But optical illusions demonstrate that our perception of reality can be flawed; they say nothing about what is. And you even note, in your example, that what really is the case is that A and B are the same color. If it were all in my head, why would you bother distinguishing what really is, from what I perceived?

Even if the light is bad, and we cannot detect the color of that apple, why isn't the apple red anyway?

The surface of the apple hasn't changed but the color of the apple isn't a property of the surface of the apple. It's a property of your experience of seeing the apple. That depends on context, such as light. If the light changes, the color of the apple changes. In green light, the apple appears black instead of red. The apple has changed color.

If your response is to say "well it only appears black but it's really still red" then you mean something bizarre by color because I mean "the color something appears".

The term, "naive realism" is used often on this forum, usually in a disparaging way. And, I suppose that although "innocent realism" would be all right (if there were such a thing) no one wants to be naive. Realism is, of course, the view that there are external objects independent of us. But what is naive realism, and why is it naive? What would sophisticated realism be?

Personally, i would call myself a sophisticated direct realist, and this view is actually supported by the science of perception. Both Representative realism and Idealism are not only logically flawed, but also present some undesirable concequences.

Naive realism is metaphysical sloth. A philosopher is a half-philosopher until he can account for his method, which is logos.....

Hmmm. My method for seeing things is looking at them. (No Nous is good news).

For example, sometimes, when I buy some article of clothing, I ask to take it to see it in daylight because the color it appears to have under the fluorescent lights of the store distort the articles real color. The real color of the apple which I see in the supermarket certainly isn't the color it had when I take it home under my dingy lights.

You must be naive.

So, the "real" colors are the ones in the daylight and the supermarket store and the "fake" colors are the ones in fluorescent light and under your dingy house lights?

Yes, and the nous within you is what makes them things, and not chaos....

You've got to go transcendental Ken, or it's all just pragmatism....

Shouldn't it be, "what makes those things", not "them things"?

"The sleep of reason brings forth monsters" Goya

No, my wording was write.(:sarcastic:) Things are only unities because of pure negativity, or nous. Our mind chops up the qualia whether we will or no. We can only think digitally. This is the clue that leads us to the realization.....

---------- Post added 03-02-2010 at 03:48 PM ----------


Very true! Except it's you who are asleep to Reason.. I just woke up.

Do yourself a favor. Go back to bed. You clearly need a lot more sleep. You are in a frenzy.

R. seems to think that it is a good idea to derail virtually all threads on this board with his nonsensical crap. It is depressive that he has not been banned as of yet. Apparently, the admins of this board think that he is really doing philosophy.

Surely a person should not be banned from a forum merely for being hard to understand?

Anyway, we don't think that the color something appears to have always is the color it is. For example, sometimes, when I buy some article of clothing, I ask to take it to see it in daylight because the color it appears to have under the fluorescent lights of the store distort the articles real color. The real color of the apple which I see in the supermarket certainly isn't the color it had when I take it home under my dingy lights. And, if Jane dyes her mousy hair blond, do you think that the color her hair appears is the real color of her hair? You must be naive.

Surely a person should not be banned from a forum merely for being hard to understand?

The point Locke was making by distinguishing primary from secondary qualities was: where is the division in the mind between thought and perception?

The type of objects that the scientists deal with must be distinguished from the experiences of the naive, unscientific man who will ultimately fuse his subjective ideas of reality with what emerges from a purely scientific descritption.

In the pre-scientific outlook the subjective qualities that objects have the power to produce have always led to an unscientific, and hence, unrealistic account of reality. Naive realism is presicely the pre-scientific account of objects.


If we say that an orange tastes sweet we do not believe that 'sweetness' exists in the orange. If we say that fire burns us, we do not believe that 'pain' exists in the fire.

When we say that the orange is sweet, what do we believe?