This is old stuff we are hashing up. Yes, there is something outside of our consciousness, but it only exist for us by means of consciousness. Is this so difficult to understand?

In one sense, of course the Earth was here before us. In another sense, it was not. Is this so hard to understand?

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If the brain in conjunction with the thing-in-itself are both necessary to create our human experience, why should we so ferociously favor the "objective" side of this equation? Of course it's quite useful, but are we not forgetting that the individual mortal finite human mind is at the center of existence, 24 hours a day.

Every living human is the center of the universe -- in any sort of human way that is. Have we not been seduced by technology into forgetting the subjective root of our personal existence? Do we forget that our mental-model of reality is limited by the structure of our mammalian brains?

Do we make an idol of this mental model, while meaning to idolize a connect to reality itself?

You must be kidding. That's another name for your God. If you think there's nothing behind phenomena, you're more skeptical than I am.

It depends on the subject. When a judge instructs the jury that if it is to find the defendant guilty "beyond a reasonable doubt" he is hardly demanding what you claim a proof would be, since that would be impossible to provide. What you have in mind is a conclusion that can be had only in mathematics or formal logic, of in other formalized subjects(except for the sensory evidence that does not exist in those two subjects, of course).

In other areas the kind of proof you demand is, of course, not available. For instance, when I prove that the word, "weird" is spelled just that way, I do it not by a formal proof like the one you describe, but by showing how the word is spelled in a good dictionary.

You don't believe physics for instance to be a formalized subject? (and its laws proven?) How do you explain all the aircraft above North America consistently staying in the air then (except in the case of some failure consistent with the laws of physics)?


That's because the spelling of a word is not a metaphysical fact. Claiming that "weird" is spelled that way in a specific dictionary, on the other hand, is a metaphysical claim, and simply producing the dictionary would be conclusive evidence (proof) of it.

Oh, I think there is something behind phenomena. It is what we observe. We don't observe phenomena. They are the means by which we observe reality.

Perhaps you will admit that phenomena (consciousness) must be interpreted -- and that our complex mental-model of objective reality is the result of this interpretation.

A lot of physics is formalized. What makes you believe I don't think so. But psychology is not, nor is geography, nor is a jury verdict.

That "weird" is spelled in a certain way is a metaphysical claim?

A jury verdict in today's America cannot be said to be formalized, but how to apply logic to reality is formalized. Scientists have been relying on it since Aristotle, that's why science is so spectacularly consistent.



"weird is spelled this way in Webster's dictionary" is a claim about a metaphysical fact, easily provable by direct evidence.

"the correct spelling of weird is this" is not a claim about a metaphysical fact, it is a claim about a man made convention.

Kenneth,
it's freaky but we may be on the same side this time. I didn't know that anything metaphysical was easily provable by direct evidence.

I suggest that science invents concepts like force, for instance, or photons, and associates these concepts with certain measurements and certain equations.

Also the principle that experiments must be repeatable is a tacit admission that objective reality is largely founded upon consensus.

I have a feeling S. does not know what "metaphysical" means.

It's not the scientist who vote. Their repeatable experiments "vote."