..., unconscious example of the relationship between perception and reality.

Your belief, which forms your perception, is made manifest in your expression of that belief.

I contend that one absolute reality exists. Our experience is determined by our belief, and subsequent perception, of this reality. Although perception informs our experience of reality, reality is unalterable.

We are responsible for distinguishing between perception and consciousness. Reality is not an illusion of consciousness, it is the manifestation of consciousness; and being of consciousness, only consciousness can alter reality.

You took each sentence I wrote out of the context I was saying them in and created a straw man argument which has nothing to do with the point I was attempting to convey. You are proving my point by arguing against things which I never said.I am trying to convey something other than what you believe I am trying to convey using words which you feel have one concrete meaning.

I don't think that Mill believe "Dartmouth" had a meaning. I don't think he believed that proper names had meanings, so I don't think he confused meaning with reference in the case of proper names.

haha...that has to be the funniest thing I've ever heard. It doesn't work that way at all. You just begged the question on your own behalf. I am not a "mind-reader." If you intend to mean something differently than the conventional meanings people normally associate with those words, then you are not communicating.

The purpose of language is to communicate based on a mutually decided-upon set of shared meanings. And if you defy conventional meaning, both in practice and as a general thesis you are trying to prove by using language differently than most people are using it in order to convey the very point that no word has any fixed meaning, then you are just being an a**.

Consequently, I am wasting my time talking to someone who decides to give his own private meanings to any word he chooses. As Witt- said, "there is no such thing as a private language."

You are consistently taking my words out of context. I never said that words are private, and I never made up any meaning for any word. Words' meaning come from syntax, not the dictionary. Anything I intended to mean I expressed through my syntax, and you have failed to pick up on.

I'm sorry you consider my opinion that of an ass, but language is not a concrete reality. It is a constant flux of activity that isn't ruled by any one perspective. The beauty of the history of language is that people have used it to create new meaning that didn't exist before. If the meaning was already connected to the phonetic sound itself, then new meaning would never be created, and we would never grow as a society.

You are wasting your time, not because I am giving words my own definitions, but because you are using such narrow definitions for your words that you are failing to see the entire point which I am attempting to convey to you.

Who do you think mutually agrees upon the meaning? Meaning arises out of the syntax used between the subjects which are using that language and nowhere else. Syntax gives words meaning, that is how it becomes agreed upon, otherwise all metaphors would be nothing less than a meaningless jumble of words.

You can mis-interpret Wittgenstein along with the rest of the logical positivists if you'd like, but I will say that you are missing out on a very brilliant philosophy in the process.

The use of syntax itself has been defiled and people have come under the illusion that the use of language is a secondary effect of consciousness, when it is my belief that language is necessary for consciousness to occur.

Words cannot be made to mean one thing or the other.

Words must represent what is being expressed subjectively and then the meaning of the words must be agreed upon inter-subjectively.

Many are under the assumption today that all words are forced to have one concrete meaning, and all people use words the same way.

Reality is only realized once it can be talked about, therefore I wouldn't consider what trees and many animals experience reality.

To say that one reality exists is to imply that their is some one perspective that is always watching everything everywhere.

An absolute reality may exist in some form, but since we can never reach it, it is much more functional to agree that we each experience a different reality.

You can mis-interpret Wittgenstein along with the rest of the logical positivists if you'd like, but I will say that you are missing out on a very brilliant philosophy in the process.

None of this is my problem. You need to be more careful about how you use the English language. Your own intended meaning is not the same as literal meaning of the words you used. There is no "context" I am ignoring, here. I am just taking the meanings of your words at face value.

You say, "language is a necessary for consciousness to occur."
Dogs do not have language.
Therefore, Dogs are not consious.

Yes they can--that is exactly the purpose of having a common language. "Bachelor" means "unmarried adult male," and English language users have stipulate that this is so.

You say:

(1) "Words cannot be made to mean one thing."
(2) "The meaning of the words must be agreed upon inter-subjectively."

If (2) is true, then words can be made to mean one thing, just as "Bachelor" means "unmarried adult male."

So if (2) is true, then (1) is false, and vice versa.

So (1) and (2) are contradictory.

People use words different ways, for sure, and the intended, or implied, meaning is often suggested by context, syntax, phonetics, and attitudes.

But words have accepted conventional meanings in and of themselves. So people can mistakenly think the word means one thing rather than another. If my boss says quite angrily, "You're fired!"--he means that I no longer work for him. If I thought my boss meant, "Go get me a beer" I would be clearly mistaken.

What on earth do you mean by "reality is realized"??

Of course animals experience reality. Surely, my dog doesn't need a language to perceive reality. A dog does not have self-reflective conceptual capacities needed to form judgments--this is true--but this doesn't entail that he doesn't consciously experience the world as it is.

No it doesn't "imply" this. Why would it?

How does "one perspective see everything"? Creatures with functioning eyes see things. Perspectives don't see things. And no one creature can see everything from his own limited perspective.

Certainly we can have different experiences of the same object, but that doesn't entail the object just is my experience. That's why someone can be in error about what is really the case.

I believe I live an imagined life in this imagined universe, but that it is all coherent and effectively real.

People often take words at face value, but no one person holds absolute knowledge of language. To suggest this is to suggest that language can hypothetically be a private experience.

The word itself has no "face value" because it can only express meaning within a certain context. If I just say "dog barks", then I am not conveying anything intelligible to you. If I add a "that" and create syntax by saying "that dog barks" then I gave those words meaning. Not meaning that was already there, but meaning which was created by my syntax.
Again, I should have been more explicit here, and I apologize. When I said "words cannot be made to mean one thing or the other", i meant before the word is experienced within its proper context. The meaning that is attached to the word, only is attached to the word because of the word's ability to be used within a certain context. Words don't have some magic power to create meaning on their own, however, people use words to create meaning, and then that meaning becomes attached to the word after the fact. The phonetic sound of the word is quite arbitrary, and it is only after people understand each other through syntactical dialogue that meaning is applied to the phonetic word itself.

I was using language as a vague term to denote communicable ability. Maybe I should have been a bit more explicit, but the meaning I was trying to convey is that a creature can only be as conscious of reality as his ability to communicate can take him.

Reality is a subjective experience, and can only be expanded outside of ones own experience through inter-subjective communication.

My point exactly. There is not any one objective or absolute reality in which words exist.

The conventional meanings for words do not exist because of the words themselves, but how people use the words. If it was conventional to call a cat a "dog," then the word "dog" would have a different meaning. If someone is using a word one way, and it functions for them, they have the right to use the word that way.

Philosophy is an attempt to use words which universalize meaning, not control it.

Again, reality can only be what is experienced.

The only things that aren't real are things that aren't experienced.

If there is only one form of reality, then nobody could experience it since people each experience reality differently.

We have different experiences of the same object, but the only reason that it is the same object is because of our ability to communicate about it.

The object is what is experienced, so an error is only a distinction between two different experiences. Whatever is "really the case" is real to the subject which is experiencing whether there is agreement or not.

To say that only your experience is real, for whatever reason, is claiming that your reality is the only reality and you are thus making consciousness a private occurrence,

which as you pointed out, Wittgenstein would disagree with.

Which is where it seems you mis-understand him.

He isn't suggesting that words exist outside the realm of subjective experience, he is suggesting that subjective experience constitutes objectivity; and hence constitutes language.

Reality has no need for anyone's believe, consciousness, and can not be altered. That which can be altered can not be reality, according to your own words..."one absoute reality exists."

Please feel free to clear up this contradiction.

Lost1

Did I ever suggest or say this? No. But you've admitted twice in this post that your intentions did not match what you actually said. So I rest my case.

Of course. All of the above is what we dub by "public language use." Every linguist and philosopher of language knows this.

This is just saying the same thing. It doesn't matter how you define "reality." If you mean "linguistic reality," then no, a dog does not experience this kind of "reality." But a dog certainly has a "doggy reality," does he not? He can still experience the post-man beating him with a stick even if he can't say "the post-man is beating me with a stick"--while I can experience the very same kind of event as my dog, namely, the post-man beating me with a stick.

So there is a shared reality between animals of "higher an lower" species, even though one can articulate it, and another cannot.

I doubt it. Ibid, dog example above. Language use and communication is not necessary to perceive or experience object X.

If by "reality" you mean "subjective reality" then this is trivially obvious.

But if you mean that there does not exist an objective reality people and animals can have veridical/non-veridical perceptions and/or judgments about-- then this is false.

Yes. But so what?

huh?

Again, if by "reality" you mean "subjective reality" this is trivially true. But if by "reality" you mean no real world exists outside a persons perceptions of it, then this is Idealism--which is a strong Robust Metaphysical Thesis about the world itself--and is not a thesis supported by any of the things you've said.

That's false. I don't have to experience the moon for the moon to be real.
The moon is not my experience of the moon.



If you are trying to construct an argument, this, above, is a non-sequiter.

(1) You say, "Each person experiences reality differently"--but this is sometimes true, sometimes false. It is not the case that everyone always experiences reality differently. This should be obvious. If nobody was ever capable of having the same experiences, then communication would be impossible, knowledge would be impossible, and we should all become Cartesian Solipsists!

(2) You say, "If there is only one reality, then nobody could experience it." This is clearly false. Take a stick in a glass of water that appears broken. It appears to be broken by all people. It also appears not-broken when you remove it from the glass. But it is certainly true of the outside world that the stick is either broken or not broken. So there is a fact of the matter independent of people's perceptions whether the stick is really broken, or the sick is really not broken.

This is such B.S. The knife that cuts John is the same knife that cuts me, even if John does not feel pain and I do. The knife is not the same knife at times T1 and T2 merely because we can talk about it.

Why is Idealism the default position? You phenomenologists are just lazy (which is why I stopped reading Husserl, Heidegger, and Brentano years ago).

Just because persons can have different experience of the same object--as in the object appearing hot to one person and cold to another--this does not entail we experience two different objects. Hot and Cold are not properties of objects, but properties of our experiences, just as pain is not a property of a knife when it cuts me, but the experiential effect it has on me. So certainly, two people can be cut by the same identical knife, while one person feel the pain and another not feel the pain.

"experiencing agreement"? I don't understand any of this. You need to be more clear.



huh? This is because you are defining "reality" as "subjective reality"--and everything that you say comes out trivially obvious. This was the problem for Husserl. One can never tell if he is saying something trivially true about private experiences, or advancing some deep metaphysical thesis--such as Berkelian Idealism--about the world.

Wittgenstein was not a phenomenologist. The phenomenologist merely *brackets* metaphysical questions, while Wittgenstein (similar to Kant) rejected the possibility metaphysics altogether because he advanced logical positivism, which says that words, language, etc., have meaning if and only if the statements in which they are embedded can in principle be subject to experiential verification.

Then you're wrong. I only said Wittgenstein rejected the notion of a private language. So don't jump to conclusions.

Wittgenstein never advanced the metaphysical thesis that "an external mind-independent object two people experience is the same if and only if the communicate about it." He merely said we can only talk about commonly shared objects of experience by using language--which is true. But he didn't conclude external objects exist only if we can talk about them. The first is an epistemic thesis about language use and meaning--the latter is a robust metaphysical theory about the world. Wittgenstein reject metaphysics--Idealism is metaphysics--he didn't uphold it whatsoever.

True, we can only talk about objectivity using human language. But Wittgenstein didn't say "subjective experience constitutes the mind-independent reality because the only thing that exists is a mind-dependent reality." They are not the same thing.

You said that you have been taking my words at face value.

Then you subsequently agreed with me that words have no face value?

My intentions matched what I said. It was me expressing my intention, so my words could not have been expressing anything besides my intentions. You failed to grasp the meaning of what I was saying based on my choice of words, but my words still meant what they intended.

Again, the meaning which words bring is not created by the words themselves, but by the context in which the words are used. Meaning isn't reducible to words, because words by themselves are meaningless.

Once again, meaning isn't created by the individual words themselves, but by the context in which the words are used.

You took my words out of context, and tried to understand them one sentence at a time. I was conveying a point that needed the whole paragraph, not just each individual sentence, to explain.

How can "reality" be experienced other than linguistically?

"Reality" is an experience that is processed linguistically and experienced as an already constituted setting.

Has a dog ever told you he is experiencing reality?

It seems it is you who is jumping to conclusions about that which can't be proven.

What each individual subject considers reality is only reality insofar as the subject experiences it.

We each experience reality, and we can know that we each experience it because of inter-subjective communication. Dogs do not communicate as we do, so we can not be sure what they do or do not experience.

Do I believe dogs experience the reality we do? Maybe, but I can't jump to the conclusion that I am certain they do, because inter-subjective reality is the only reality we know. It is not private only because of language.

Can you be certain that reality is shared between the higher and lower species? Our reality is constituted linguistically as a way to come to terms with differences in perception. What we perceive is simply what we perceive, and we can only describe what we perceive linguistically. If another subject is unable to describe his experience to me, how can you be sure he is experiencing the same reality? Again, that seems to be an unsupported assumption on your part.

"Object X" is nothing more than what "object X" means in the context that it is presented.

Ex. My experience of this thread becomes tied into your experience of this thread only when we inter-subjectively grasp the fact that we are in fact both discussing the same thread.

If we were unable to do this, the thread would in fact be two different threads to the both of us.

The concept of grasping the same object is what it means to be perceiving the same thing.

As far as I experience, a dog has no concept of sameness of differentness, or even thingness for that matter, and until he conveys that he does, it is an assumption to say that what the dog experiences is the same as what I am experiencing.

Our individual biological and historical differences dictate what we perceive and how it is perceived.

If humans had eyes on the sides of their heads, we would all have a very different concept of what constitutes reality.

Therefore, when people talk about reality, what they are really talking about is how they experience reality.

Many times, however, people just assume every subject experiences reality the same, which is a lapse in judgment.

How can any "reality" exist that isn't subjectively constituted? Only subjects experience reality, so doesn't that entail that any "reality" is subjective at its foundation?

Subjective doesn't necessarily mean isolated and disconnected. The only reason people assume this is because of the object-subject dichotomy myth created by Descartes' dualism. Reality can be subjective and still influenced by other subjects. Idealism can be transcendent, and when it is it allows for inter-subjectivity to create objectivity through communication.

What is objectivity outside of subjectivity?
It is not the position of the phenomenologist that objectivity doesn't exist, just not the way many people assume it does today. We reach objective truth through inter-subjective dialogue, and if there was not this inter-subjectivity, then yes, no objectivity could possibly exist. Objective reality is what is inter-subjectively experienced.

For a thing to be real, it has to be experienced as real.

Before that there is no experience of it, so it is nothing.

The experience of "reality" and the concept of "things" are human experiences.

What makes things the things they are is our experience of them through our senses and through the linguistically developed reasoning skills that each of us have to conceptualize that thing.

Without this ability, the thing wouldn't be able to exist.

Reality as truth is something that must be reflected upon to be understood, and until something is understood as truth I would suggest it doesn't exist by whatever subject is experiencing it.

So you could suggest that dogs might experience something similar to what we consider reality, but to jump to the conclusion that what they experience is reality would mean that they comprehend the concept of reality.

For phenomenologists, the only thing that knowledge is reducible to is experience, and without proper understanding of ones own experience, one cannot completely convey what is or is not real to them. If a subject isn't conveying an understanding of reality, then it is wrong to suggest that they experience reality. I would say phenomenologists are even more precise than most about their word choices because a proper description of experience is the key to any sort if truth.

Phenomenology evolved greatly from Brentano to Heidegger and I would suggest reading an introduction to phenomenology which distinguishes the two before reading any of them.

Again, if John is experiencing a different thing than you, then they are two different things. They only become the same thing upon the inter-subjective confirmation. Your experience may be more sensibly filled by your sense experience, but to John it is a different knife. Experience constitutes reality subjectively, and only through inter-subjective experience can a more objective reality be reached.

It becomes the same knife upon confirmation. Before that there is no reason to suggest it being the same as anything else. Phenomenology is an attempt to get back to the things themselves, and by that I mean it is an attempt to rediscover the primordial experiences by which things are understood. Things are in fact what they are, and what they are is constituted linguistically.

Phenomenology does not operate under the adaquation theory of truth. Truth is not what is represented exteriorly, because that would entail that many of our experiences can't be truthfully described. For a phenomenologist, there is no interior-exterior dichotomy, so all experiences are equally real, some are just more concretely presented to us than others, and thus easier to express truthfully.

Wittgenstein was not a phenomenologist per se, that is correct, but his later works were very influential on the movement. He expressed great frustration that his earlier works were greatly mis-interpreted by many positivists that had read Tractatus. It is not a coincidence that his later work took such a sharp turn towards transcendent idealism, and it seems to me to be closer to his position all along.

True, he never concluded anything about metaphysics, but metaphysics will determine ones epistemology.

Phenomenology provides the metaphysical foundation for the Wittgensteinian linguistically focused epistemological position. Both Wittgenstein and early phenomenologist were heavily influenced by many of the same people, and all were responding to the irrational Cartesian axiom that many philosophies were working with which was inherent in modernism.

I suggest reading Wittgenstein and Phenomenology: A Comparative Study of the Later Wittgenstein, Husserl, Heidegger, and Merleau-Ponty by Nicholas F. Grier. He does a fine job of rationally connecting it all together in a very concise manner.

But they are the same thing. The "mind-independent" reality is in fact dependent upon the mind which perceives it.

Again, the only knowledge we can have is of that which can be perceived.

We form judgments within our already constituted world, and to try to suggest that whatever exists within this world is constituted separately from it is a fallacy supported only by modern philosophers.

The only way to make sense of what I am saying is to epoche that notion, and start with a Cogito that is radically intertwined with others in a world filled with linguistic meaning.

Once you epoche the subject-object dichotomy, you begin to understand that the subject gains knowledge of the object by becoming one with it.

You are talking of knowledge of things like they are discursive, but I experience things very intimately.

Through my relationship with things, their knowledge becomes part of me

and there really isn't a metaphysical distinction to be made between me and the objects which I come to know.

Again, others can experience the same things as me, I don't adhere to solipsism, but these things are the inter-subjective experience of them. It isn't taking anything away from the things themselves, it is just being truthful about my experience. My sense-experience of things are very meaningful.

The facticity behind those things are important, and become part of the thing as it becomes known to me. You keep asking me to provide proof, but my only proof is my experience, and my only argument is my description of that experience. I am inviting you to take a look at a different perspective, not one that is essential in itself, but one that urges you to distinguish what is essential in reality from what is accidental.

You keep urging me to be mindful of the words I use, but I am using the only words I know to describe my experience. You say I am jumping to conclusions, but I am only describing you what becomes presented to me during my experience in the world. I am describing it as carefully as I possibly can, but it isn't something easily described. Experience of reality is a very abstract existence, and it is my opinion that one can only understand it through careful dialogue with other subjects about their personal experience. We all share our experience, and understandings can be reached; sometimes it just takes a shift in perspective to make that happen.

I have had experiences of Dogs displaying some signs of consciousness, however, I have never had a conversation with a dog, or any other animal, to confirm it.

For that reason, I maintain that it cannot be said for certain what the state of each animals consciousness is, and all that can be said for certain is that they display some signs of consciousness.

You demand verification, but I ask you what does verification entail? How much justification is needed to justify a belief? In my experience grounding epistemic belief in these types questions leads one down a very slippery slope.

I don't deny that.



But I don't understand what it means to "become one with the object." That doesn't even make linguistic sense. You are certainly free to talk that way, but don't just assume every philosopher automatically knows what that is even supposed to mean. Personally, I don't think that means anything, neither within my experience, nor projected outside my experience, metaphysically, epistemically, or even spiritually. I simply cannot make sense of it.

I agree. But experiencing things intimately is not antithetical to having discursive knowledge of things. You just assume it must be.

Things? "their knowledge"? So rocks have knowledge? And their knowledge becomes a part of you?

You just assume this metaphysical distinction does not hold. I contend my knowledge of an object X, is not identical the object known. Metaphysical realism is the default common sense position, not metaphysical Idealism, or monism for that matter. So the burden of providing a good argument for showing us why you think any of your monism is true, is your problem, not the dualist's problem.

I agree. But how does this entail the subject of knowing is identical to the object known? I don't understand that at all.

And I do, do that. I just don't see how the subject of knowing is identical to the object known. Or how my perception of an object is identical to the object that I perceive. You just assume they are one and the same. I don't think that is commonsensical at all. And most people would disagree with you--philosophers and non-philosophers alike.

But you are not using your words carefully. Most average people distinguish between their experience and the object experienced, no matter how rich and unique that experience is. So you are in the minority in thinking what you do.

So. You can't confirm you are talking to a Zombie, or a robot, either, when you talk to what looks and sounds like a rational human creature using the same sets of sounds and exhibiting the same behavior that you do. Descartes pointed this out long ago.

But this isn't a good reason to think dogs don't have experiential states. We inductively infer what dogs are thinking and feeling. So we have what is called an "indirect awareness" of what they might be feeling. You don't think mammals can feel shame, anger, love, and fear? Of course they can!! Just look at your average dog cowar away in shame with his tail in between his legs when you slap him on the ass, and yell "no," for eating your sandwhich.

We inductively infer what human beings are thinking and feeling from their outward signs and behaviors too. So it is no more problematic guessing what a dog is feeling when he doesn't talk than what a human being is feeling when he doesn't talk. Human beings are more complex creatures than dogs, anyway, so sometimes it can even be harder to determine what someone else is thinking or feeling than dogs, even by his own sounds and words.

You're being sloppy again.

I never asked for "verification." "Verifcation" and "confirmation" are terms having to do with empirical/scientific observation of the world. I only asked for a good reasoned argument for your Idealism. And I haven't heard one yet, precisely because I'm sure you can't give any. That's why the "burden of proof" is on you.

It doesn't make linguistic sense within a paradigm featuring a closed consciousness, but if you accept that experience in the world is that of a subject intimately connected with objects within a given state of affairs, you understand that they all only exist within one context, and any one piece of that state cannot be taken out and examined apart from it. This would be an attempt to judge something in a way it does not naturally occur and this is the problem phenomenology has with most empirical sciences today.

This version of Intentionality is a central theme in both brentano's and husserl's philosophies. I assumed you would've been aware of it, again I was not explicit enough, and I apologize.



No, I don't assume they are antithetical, I just don't think knowledge of things come about discursively. I think knowledge of processes or directions to places come about discursively, which can become intimate with practice. I firmly believe when we grasp knowledge of a thing it is a directly intimate relationship.




Rocks have knowledge about them which can be known, just as any other object. Knowledge associated with a rock becomes presented to me, and for me, upon my experience with it. Whether it be directly or through a medium, such as a picture or another person. That knowledge of the rock becomes part of my consciousness, and once it becomes part of my consciousness it becomes part of me.



The dualists created their own problem by separating the cogito from the exterior world. Please explain to me how we can experience any reality exteriorly that is separate from individual interior consciousness. It doesn't make any sense. This is a modern problem that didn't need to happen. The only way Cartesian dualism makes any sense is if you adhere to Descartes idea of God placing exterior knowledge into the Cogtio; otherwise, it leaves individuals isolated, and alienated from the outside world, with no access to any sort of knowledge.

Phenomenology is not idealism in the traditional sense, and it deals with a cogito that is also much more than the Cartesian cogito could offer. Consciousness is not different from reality, they are intertwined with each other along with other consciousnesses creating an inter-subjective reality.



They are distinguishable yet they become part of each other. Forgive me for my sloppy language, but they appear with each other, for each other, within a given state of affairs. They give each other meaning, and give meaning to the whole state.



I don't assume anything about the object. It takes an assumption to make the claim that the object is different from the object that appeared. Remember to understand what I'm talking about you have to suspend all learned presuppositions which you carry with you, including your dualist perspective of the world.

People have disagreed with phenomenologist throughout its entire evolution, and they even often disagree with each other. I am not claiming that phenomenology asserts its primacy over any other way of thinking, and it is still a very young philosophy. However, all who become involved with it seem become consumed by it, and there is something very real about it. I would say that it is closer to a realism than an idealism; however, realism carries with it undesirable connotations. It can't be labeled any way, and because of its prime focus deals with subjective experience it is not very desirable for those in need of some tactile understanding of reality. For those who grasp it, however, it brings with it a very serine perspective towards the world.


I may be in the minority, but this is where I believe Wittgenstein would understand my perspective. This is the language game I choose to play because it is most functional for me in my daily life. It allows me to understand myself within a world already constituted for me. It allows me to become part of my world along with others' worlds, and it is this experience that leads me to describe my perspective as realism.



It would take me very long to explain my perspective on this issue, and I already know we are going to have communicative problems, but put is simply I'll say that I communicate with persons and not humans. The two terms are not always interchangeable and only have been since the rise of modernism, as I consider the term person to be species-neutral. If you want I can explain more, but to make it easier I would suggest looking into Robert Sokolowksi's Phenomenology of the Human person. He could sum it up better than I ever could; although, like I said I could try if you so desire.




I never said they don't have experiential states, I only claimed we cannot be sure of those states without discourse with the subject. They may feel all sorts of feelings, but I am hesitant to jump to any absolute conclusion concerning their actual state.

It is here that I will share with you a bit of my expertise. I have a BA in psychology and am working on my masters in phenomenological research methods. As much as I've studied the field of psychology, I must admit much of it rests in a faulty foundation. I cannot assert that consciousness is reducible to behavior, and biological factors do not have a causal relationship with mental states. You won't find many psychologists who will say that they do because all that the scientific method can give you is correlational data. It requires a leap of faith to find a cause, and I know from experience that many psychologists take that leap much too easily. Some of the data that is spewed out by psychologists are just unscientific garbage that isn't practically useful in the least. I practice phenomenology because I, along with many other psychologists, see it as a more rational alternative to a very irrational science.

I find it insulting, and flat out wrong, that a scientist can tell me more about my experience as a being-in-the-world than I can tell him myself. Much too often are unhealthy conclusions made based on appearances alone, and I feel much more can be learned about a person from proper discourse than any other means.



I don't feel any burden of proof, because again I am simply describing my experience of the world exactly how I experience it. I can suggest that you attempt to suspend your judgement while reading what I write, but that is an impossible task for most.

It is only an idealism insofar as its emphasis on the Cogito, but again it is not a closed Cogito. I am not saying what exists only exists the way it does because of the single mind that perceives it, but because of the way it is perceived by all who are perceiving it. Things appear to whomever they appear to, and those who they appear to are free to express to others however they experience it. Only through this freedom can objectivity emerge from the chaos.

Psychology is way different than philosophy. So your phenomenology fits well. But phenomenology doesn't fit well within the analytic tradition whatsoever. It's too sloppy. There is not enough attention paid to clarity, precision, reason, and logic.

I agree roughly with half of what you say. The rest is either convoluted, or isn't argued for and just assumed. I will spend another 20 minutes correcting your mistakes, and I don't feel like playing the role of "teacher."

I don't pass premature judgments--I've just been discussing these exact same topics in academia for over 8 years, and reading this stuff for 15 years--and this topic is a little elementary for me, so it's boring. Sorry, that's condescending, I know. But it's the truth. I'm just not learning anything new. I want to learn. I want to be challenged with a puzzle to try and figure out--not with opinions I just flat out find absurd.

Take care.

I understand, it is not for everyone, and I feel I am not doing it enough justice. I would recommend looking into it more if you get the chance. Thanks for entertaining all my ranting and raving.

Have a good one

But I have looked into the phenomenology of Husserl, Heidegger, Brentano, etc...quite extensively already. To pick it up again, I would need a good reason, such as needing a reference concerning a phenomenologist's analysis of perception and how the presupposition of the Cogito is necessarily contained within the structure of that experience--something kantian like that. But that's not to say I won't read it again. I rather enjoy reading it.

Here's the deal: I totally understand why you would be interested in phenomenology if you have a BA in psychology. That makes perfect sense. But it's just not a way of approaching philosophy that is readily respected by "the professionals" in the better philosophical departments throughout the States. There is a good reason for this too--since the entire method of "bracketing" traditional philosophical issues in order to describe the structure of 1st person experience as it is immediately (not mediately) given, is what is so suspect.

I don't deny phenomenology is difficult for anyone to read, especially Husserl. I like reading him, but I can only take him seriously so far--and then I find myself giving up because I begin to feel like I am reading nonsense. I've racked my head with that guy for years, and I like Kant much better.

So no worries.

Take care.