ring'.

You are asking: why isn't Y, the gold ring, a real object in its own right?

The problem for me is the independence of Y. Modern realism grants independence to macroscopic objects in the world. It would call it an object that posesses absolute or full reality.

The reason that the individual gold ring is dependent for me, is because in order for us to posess sufficient knowledge of it for it to exist as an object for us, we need to know the process whereby it came to exist as an 'independent object'.

For, how could we know the actual nature of the ring without knowing the processes that formed its existence?

Our knowledge of the ring as an independent object is itself dependent upon the processes and materials that constitute(d) it as an object. As long as the ring is an object of real knowledge (as long as it persists in ring form) it is dependent upon the original manufacturing process that took gold and produced a gold ring.

So, it seems to me, to say that the gold ring exists as real, requires that we can have no knowledge of it.

-

@prothero,

prothero;148232 wrote:

You know how the response will go.
Trees and flowers are concepts we impose on reality. We break reality up into objects with our minds. Reality itself is an integrated, interrelated, whole in which trees and flowers do not exist independent of their relationships to other objects, to each othe and to the rest of reality. There is something there we sense percept and label a tree or a flower but that notion of "tree" independent and separate from "flower" is not real. Objects exist in isolation and in neat little independent packages only in human minds?
There is a reality independent of human minds, yes but
our reality (as we perceive it) is mind dependent and operates according to imposed mental categories and sense perceptions.

Of course I still dont think the order of nature has anything to do with realism.

Trees and flowers are not concepts at all. The concepts of trees and flowers are concepts. Trees and flowers are trees and flowers. The concepts of trees and flowers did not exist before human beings, but how does that mean that trees and flowers did not exist before human beings? It doesn't. So the response is wrong since it confuses the concepts of trees and flowers which did not exist before human beings, with trees and flowers which did exist before human beings.

@Khethil,

Khethil;148175 wrote:

I'm a bit confused here, perhaps someone can help clarify.

I tend to be more of a philosophic realist, in that I believe that 'reality' exists independent of our perceptions of it. What we see, feel, touch, taste and feel may correspond precisely to that external, hard-cast reality or (more likely), we are simply receiving input from it that may or may not correspond directly. In either case, what we sense is just that: not necessary the entire "story" or perfectly-accurate correlate.

Yet I also believe, quite firmly, that we live in constant connection with the natural world; in a relationship that pits us directly as "one of the family". Our only difference being that our level of intelligence allows us to comprehend more, and in different ways, than most other living things. Subject and object are related, without any doubt; and whether or not we call subject Me (as I look at my cat) or my Cat (as he looks at me), "subject-object" relationship nomenclature exists only as a matter of who's doing the 'looking', so to speak.

So I suppose my question is this: While I'd agree, for the most part, with the order of nature statements in the OP, I also fit the definition of a philosophical realist. I've done some research on others' definitions of this Realism and still don't see the conflict.

Can someone assist?

Thanks

The question for me is an epistemological one. The objects are real in the sense that we can identify them empirically. However, in order to know their properties, we must also know that their properties, i.e. the properties of matter, are interdependent and fall under the physical laws of science which understands that all matter is related.

In order to know what an object actually is we need to know of its causes in time and space. How it came to be. So in order to know an object we need to know what it was before it became such an object. We need to know it prior to its being what it now is: that is what constitutes knowledge. The principles of the coming to be of objects are what is real because they are what constitutes actual knowledge, in my opinion.

Real knowledge can not be of particular properties, because particular properties are contradictions. There are no particular properties and this is what makes the science of physics possible.

If we were to treat space, time and causation as being real (which they are), and if we were to know of every single property that went into the creation of an object, including its position(s) in space and time which leave their traces on the object, then we should be left with a solid chain of events out of which (every) object emerges into the empirical present. Objects are physically connected to their causes and to say that objects exists in an independent fashion is to deny those processes which created the object.

-

@Pythagorean,

Pythagorean;148317 wrote:

The question for me is an epistemological one. The objects are real in the sense that we can identify them empirically.

-

Even if the only way we can identify objects is empirically, that does not mean that what it means for them to be real is that they can be identified empirically. For something to be real, it must be independent of mind. It must be able to exist even if consciousness does not exist. But since we cannot identify them (according to you) unless we do so empirically, and since in order to do that a mind is necessary, the identification of them empirically is not a condition of their being real.

In any case, numbers, for instance, can be identified, but how could they be identified empirically? We cannot observe numbers. But aren't numbers real?

The question of whether something is real might be an epistemological question, but the question of what it is for something to be real is, of course, a metaphysical question.

@kennethamy,

kennethamy;148324 wrote:

For something to be real, it must be independent of mind.

This is often stated by you as an axiom or law. I would be interested to know where in the history of philosophy this 'law' was discovered.

@kennethamy,

kennethamy;148215 wrote:

Even if the same process formed X and Y, then why are not X and Y different? The same natural process formed trees and flowers, but trees and flowers are different from each other. If a tree and a flower were in the same room, and you were asked, how many things are in the room, wouldn't your answer be, "two"?

Be it primordial soup or big bang theory - I think it is agreed that all the elements (or whatever else was needed to start our world), were present - likely it their very simpliest form - the thing that makes differences seems to be where and when one was introduced to another. From that beginning all that is came to be, right?

So...the process is singular - the end result has endless possiblities.

If I walked into a room which contained a tree and a flower - and were asked how many items were in the room I would indeed state two.

If I walked into the same room and someone asked how many processes did it take to make the tree and/or the flower - I would state, bottomline it was one process. Endless changes in the process perhaps but one process.

Lost 1

@jeeprs,

jeeprs;148336 wrote:

This is often stated by you as an axiom or law. I would be interested to know where in the history of philosophy this 'law' was discovered.

It's neither an axiom nor a law. Nor have I ever called it either. It is what philosophers have meant by saying that something is real. You may, of course, prefer a different definition. But that remains what philosophers have meant. For instance, when Hume used the term, "real existence" he meant independent of mind. And, I think it conforms with ordinary language too. For instance, if people ask whether ghosts are real, it seems to me that they are asking whether ghosts are only imaginary, or whether they exist independently of what humans imagine.

@kennethamy,

kennethamy;148347 wrote:

It's neither an axiom nor a law. Nor have I ever called it either. It is what philosophers have meant by saying that something is real.

Which philosophers in particular though? With any aphorisms or quotes to illustrate?

---------- Post added 04-05-2010 at 09:17 AM ----------

this is not an idle question. I think you are over-valuing objectivity. I think if you look into it, you won't find any such attitude among philosophers, much before the modern period.

@jeeprs,

jeeprs;148350 wrote:

Which philosophers in particular though? With any aphorisms or quotes to illustrate?

Well, I did mention Hume. And C.S. Peirce often uses the example of a pearl at the very bottom of the sea which is thought about by no one, as his example of "the real". But, I don't see the fuss. What do you think is supposed to be refuted by "the order of nature" if not mind-independence?

Oh yes, I have mentioned several times that Peter Viereck (the poet) said that what is real is what remains after we have ceased to believe in it, which appears to convey the same point.

But what do you think someone means by asking whether ghosts are real if not whether ghosts exist even if we cease to believe they do?

@kennethamy,

kennethamy;148324 wrote:

Even if the only way we can identify objects is empirically, that does not mean that what it means for them to be real is that they can be identified empirically. For something to be real, it must be independent of mind. It must be able to exist even if consciousness does not exist. But since we cannot identify them (according to you) unless we do so empirically, and since in order to do that a mind is necessary, the identification of them empirically is not a condition of their being real.

How then would objects exist as objects in time?

The passage of time is always only relevant to humans who have developed our sense of time through living on the natural land of earth.

From the perspective of material objects (assuming they are independent of human minds), at what point does time stop - and the material object's 'real' independence begin - and at what point would time restart in order for the object to be said to be real? In other words, considering the dramatic effects of the passages of long durations of time upon macroscopic material objects, how does an object know at what time it becomes a real object?

Objects, as we know them through our knowledge of science, are always changing in time. Even if you are to say that for each of the shortest known moments in time corresponds the totality of existing objects, then you have still arbitrarily divided time and granted reality to what exists in a scientific fashion once again. The problem with that is that there is no physics which corresponds to each and every object as object. Physics rather, unifies matter under forces and laws and not under the aspect of independent objects.

-

Philosophy Forum

The Order Of Nature Refutes Realism

Quick Links

My Account

able2know