A Non-Metaphysical Theory

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jeeprs
 
Reply Mon 12 Apr, 2010 02:07 am
@Extrain,
Extrain;150717 wrote:
What is "Western Idealism" in philosophy?


I meant, the idealist philosophy arising from the Ancient Greek tradition, by way of contrast with idealist tendencies in Indian philosophy.

Extrain;150717 wrote:
What is wrong with Greek philosophy having "speculative tendencies"?


Nothing, provided it doesn't become the basis for interminable disputes which really have no bearing on anything that happens in real life.


Extrain;150717 wrote:
What is "mathematical realism" if numbers don't exist?


I think numbers are real in that a numerical value is the same for any person, and also the same in any language. One can create any symbol for "7" but it always refers to the same quantity. I find that interesting. The distinction I am interested in is exactly that numbers don't exist in the sense that objects do. The number 7 never came into existence and does not go out of it, whereas ordinary objects by their nature are transient. I am interested in this.

---------- Post added 04-12-2010 at 06:08 PM ----------

Extrain;150745 wrote:
It's still metaphysical, regardless. It is also contradictory. No theory can sustain a contradiction. So it's doomed from the start.


What contradiction do you see?

---------- Post added 04-12-2010 at 06:26 PM ----------

although LK was right in saying that I named it non-metaphysical because of the rejection of the substance-idea.

What interests me is the platonic 'ideas' but without the idea of 'substance'. If there is no incorporeal substance, or no spiritual 'things', then how is it that spiritual realities exist? It seems to me that thought must always posit a substance or a thing of some kind. But it seems possible to me that the substance we are considering in this case could be better expressed as 'the substance of thought'. And the substance of thought is actually meaning itself. Meaning->gist->geist.
 
Extrain
 
Reply Mon 12 Apr, 2010 03:18 am
@jeeprs,
jeeprs;150756 wrote:
I meant, the idealist philosophy arising from the Ancient Greek tradition, by way of contrast with idealist tendencies in Indian philosophy.


Again, to what Idealist philosophy of the "Ancient greeks" are you referring?

jeeprs;150756 wrote:
Nothing, provided it doesn't become the basis for interminable disputes which really have no bearing on anything that happens in real life.


Philosophy has always been concerned with real life.

jeeprs;150756 wrote:
I think numbers are real in that a numerical value is the same for any person, and also the same in any language. One can create any symbol for "7" but it always refers to the same quantity. I find that interesting. The distinction I am interested in is exactly that numbers don't exist in the sense that objects do. The number 7 never came into existence and does not go out of it, whereas ordinary objects by their nature are transient. I am interested in this.


But you don't think numbers exist. So why are you talking about non-existent things?

jeeprs;150756 wrote:
What contradiction do you see?


"Now I don't regard numbers as existing things. They are real, but they don't exist."

Something can't be real and not exist.

jeeprs;150756 wrote:
'the lawfulness of the universe' cannot be objectified. It is not anything in particular - it is simply the way that everything is related or comes to exist. In other words, in itself it does not exist. It is not any particular thing. Nevertheless, without it, nothing would exist. Furthermore, it underlies not only all material particulars, but also the way that the mind itself works.


That's another contradiction. If "universal regularity and necessity" does not exist, then nothing else can be "dependent" on it. How can something be dependent on something that doesn't exist??

jeeprs;150756 wrote:
although LK was right in saying that I named it non-metaphysical because of the rejection of the substance-idea.


It's still a metaphysical theory, regardless. Metaphysics makes substantive claims about the world. You are making claims about the world. It doesn't matter what you think exists or not. That's still metaphysics so long as you are committed/not-committed to cetain types of entities existing/not existing...

jeeprs;150756 wrote:
What interests me is the platonic 'ideas' but without the idea of 'substance'.


That's metaphysics.

jeeprs;150756 wrote:
although LK was right in saying that I named it non-metaphysical because of the rejection of the substance-idea.


What is a "substance-idea"?

jeeprs;150756 wrote:
If there is no incorporeal substance, or no spiritual 'things', then how is it that spiritual realities exist?


I don't know. you tell me. It's not my "theory."

jeeprs;150756 wrote:
It seems to me that thought must always posit a substance or a thing of some kind. But it seems possible to me that the substance we are considering in this case could be better expressed as 'the substance of thought'. And the substance of thought is actually meaning itself. Meaning->gist->geist.


I'm not sure I know "meaning is the substance of thought" is supposed to mean if the thought (meaning) is what posits the substance.
 
jeeprs
 
Reply Mon 12 Apr, 2010 03:39 am
@jeeprs,
"Reality, to put it in the simplest form, is here defined as that which is not fake. Existence is that with which an encounter is comprehensible. Reality contains everything that exists, but existence is only a subset of what is real. Nothing unreal exists, but some things which are real do not exist. Existence is of objects, while reality also covers ideas beyond objects. A number is only real, while a baseball exists. The gross national product is only real, while Antarctica exists. The probability of the sun not rising tomorrow is real, while the sun itself exists." (Source shall be provided.)

---------- Post added 04-12-2010 at 07:45 PM ----------

"Substance of thought" is a figure of speech which refers to the import or meaning of something thought or said. I might tell a story or a parable, and if you want to get to the meaning of it, without going through all the details, you would say "what was the substance of the story". It occurred to me while writing that point that this might be one meaning of 'substance'.

For the record, the official brief definition is "Substance, the first of Aristotle's categories, signifies being as existing in and by itself, and serving as a subject or basis for accidents and accidental changes."

Hence the idea of a 'spiritual substance' as in Descartes res cogitans. But I have always found the idea of 'spiritual substance' completely self-contradictory even though it is used widely in pre-modern and scholastic philosophy. I have asked previously if the idea of 'substance' appears in Plato or the pre-socratics. I think it only commences with Aristotle. That is something I am investigating.
 
Extrain
 
Reply Mon 12 Apr, 2010 03:50 am
@jeeprs,
jeeprs;150769 wrote:
"Reality, to put it in the simplest form, is here defined as that which is not fake. Existence is that with which an encounter is comprehensible. Reality contains everything that exists, but existence is only a subset of what is real. Nothing unreal exists, but some things which are real do not exist. Existence is of objects, while reality also covers ideas beyond objects. A number is only real, while a baseball exists. The gross national product is only real, while Antarctica exists. The probability of the sun not rising tomorrow is real, while the sun itself exists." (Source shall be provided.)


(1) Reality contains everything that exists.
(2) Existence is a subset of what is real.
(3) Some real things do not exist.

(3) contradicts (1).

If some real things do not exist, then those things are not part of a set. Sets can't be sets of non-existent things. For a set to be a set of x, y, and z, that set must have x, y, and z as members, otherwise it is not a set of x, y, and z. This contradicts set theory.

Again, how can something be real and not exist?

And why are you talking about numbers if they don't exist?

---------- Post added 04-12-2010 at 03:53 AM ----------

Quote:
categories, signifies being as existing in and by itself, and serving as a subject or basis for accidents and accidental changes."

Hence the idea of a 'spiritual substance' as in Descartes res cogitans. But I have always found the idea of 'spiritual substance' completely self-contradictory even though it is used widely in pre-modern and scholastic philosophy. I have asked previously if the idea of 'substance' appears in Plato or the pre-socratics. I think it only commences with Aristotle. That is something I am investigating.


"Substance" is the most widely disputed term throughout philosophical history. It means something different for just about every philosopher who makes use of it...fyi.

How is res cogitans self contradictory?
 
jeeprs
 
Reply Mon 12 Apr, 2010 04:29 am
@Extrain,
Extrain;150772 wrote:
If some real things do not exist, then those things are not part of a set.


But we are considering possible differences between 'to be real' and 'to exist'. If there are 'transcendent realities' these might be beyond existence.

Isn't one of the meanings of 'transcendent' 'that which is beyond experience' or 'existence'.

A quote from a passage about 'Systematic Theology'.

'Paul Tillich sees God as Being-Itself, or the "Ground of all Being." For this reason there cannot be "a" God. There cannot even be a "highest God," for even that concept is limiting. We cannot make an object out of God. And the moment we say he is the highest God or anything else, we have made him an object. Thus, beyond the God of the Christian or the God of the Jews, there is the "God beyond God." This God cannot be said to exist or not to exist in the sense that we "exist". Either statement is limiting. We cannot make a thing out of God, no matter how holy this thing may be, because there still remains something behind the holy thing which is its ground or basis, the "ground of being", that by virtue of which things exist, but not an existing thing.'

Now in this sense, God is a reality beyond existence. He is not non-existent in the sense of a phantasm or a fiction or the square root of two. These are things that fall short of existence. God (or the transcendent ground of being) is beyond existence, that by virtue of which anything at all exists. This is what 'transcendent' means, in connection to the nature of Deity. Most atheists and materialists seem to think that God is just another kind of existing thing, albeit a pretty mysterious one. They don't seem to realise just what is involved in a radically different kind of being.

Dawkins says in an interview with McGrath that he could actually envisage God as a kind of super-intelligent alien race that manufactures the Universe. He doesn't think it is likely, but he thinks it is much more likely than the idea of God. But this is because his idea of God is actually the wrong idea.

Extrain;150772 wrote:
"Substance" is the most widely disputed term throughout philosophical history. It means something different for just about every philosopher who makes use of it...fyi.


I am finding that out. I still think metaphysics went seriously wrong with the idea of 'substance'.

Extrain;150772 wrote:
How is res cogitans self contradictory?
Because there is no res, no thing that thinks. There is not actually a 'thinking thing'. It might sound like a small point, but it has given rise to diabolical problems, because, again, it conveys the idea that there is something in the brain that thinks. Ghost in the machine. This is pretty well what Ryle demolished, isn't it? But is the conclusion, then, that being is just the activities of neural networks? That humans are just another thing, but thinking is one of their attributes? Even this doesn't account for the unitary nature of experience, the Hard Problem, and much else besides. There is something radically wrong with all accounts of the nature of being, in terms of neural activities or other reductionist explanations, and a lot of it arises from the attempt to 'explain consciousness' when it always must be consciousness doing the explaining. So I think all such attempts must always assume what they are setting out to demonstrate.

---------- Post added 04-12-2010 at 08:39 PM ----------

I guess it is a fair question how I leapt from 'numbers' to 'deity'. The reason I started thinking about the way that numbers, logical relations, and the like, are different to existing things, is because it is a possible avenue to understanding how to conceive of transcendent realities. All of our language is mired in dualism in this matter. I know that I have probably made a hash of this post. Oh well. Admission is free.
 
Extrain
 
Reply Mon 12 Apr, 2010 05:22 am
@jeeprs,
jeeprs;150776 wrote:
But we are considering possible differences between 'to be real' and 'to exist'. If there are 'transcendent realities' these might be beyond existence.


I don't understand how something non-existent could be beyond existence. It wouldn't exist. Nothing is beyond existence. It simply would not exist. Everything that exists, exists. You are talking nonsense.

jeeprs;150776 wrote:
Isn't one of the meanings of 'transcendent' 'that which is beyond experience' or 'existence'.


No. "Beyond experience" doesn't mean "beyond existence." That's Idealism if you think otherwise. I don't have to experience something for that thing to exist. That's presumptuous. you must think you're god or something...

Quote:
A quote from a passage about 'Systematic Theology'.

'Paul Tillich sees God as Being-Itself, or the "Ground of all Being." For this reason there cannot be "a" God. There cannot even be a "highest God," for even that concept is limiting. We cannot make an object out of God. And the moment we say he is the highest God or anything else, we have made him an object. Thus, beyond the God of the Christian or the God of the Jews, there is the "God beyond God." This God cannot be said to exist or not to exist in the sense that we "exist". Either statement is limiting. We cannot make a thing out of God, no matter how holy this thing may be, because there still remains something behind the holy thing which is its ground or basis, the "ground of being", that by virtue of which things exist, but not an existing thing.'


If God doesn't exist, then Tillich is an atheist.

jeeprs;150776 wrote:
Now in this sense, God is a reality beyond existence. He is not non-existent in the sense of a phantasm or a fiction or the square root of two. These are things that fall short of existence. God (or the transcendent ground of being) is beyond existence, that by virtue of which anything at all exists. This is what 'transcendent' means, in connection to the nature of Deity. Most atheists and materialists seem to think that God is just another kind of existing thing, albeit a pretty mysterious one. They don't seem to realise just what is involved in a radically different kind of being.


Nonsense. Nothing is beyond existence. It either exists, or doesn't exist. There is no such thing as something falling short of existence. If it fell short of existence, it wouldn't exist. Period. No one can makes sense of this. Gibberish is, as gibberish does.

jeeprs;150776 wrote:
I am finding that out. I still think metaphysics went seriously wrong with the idea of 'substance'.


So far, that's an unwarranted assumption.

jeeprs;150776 wrote:
Because there is no res, no thing that thinks. There is not actually a 'thinking thing'.


You're just begging the question. So where is the contradiction? You said there was a contradiction.

lol....Of course I exist. I am a thinking thing. Who do you think you are you talking to? You're a thinking thing too.

jeeprs;150776 wrote:
It might sound like a small point, but it has given rise to diabolical problems, because, again, it conveys the idea that there is something in the brain that thinks. Ghost in the machine.


What's so problematic about a thinking thing that thinks? I don't see any problems.

jeeprs;150776 wrote:
This is pretty well what Ryle demolished, isn't it?


So you don't think you exist. I must be just talking to myself then. Alright, fine. But at least I know that I exist. There is nothing more indubitably certain than that.

jeeprs;150776 wrote:
But is the conclusion, then, that being is just the activities of neural networks? That humans are just another thing, but thinking is one of their attributes? Even this doesn't account for the unitary nature of experience, the Hard Problem, and much else besides. There is something radically wrong with all accounts of the nature of being, in terms of neural activities or other reductionist explanations, and a lot of it arises from the attempt to 'explain consciousness' when it always must be consciousness doing the explaining. So I think all such attempts must always assume what they are setting out to demonstrate.


Reductionism is only a problem for the materialist reductionists. It wasn't a problem for Descartes, nor for me.

I think, so I exist. Period. You can't refute it. It is immediately self evident to me. Everytime I reflect, I am aware that I exist, in spite of what silly philosophy you want to throw anyone's way.

Again, how is the res cogitans a contradiction?
 
jeeprs
 
Reply Mon 12 Apr, 2010 05:34 am
@jeeprs,
So where does God exist?

What is the meaning of the word 'transcendent' in your book?

---------- Post added 04-12-2010 at 09:35 PM ----------

I should add: I don't think a person is a thing. I think a person is a being. Being and things are different, although loosely speaking one might equate them.
 
Extrain
 
Reply Mon 12 Apr, 2010 05:42 am
@jeeprs,
jeeprs;150781 wrote:
So where does God exist?

What is the meaning of the word 'transcendent' in your book?

---------- Post added 04-12-2010 at 09:35 PM ----------

I should add: I don't think a person is a thing. I think a person is a being. Being and things are different, although loosely speaking one might equate them.


"Transcendent" could mean any number of things, beyond space/time, beyond life/death, out-of-body, the poet's experience of the Divine in Nature, etc., etc.,

But I certainly don't think "transcendent" means "beyond existence." That's nonsense.

God is a non-spatially, non-temporally omnipresent Spiritual Substance.

God doesn't have to have a spatio-temporal location to exist, just as minds, ideas, concepts, or numbers don't have to have spatio-temporal locations to exist either.

---------- Post added 04-12-2010 at 05:56 AM ----------

Your view is very anti-Plato, btw. I see nothing resembling his views here. In fact, your view is much closer--in fact, IDENTICAL--to mainstream materialism than anything. You think physical objects exist, but abstract objects don't.

Plato had very much a contrary view about this...

It is very apparent to me that you are deeply confused about these matters concerning the Greeks. I am not sure how it was so easy for you to miss the train...
 
jeeprs
 
Reply Mon 12 Apr, 2010 06:04 am
@jeeprs,
As for transcendent, the dictionary says:

1. going beyond ordinary limits; surpassing; exceeding.
2. superior or supreme.
3. Theology. (of the Deity) transcending the universe, time, etc.Compare immanent (def. 3).
4. Philosophy. a. Scholasticism. above all possible modes of the infinite. b. Kantianism. transcending experience; not realizable in human experience. Compare transcendental (defs. 5a, c).
c. (in modern realism) referred to, but beyond, direct apprehension; outside consciousness.



'Not realizable in human experience' and 'outside consciousness' seem awfully close to 'beyond existence'.

It is natural to assume that to exist and to be real, mean the same thing. But I don't think they do. I think 'exist' has a specific meaning which is different to the meaning of 'to be'. The particle 'ex' means 'apart from'. So anything that exists has an identity, it is individuated. Every existing thing is composed of parts and has a beginning and an end in time.

In Kant, I think I would be correct in saying that we can infer the existence of 'the nouemenon' but beyond the fact that 'it exists' or 'is real', we can't say too much about it.

In some types of theology (as quoted above) and in mysticism, the 'ground of being' similarly precedes or gives rise to existing things, however it does not exist in the sense of being an individuated entity.

As for the manner in which God is, you might be familiar with the term 'the uncreated' or 'the unmanifest'. This says something about the nature of the divine being. For obvious reasons, one cannot say too much about it.

---------- Post added 04-12-2010 at 10:06 PM ----------

I would be interested to know how what I have written could be described as materialism.
 
Extrain
 
Reply Mon 12 Apr, 2010 06:15 am
@jeeprs,
jeeprs;150786 wrote:
As for transcendent, the dictionary says:

1. going beyond ordinary limits; surpassing; exceeding.
2. superior or supreme.
3. Theology. (of the Deity) transcending the universe, time, etc.Compare immanent (def. 3).
4. Philosophy. a. Scholasticism. above all possible modes of the infinite. b. Kantianism. transcending experience; not realizable in human experience. Compare transcendental (defs. 5a, c).
c. (in modern realism) referred to, but beyond, direct apprehension; outside consciousness.

'Not realizable in human experience' and 'outside consciousness' seem awfully close to 'beyond existence'.


what are you talking about?? no it doesn't. I don't have to experience my kitchen for my kitchen to exist. Nor can anything at all exist beyond existence. That's a contradiction! Why do so many of you insist on pushing your contraditions?? They're absurd. Only a person who has lost his mind believes what you're saying is true!

jeeprs;150786 wrote:
It is natural to assume that to exist and to be real, mean the same thing. But I don't think they do. I think 'exist' has a specific meaning which is different to the meaning of 'to be'. The particle 'ex' means 'apart from'. So anything that exists has an identity, it is individuated. Every existing thing is composed of parts and has a beginning and an end in time.


Whatever. You must have ignored all of my posts yesterday about this.

jeeprs;150786 wrote:
In Kant, I think I would be correct in saying that we can infer the existence of 'the nouemenon' but beyond the fact that 'it exists' or 'is real', we can't say too much about it.


This is wrong. Now you sound just like Humanity, by reading whatever you want into philosophers. But this is dishonest.

Kant never says we "infer the existence of the noumenon." Don't make things up.

jeeprs;150786 wrote:
In some types of theology (as quoted above) and in mysticism, the 'ground of being' similarly precedes or gives rise to existing things, however it does not exist in the sense of being an individuated entity.


This is just your own *word salad* I don't even know what this means anymore with respect to whatever it is you are trying to say. It's all gobbledygook to me.

jeeprs;150786 wrote:
As for the manner in which God is, you might be familiar with the term 'the uncreated' or 'the unmanifest'. This says something about the nature of the divine being. For obvious reasons, one cannot say too much about it.


Philosophical Theology has centuries of work behind this stuff. There is no sense in going into this here....

But none of this means "God is beyond existence"--no one knows what that means except for you and Tillich.

Quote:
I would be interested to know how what I have written could be described as materialism


I already told you. You deny Platonic Realism about the Forms, You deny numbers exist, you deny all abstract objects exist, and say the only things that exist are physical things.

Modern materialists say the exact same thing.

You deny Natural Laws in Nature exist.

Modern philosophical Materialists say the exact same thing.

You also seem to think the mind as a mental entity doesn't exist because physical reductionism has proved problematic for Substance Dualists like Descartes who believe in the existence of Minds.

Materialists say the exact same thing.

You also ask where God is spatially located.

Materialists ask the exact same thing.

Believe me! This is much more Hobbesian than Platonic!!

Again, you seem very confused about what you believe.
 
jeeprs
 
Reply Mon 12 Apr, 2010 06:19 am
@jeeprs,
Thanks for your criticisms. However I don't think there is a point in taking this further. Good night.
 
Extrain
 
Reply Mon 12 Apr, 2010 06:34 am
@jeeprs,
There probably wasn't much use anyway.
 
jeeprs
 
Reply Mon 12 Apr, 2010 03:56 pm
@jeeprs,
well there are a couple of things I would like to say. The idea of 'immaterial substance', which is also the idea of 'soul' (as a paraphrase of Res Cogitans in Descartes) is impossible to demonstrate by scientific means, as is well known. One can assert the existence of soul, or God for that matter, but there is no way to demonstrate, prove, or show that there is any such thing. So if you say that the soul and God exists, it seems to me scientific naturalism will have you on a hiding to nothing. You can then simply assert that you believe it anyway, and it is a matter of faith, but then it is really out-of-scope for philosophy as such.

I think there is a philosophical method. The method required is what the Greeks called 'metanoia' which is a change in perception. It is analagous to 'religious conversion' but, again, it relies more on reason and on insight than on devotional theology, which is why it is more philosophical than religious. Through metanoia mind itself has to be brought into accord with that which it seeks to know. In the West, this no longer seems to me the subject matter of philosophy. But every time I say this, it provokes howls of outrage. So if I am wrong, I would be glad to know it and will freely acknowledge it. If there are philosophers who advocate this understanding in the modern discipline of philosophy, I would like to know of them, I will buy their books, study them and sing their praises.

The only current philosophical academic I am aware of is Pierre Hadot, who understands this matter in the context of ancient philosophy. I am working through his books.
 
Extrain
 
Reply Mon 12 Apr, 2010 05:21 pm
@jeeprs,
jeeprs;151087 wrote:
well there are a couple of things I would like to say. The idea of 'immaterial substance', which is also the idea of 'soul' (as a paraphrase of Res Cogitans in Descartes) is impossible to demonstrate by scientific means, as is well known. One can assert the existence of soul, or God for that matter, but there is no way to demonstrate, prove, or show that there is any such thing. So if you say that the soul and God exists, it seems to me scientific naturalism will have you on a hiding to nothing. You can then simply assert that you believe it anyway, and it is a matter of faith, but then it is really out-of-scope for philosophy as such.


lol....yeah, ok, Mr. Scientific Materialist. Youre wrong. Science doesn't say squat. People like yourself make science say that. This view is scientism; not science. Can you get any more paltitudinal than saying something a 15 year old would say? That's a pretty rudimentary understanding of the neuroscience/philosophical landscape with respect to the current Mind/Body problem as it is seen today. :rolleyes: Trying reading some recent works by Fodor, Chalmers, Jackson, Searle, Levine, Block, and Stoljar about this matter in cognitive science, neuroscience, linguistics, and the Philosophmy of Mind. It is not as near so simple-minded as your own simple-minded view of these things.

jeeprs;151087 wrote:
I think there is a philosophical method. The method required is what the Greeks called 'metanoia' which is a change in perception. It is analagous to 'religious conversion' but, again, it relies more on reason and on insight than on devotional theology, which is why it is more philosophical than religious. Through metanoia mind itself has to be brought into accord with that which it seeks to know. In the West, this no longer seems to me the subject matter of philosophy. But every time I say this, it provokes howls of outrage. So if I am wrong, I would be glad to know it and will freely acknowledge it. If there are philosophers who advocate this understanding in the modern discipline of philosophy, I would like to know of them, I will buy their books, study them and sing their praises. The only current philosophical academic I am aware of is Pierre Hadot, who understands this matter in the context of ancient philosophy. I am working through his books.


Your presumption just astounds me. You are not even afraid to show it either. Who do you think you are judging people's own personal struggles with philosophy?! You haven't the slightest clue what goes inside other thinkers within philosophical circles in academia! Time and again philosophers struggle with these things just as any human being does who is willing to give life's deep questions the hearing they deserve!

I see clearly that gnawing worm of disgust toward the Western Tradition buried underneath that shallow "Eastern facade" of equanimity you flaunt to people. Your hypocracy is very noticeable, and one can only wonder why these Eastern views have failed to teach you that "mindful awareness" necessary to put your own biases into proper perspective. I'm tired of defending my peers and fellow thinkers against your own secret bitterness toward them. I'm done with you. Don't bother asking me anymore questions, because I clearly understand what your agenda is now: to scowl at Western Tradition in order to supplant it with your own tyrannical ideologies. Let others help you out with that. I won't do it anymore.
 
jeeprs
 
Reply Mon 12 Apr, 2010 08:48 pm
@jeeprs,
That acrid smell is ego burning, as far as I can tell.

I write everything on this forum as a free expression of a reasoned argument. I attempt to be diligent, courteous, conscientious and reasonable in my interactions with others. By way of contrast, I find your attitude brimming with condescension, hyperbole, sarcasm and subjectivism.

If you have any philosophical criticism of what I have written, I would be quite willing to consider it, and if it is accurate, I will change my views accordingly. But all I am getting from you is ideological polemic with nothing of philosophical substance whatever (with the exception of your excellent answers on Kant which I acknowledge). Passion is one thing, temper another, and you clearly have not identified the line yet. I refuse to get drawn into one of the shouting matches you seem to enjoy stirring up. If you have anything useful to say, I shall look forward to resuming correspondence with you.


hrmmph

---------- Post added 04-13-2010 at 12:59 PM ----------

And I am sure that tyrannical Western Tradition is just shaking in its boots, knowing the likes of me are coming after it.....
 
Extrain
 
Reply Mon 12 Apr, 2010 09:33 pm
@jeeprs,
jeeprs;151194 wrote:
That acrid smell is ego burning, as far as I can tell.

I write everything on this forum as a free expression of a reasoned argument. I attempt to be diligent, courteous, conscientious and reasonable in my interactions with others. By way of contrast, I find your attitude brimming with condescension, hyperbole, sarcasm and subjectivism.


This is not "ego." I'm upset because you are always attacking my very own profession to which I've devoted my life. You would be upset too!

Nothing you write is well-reasoned at all. You speak in nonsensical contradictions, and continue to insist on their correctness while knowing they are contradictory. You attack Western philosophy as a whole constantly sizing it up for its alleged "failure" to say the things YOU want it to say. You ad hominem attack particular philosophers like Russell, Frege, Stove, and Quine, while using whatever quotes you've found to blame the entire discipline for its lack of any real insight.

You've got your entire philosophical map backwards mistaking Realists like Plato for Idealists, and Idealist like the Postivisists for Realists. You then blame Westernized Religion for all of this happening because of its alleged "literalistic dogmatism". You then interpret Plato as a mystic when he was anything but. And rather than being charitable to the authors you read, you insist on whitewashing their actual views in order to make them fit in with your own senseless and illogical ideology.

jeeprs;151194 wrote:
If you have any philosophical criticism of what I have written, I would be quite willing to consider it, and if it is accurate, I will change my views accordingly.


I've already pointed out your alleged theory rests on a contradiction. But you stubbornly insist otherwise, while introducing more gibberish to defend the gibberish that is already there.

jeeprs;151194 wrote:
But all I am getting from you is ideological polemic with nothing of philosophical substance whatever (with the exception of your excellent answers on Kant which I acknowledge).


This is wrong. I am certainly one of the more thoroughly investigative philosopher on this thread. Just go read all of my other posts. You won't find anybody like me drawing up analyses like I do.

I just end up having to perform apologetics everytime I address your posts because they stink of your rampant bias, your close-mindedness, and your failure to be charitable to the Western Tradition. It's your own fault our conversations suck. Maybe if you stopped generalizing and blaming others so much, discussion might actually be fruitful?!

jeeprs;151194 wrote:
Passion is one thing, temper another, and you clearly have not identified the line yet. I refuse to get drawn into one of the shouting matches you seem to enjoy stirring up. If you have anything useful to say, I shall look forward to resuming correspondence with you.


I've made numerous patient attempts to try to get through to you. Now, I'm just fed up. You don't learn, you don't listen. You are certainly one of the more religiously biased persons on this forum I've encountered, and you don't say much that is enlightening at all because most of the content of your posts are ad hominem attacks against other philosophers. Go count them up!! Take a poll! Go back and read the things you write. Most of your posts are expressions of your own religious allegiances, and your disgust for analytic philosophy. You are not practicing philosophy, here; you are engaging in dogmatism.
 
Reconstructo
 
Reply Mon 12 Apr, 2010 10:05 pm
@Extrain,
Extrain;151110 wrote:
lol....yeah, ok, Mr. Scientific Materialist. Youre wrong. Science doesn't say squat. People like yourself make science say that. This view is scientism; not science. Can you get any more paltitudinal than saying something a 15 year old would say? That's a pretty rudimentary understanding of the neuroscience/philosophical landscape with respect to the current Mind/Body problem as it is seen today. :rolleyes: Trying reading some recent works by Fodor, Chalmers, Jackson, Searle, Levine, Block, and Stoljar about this matter in cognitive science, neuroscience, linguistics, and the Philosophmy of Mind. It is not as near so simple-minded as your own simple-minded view of these things.



Your presumption just astounds me. You are not even afraid to show it either. Who do you think you are judging people's own personal struggles with philosophy?! You haven't the slightest clue what goes inside other thinkers within philosophical circles in academia! Time and again philosophers struggle with these things just as any human being does who is willing to give life's deep questions the hearing they deserve!

I see clearly that gnawing worm of disgust toward the Western Tradition buried underneath that shallow "Eastern facade" of equanimity you flaunt to people. Your hypocracy is very noticeable, and one can only wonder why these Eastern views have failed to teach you that "mindful awareness" necessary to put your own biases into proper perspective. I'm tired of defending my peers and fellow thinkers against your own secret bitterness toward them. I'm done with you. Don't bother asking me anymore questions, because I clearly understand what your agenda is now: to scowl at Western Tradition in order to supplant it with your own tyrannical ideologies. Let others help you out with that. I won't do it anymore.



No need for this aggression. Jeeprs is good people. This comes off as paranoid, too angry.
 
Extrain
 
Reply Mon 12 Apr, 2010 10:18 pm
@Reconstructo,
Reconstructo;151207 wrote:
No need for this aggression. Jeeprs is good people. This comes off as paranoid, too angry.


It's not paranoid. It's a result of having to listen to someone attack my profession for weeks on end now with the same old false allegations about how misguided philosophy my profession is. You would be upset, too, if someone insisted on continually attacking what you love to do for a living. So, of course I take it personally.
 
Reconstructo
 
Reply Mon 12 Apr, 2010 10:18 pm
@jeeprs,
I salute Jeeprs for having the guts to present something. I would say that his theory might be called metaphysical, but I like the word "metaphysics." And I contend that physics rests on an implicit metaphysics to begin with. Metaphysics includes ontology, and we are all living with a more or less implicit ontology. Personally, I say shine some light on it. Let us see what it is we think. Let us discover our perhaps unconscious axioms. And let's meet as friends, as far as is possible, to do it. Because unfriendly conversation is generally a waste. It ups stress levels, kicks us in to our uglier modes.

---------- Post added 04-12-2010 at 11:21 PM ----------

Extrain;151210 wrote:
It's not paranoid. It's a result of having to listen to someone attack my profession for weeks on end now while having to listen to the same old remarks about how misguided philosophy my profession is, when Jeeprs knows very little about it anyway. You would be upset, too, if someone insisted on continually attacking what you love to do for a living. Of course I take it personally!


I see Jeeprs as a lover of science. & even if he weren't, still not a good plan to take it personally. I get attacked all the time on this forum. And only those who actually insult me, rather than my ideas, invoke my anger. For me, a separation person/ideas is desirable. I'll engage my ideological opposite in a friendly spirit, as long as a root human respect remains intact. Don't mean to talk about myself so much. Just seems like a safe point of reference.
 
Extrain
 
Reply Mon 12 Apr, 2010 10:22 pm
@Reconstructo,
Reconstructo;151211 wrote:
I salute Jeeprs for having the guts to present something. I would say that his theory might be called metaphysical, but I like the word "metaphysics." And I contend that physics rests on an implicit metaphysics to begin with. Metaphysics includes ontology, and we are all living with a more or less implicit ontology. Personally, I say shine some light on it. Let us see what it is we think. Let us discover our perhaps unconscious axioms. And let's meet as friends, as far as is possible, to do it. Because unfriendly conversation is generally a waste. It ups stress levels, kicks us in to our uglier modes.


That's not what the problem is here. I don't care what Jeeprs believes.

The problem is Jeeprs' always attacking analytic philosophy as a whole for not doing what Jeeprs wants it to do. Jeeprs thinks the entire discipline in the West is "shallow, numb, materialistic, and biased" in some way.

But this is Jeeprs own bias, and I've been patiently trying to get that across to Jeeprs for weeks now...I've just had enough already.
 
 

 
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