Philosophy Discussion Forums | A Humans-Only Club for Open-Minded Discussion & Debate

[Terrapin Station]

Yes, they are --- they are in response to sensory data represented in your brain --- phenomena.

Not sensory data "represented." Sensory data (directly) perceived.

[/quote]

They're in response to shapes and colors you see, textures you feel, sounds you hear, tastes and smells you perceive, etc. [/quote]

External things you see.

All of which are phenomena occurring in your brain.

No. Not at all. That's ridiculous. It's phenomena occurring in the external world that you can directly perceive via your senses sending signals to your brain.

That they have an external cause is an hypothesis --- a useful one, but still an hypothesis.

It's not just a hypothesis but something we can and do test. Furthermore, there's no reason to believe and no way to test a hypothesis that they don't have an external cause.

The only world to which you have access is the world of phenomena inside your head.

Nope. That's the sophomoric confusion of how you know something with what you know.

[Terrapin Station]

There's no difference between phenomena and noumena. It's just that phenomena is never the "complete set of facts" about anything.

Oh, my. I'd suggest a careful reading of Kant.

Kant sucks. I suggest tossing him in the trash along with Wittgenstein.

[creation]

Is there any distinction?

If there isn't then "absolute" is redundant and you should just write "belief."

An example of 'absolute belief' is provided in your very next comment.

I am just pointing out that you have beliefs,

Of course. Everyone does.

Here is a PRIME EXAMPLE of a human being expressing their own belief as though it is thee absolute Truth of things.

How are you defining 'everyone' here? And, are you absolutely 100% positively, without doubt, SURE that your own personal belief that "Everyone has beliefs" is absolutely True?

If you are, then what proof do you have that just 'I' have beliefs, let alone all the other ones who obviously do not have beliefs.

Saying, "everyone" is expressing an 'absolute belief'. A term of absoluteness when expressed as a belief is an 'absolute belief'.

and you expose them as being absolutely true, right, and correct, although you also like to express that there is no absolutely true, right, and correct anyway.

Would you say there are beliefs that people don't think are "absolutely true" etc.?

No, I would not. And, I would even go as far to say there are beliefs that people believe are 'absolutely true'.

But human beings can express a belief about something that is not absolute, compared to something that is said to be absolute. For example, someone could say something like: "Some people have beliefs while others do not", which is a belief that is believed to be 'absolutely true', but it is not expressed in an absolute context. For example, Someone could say something like: "Everyone has beliefs", which is also a belief that is believed to be 'absolutely true', but it is expressed in an absolute context.

Saying that "Everyone has beliefs" is expressing one's own beliefs in an 'absolute context'.

Trying to speak for 'everyone' as though one KNOWS 'every one' is a belief in the 'absolute sense'.

Do you ever like to stay on the actual topic?

I address what people say. If you use a term like "absolute belief," it's not on-topic?

Again, you make a statement, but just add a question mark at the end of that statement.

Are you asking me, If I use a term like 'absolute belief', is it not on topic? or, are you telling me, If I use a term like 'absolute belief', it is not on topic.

If it is the former, then when I used the term 'absolute belief' in the context that I did, then it was on topic.

Then why use the term if you only want to stay on topic?

It appears you have once again answered your own statements with a question mark on the end of it all by yourself, and carried on as though you already know what the actual truth is. I actually used the term on topic, so the question you have asked here has absolutely nothing at all to do with me. So, only you can now answer your own question here yourself.

Avoid saying stuff that's off-topic if you don't want anyone to comment on it.

I wrote: If, and when, you stop thinking of 'right and wrong', or 'true and false', being "embedded" in the extramental world, then you will decease with the constant absolute beliefs that you have and are sharing here with us now. What I said here was obviously on topic.

I was just explaining HOW and WHY you are not seeing what it is that actually makes 'morality' objective.

What could make morality objective is agreement.

Do you agree or disagree with this statement?

It has nothing to do with the way I use the term "objective." If someone else is using a different definition of "objective," then that would make morality objective on their schematic.

It's just like if someone were to say, "What makes morality objective is that it's a moral stance I hold. I hold that it's morally permissible to commit murder. Therefore that's an objective moral stance." So that would be a moral objective stance to that person. It wouldn't have anything to do with how I use the term "objective" though.

If you disagree with this, then why?

As I've already noted, I use "objective" to denote the complement of "mental phenomena."


. . . again, too many different issues for one post, so I'm cutting it off.

Okay.

So, now that that is settled, and that what could make morality objective is agreement with and by everyone, then we now, at least, have something we can use to find out and see whether this is actually true or not.

I have already provided one example of a moral issue that everyone could agree with, which when looked at and into fully will help in finding the answers to what is actually right and wrong in Life, in that if we only did the right, then that would help in reaching and making the goal of morality become a reality. That goal is; Living in peace and harmony with everyone together as One.

[Terrapin Station]

Here is a PRIME EXAMPLE of a human being expressing their own belief as though it is thee absolute Truth of things.

How are you defining 'everyone' here? And, are you absolutely 100% positively, without doubt, SURE that your own personal belief that "Everyone has beliefs" is absolutely True?

That it's the case, yes. I wouldn't call it "absolutely true."

But so apparently you would say there's a difference between "absolute belief" and "belief" after all then?
As I've explained before, everyone has beliefs or they'd not be able to function. You'd not be able to eat, or go to the bathroom (via a toilet, at least), or type things on message boards, or watch TV, or anything else if you didn't have beliefs.
Ah--so you're apparently just using "absolute" to refer to "all" or "everything" etc.?

[qoute]Again, you make a statement, but just add a question mark at the end of that statement.

Well, or I'm actually asking you a question.

Are you asking me, If I use a term like 'absolute belief', is it not on topic?

I'm asking you if you don't think it's on topic. Hence the question mark.

Again, too long. Too many issues, so cutting off here.

[creation]

You actually believe that you have the right to go around slapping others, scaring others with your dog, and even killing others whenever you feel like it. But, absolutely NOTHING in the Universe has the right to ever do absolutely anything like this to you, nor to your dog.

I expect everyone has a point where slapping a person is justifable.
I told you - you hurt my dog - I hurt you.
It's not rocket science.
ROTFL

And I told you absolutely anyone else could use the exact same "excuse" to try to "justify" their obviously wrong behaviors. Having a 'point' at where one tries to "justify" harming and/or hurting another is just an "excuse" for doing wrong, and a very weak excuse at that. I can just as easily forewarn you; you scare or hurt me, my child, or my dog - then I hurt you. Is that absolutely understood?

See, what can be seen here, which obviously you have not yet recognized nor yet seen, is this kind of thinking and so called "reasoning" is the most absurd and stupidest of human being thinking that there is, and which is part of the reason WHY human beings, in the days of when this is written, live in the most idiotic and stupidest of ways.

As for "this" being "rocket science", then it is "rocket science" that will eventually lead to human beings demise.

Roll around on the floor laughing as much as you like. The "world" will just keep crumbling on around you. Although, really you would not and do not care one little bit, just as long as you and your dog are okay. Am I right?

You have no idea just how stupid you sound.

PERFECT. The lack of understanding that 'i' have of how stupid 'i' am sounding now, provides the absolute evidence and PROOF of what it is that I am pointing out, revealing, and showing the readers here.

This, I do not expect 'you' to yet understand at all.

You have constructed a fantasy world about who I am and what my dog is like.

Have I?

Or, are you making assumptions and jumping to conclusions, and in doing so have actually MISSED the whole point of what is IS that I have been saying, revealing, and showing here, which is; You believe you have certain rights, but do not afford those exact same rights to others.

What exactly do you assume and/or believe I have supposedly constructed about who you are and what your dog is like?

Could that assumption or belief of yours here be wrong?

Let my show you what my dog looks like.

Again, this is just more proof that your "world" revolves around 'you' and the selected 'few' you want in it.

I am showing how IF people want to seriously live in a Truly peaceful and harmonious "world", then how this is and will be achieved. I am even using examples of how through 'agreement' ALL animals are protected and cared for, just like you would do with and for that one and only animal.

See, in your own little "world" your dog is protected no matter what. But, you will kill other animals and eat them, just because you 'want' to, and because you believe you have the right to, which as I have been saying and pointing out is part of the very reason WHY human beings are killing each other, and literally themselves, as they destroy their one and only home that they live on.

I was just writing in a particular way to stir you right up, to show just how easily human beings will react and hurt others just because of the beliefs that they have and hold and maintain onto.

To me, your dog is NO more special and NO more important, nor less special and less important, than any other living thing this, including ALL human beings themselves. Showing me a picture of your dog is NOT going to make me love it any more, nor love it any less, than my own children for example. To me, they are ALL equal.

To me, there is no one animal that is more, nor less, special than another, and remember a human being is just another animal.

To me, ALL animals, including ALL human beings, are the same and need as much love, care, and protection as they can get. But, to me, there is not one that needs more love, more care, nor more protection over another one. But, as I continually say; I do look at and see things very differently than others.

[GE Morton]

Not sensory data "represented." Sensory data (directly) perceived.

Oh, I'm sure even you can see that is false. Assuming, of course, that you accept the standard theories of optics and neurophysiology. The data delivered to your brain is a series of electrical impulses originating in cell complexes in the sensory organs. Though their patterns may vary from event to event and from organ to organ, those pulses are identical from all organs. But you don't perceive those pulses. What you perceive is a representation of that data --- a color, a smell, a sound, a tactile sensation, which your brain creates based on the source of that data stream --- which sensory organ sent it. It is a representation in exactly the same sense as the images you now see on your computer screen are representations of a stream of bits sent to it from the CPU or video chip.

External things you see.

What you see is a pattern of shapes and colors constructed by your brain from a stream of neural "bits" arriving from some sense organ. You see nothing external; you don't even see the bits. That something external somehow stimulated your retina to send those bits is an hypothesis, a theorem of a theory you have concocted or adopted --- a useful and perhaps even necessary hypothesis, but still a hypothesis.

It's not just a hypothesis but something we can and do test.

Really? Please describe that test. Be careful to avoid circularity.

Furthermore, there's no reason to believe and no way to test a hypothesis that they don't have an external cause.

I didn't say they had no external cause. I said that, though we must postulate an external cause, we can say nothing about that cause other than that it exists. We certainly don't see it, smell it, it feel it, etc., since those sense impressions are all internal.

[GE Morton]

Kant sucks. I suggest tossing him in the trash along with Wittgenstein.

LOL. Ok.

[creation]

Here is a PRIME EXAMPLE of a human being expressing their own belief as though it is thee absolute Truth of things.

How are you defining 'everyone' here? And, are you absolutely 100% positively, without doubt, SURE that your own personal belief that "Everyone has beliefs" is absolutely True?

That it's the case, yes. I wouldn't call it "absolutely true."

Once again, not answering and clarifying my clarifying questions asked, leaves me not knowing exactly what you are actually meaning.

So, you say that "Everyone has beliefs", but then stipulate this as not calling it 'absolutely true'.

Either you believe it to be true, or it is just what you think it is true. So, which one is it?

But so apparently you would say there's a difference between "absolute belief" and "belief" after all then?

Once again, you are making a statement, and then just adding a question mark on to the end of it.

Why do you do this? And, will I apply the reason that you hopefully will provide this time, for each and every time you do this? Or, do you sometimes do this for other reasons?

As I've explained before, everyone has beliefs or they'd not be able to function.

1. You did not "explain" this before. You just 'said' this before. This is just a repeat of just what you "said" previously.
2. You just saying that this is what occurs does not mean that this is actually what does occur. You need to provide evidence and/or proof.
3, Last time you said this, if I recall correctly, I provided examples of how this is not true, and/or I asked you clarifying questions, which if you had answered would have either proven or disproved what you say here. Some might be suggesting the reason WHY you did not answer the clarifying questions previously.

Human beings can quite easily and very simply function without beliefs. This has been proven time and time again. If, and when, you answer my previous clarifying questions OPENLY and Honestly, then what I am saying can be clearly seen and understood.

You'd not be able to eat, or go to the bathroom (via a toilet, at least), or type things on message boards, or watch TV, or anything else if you didn't have beliefs.

This is so far beyond ridiculous now that it is not even funny anymore.

LISTEN. I do NOT have any beliefs. Accept it or do not. But, if you do not accept it, then there is nothing that I could do to prove that your belief is just plain old WRONG.

What beliefs do new born babies have? Do they function?

How are you defining the word 'belief' here?

Ah--so you're apparently just using "absolute" to refer to "all" or "everything" etc.?

Once again, you make another statement and just add a question mark onto the end of it.

[qoute]Again, you make a statement, but just add a question mark at the end of that statement.
Well, or I'm actually asking you a question.

I suggest if you want to ask others questions, then ask a question and not make a statement.

Are you asking me, If I use a term like 'absolute belief', is it not on topic?

I'm asking you if you don't think it's on topic. Hence the question mark.

I told you what my answer is already.

Again, too long. Too many issues, so cutting off here.

That is one way of getting out of this.

I suggest if you are not capable of clarifying and responding to my responses, answers, and corrections, then you do not write so much that needs to be responded to, answered, and corrected.

Obviously what could make morality objective is agreement with and by everyone. That is all that is really needed to be said in relation to answering this topic's question.

[Terrapin Station]

Oh, I'm sure even you can see that is false. Assuming, of course, that you accept the standard theories of optics and neurophysiology.

You can't appeal to optics and neurophysiology if all you can get at are representations where there's no way to ground anything in direct, accurate perceptions of the external world. Claiming representationalism and also claiming accurate knowledge of what eyes are, how they work, etc. is attempting to have your cake and eat it, too.

[Terrapin Station]

Either you believe it to be true, or it is just what you think it is true. So, which one is it?

I have no idea what distinction you might be attempting to make between "believing" that something is true or that something is the case and "thinking" that something is true or that something is the case.

Once again, you are making a statement, and then just adding a question mark on to the end of it.

That was a question, not a statement. What do you think I was stating? If you can't even read something that simple this is going to be like pulling teeth.

Didn't read the rest.

[Sculptor1]

To me, ALL animals, including ALL human beings, are the same and need as much love, care, and protection as they can get. But, to me, there is not one that needs more love, more care, nor more protection over another one. But, as I continually say; I do look at and see things very differently than others.

To be clear.
I don't give a rat's **** about your hypocrisy.
I care more about my dog, than the insects that your vegetarianism is killing.
In fact I make no apology that I love my dog to the same depth as my disdain I hold for you and the ramblings your fantasy world.
At least I'm honest.

[creation]

Either you believe it to be true, or it is just what you think it is true. So, which one is it?

I have no idea what distinction you might be attempting to make between "believing" that something is true or that something is the case and "thinking" that something is true or that something is the case.

If you cannot make a distinction between 'believing' and 'thinking', then so be it.

If you do not ask a clarifying question, then obviously you are not at all interested in learning and understanding more or anew.

Once again, you are making a statement, and then just adding a question mark on to the end of it.

That was a question, not a statement. What do you think I was stating?

My mistake. I misread it. I apologize.

The answer to your question is obviously yes, if you read what I simply wrote.

If you can't even read something that simple this is going to be like pulling teeth.

Yes we could say this.

But what is it that you want to get across here?

I have already shown what could make morality objective. All I have seen from you are your own beliefs, which you have yet to back and support.

By the way, there is an extreme lot of what I have written and asked you in very simple terms, which it could be said you could not read nor understand.

Didn't read the rest.

Of course you would not, because of what they show and reveal.

[creation]

To me, ALL animals, including ALL human beings, are the same and need as much love, care, and protection as they can get. But, to me, there is not one that needs more love, more care, nor more protection over another one. But, as I continually say; I do look at and see things very differently than others.

To be clear.
I don't give a rat's **** about your hypocrisy.

Where was "my hypocrisy"?

I was writing in a way that just showed that IF I had the same views as you, then how you would not afford those same views to me.

By the way, I do NOT have those same views as you do, and I do care about your hypocrisy. That is why I exposed it, in the way I did.

I care more about my dog, than the insects that your vegetarianism is killing.

I know you do. You have already made it crystal clear that you care more about that stupid mutt than you do about any other living thing, including any human beings, and especially those humans of a darker skin tone than that tone that is on that human body.

In fact I make no apology that I love my dog to the same depth as my disdain I hold for you and the ramblings your fantasy world.
At least I'm honest.

You can try and look all high and mighty now by saying, "At least I am honest", but this will never distract away from your hatred of others and your love of only your self and some mutt.

You kill and eat other's animals, for your own greedy self-serving pleasures, but you would kill any one for even just threatening that stupid dog of yours, just because it is "yours".

Now, talk about hypocrisy. See, I provide the proof and evidence for what I say.

[Peter Holmes]

Obviously what could make morality objective is agreement with and by everyone. That is all that is really needed to be said in relation to answering this topic's question.

I've been trying to follow this discussion, but I'm not sure what the clear lines of your disagreement are.

I apologise for butting in - but the above assertion about objectivity is just plain false, and I think that needs to be said loud and clear.

What we call objectivity is independence from opinion. And that means independence from any and everyone's opinion. So 'agreement with and by everyone' doesn't and can't constitute what we call objectivity.

It's possible to deny that what we call objectivity exists or is possible. But then there's no reason to talk about what we call objectivity. And then, the claim that morality is objective is incoherent anyway.

[Terrapin Station]

I have already shown what could make morality objective.

If we define "objective" as "something that everyone agrees on," then sure, we could wind up with some objective moral stances under that definition (even if I think we don't have any at the moment, especially given seven and a half billion people).

It's just that "objective" in that case wouldn't amount to anything, it wouldn't imply anything, aside from the fact that everyone happens to agree on something at that point in time.

It's just like if Joe were to define "objective" as "what Joe feels." Then every moral stance Joe has would be objective under that definition. It just wouldn't amount to anything or imply anything aside from the fact that Joe has the moral views that Joe has.