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

[Terrapin Station]

On your view there aren't both people and other things in the world?

You mean that people exist but other things don't exist, or vica versa?

??? No.

At any rate, I was asking you a question, not making any sort of statement.

I'm asking if you think that both people and other things (than people) exist. Do you think this or not?

[Consul]

I've been talking about the subject-content difference, the difference between the subject and the content of consciousness/experience. The object of (perceptual) consciousness/experience is something else, something different both from the subject and from the content. For example, visual perception essentially has three different elements: the seer (subject), the seeing (content), and the seen (object).

Oh so you are using two made-up dichotomies? Neither of them exist for the same reasons.

These conceptual distinctions reflect real differences! The monistic equation the seer (subject) = the seeing (content) = the seen (object) is ontological nonsense.

[Consul]

The monistic equation the seer (subject) = the seeing (content) = the seen (object) is ontological nonsense.

…no matter whether it's asserted by Western philosophers or Eastern ones.

[Terrapin Station]

Are you going to attempt to support this claim or?

"Bundles and collections in the non-set-theoretical, i.e. mereological, sense are sums or aggregates of things; and one thing cannot be a sum or aggregate of things, so correspondingly a bundle or collection of perceptions cannot consist of only one perception. "

[Atla]

You mean that people exist but other things don't exist, or vica versa?

??? No.

At any rate, I was asking you a question, not making any sort of statement.

I'm asking if you think that both people and other things (than people) exist. Do you think this or not?

I wasn't saying that you were making a statement.
Again, let's get this straight: are you actually asking me, whether or not I think that only people exist?

[Consul]

Bundles and collections in the non-set-theoretical, i.e. mereological, sense are sums or aggregates of things; and one thing cannot be a sum or aggregate of things, so correspondingly a bundle or collection of perceptions cannot consist of only one perception.

Support for that claim?

I just saw that my statement that "one thing cannot be a sum or aggregate of things" is incorrect insofar as one thing (as a whole) can certainly be a sum or aggregate of other things. But what I meant to say is that one thing of kind K cannot alone be a mereological sum, aggregate, bundle, or collection of things of the same kind K. For example, one elephant cannot be a herd of elephants, one flower cannot be a bunch of flowers, and one experience cannot be a bundle of experiences.

[Atla]

Oh so you are using two made-up dichotomies? Neither of them exist for the same reasons.

These conceptual distinctions reflect real differences! The monistic equation the seer (subject) = the seeing (content) = the seen (object) is ontological nonsense.

They are all (parts of) the same process. But I really hope you didn't literally equate them?

[Terrapin Station]

Support for that claim?

I just saw that my statement that "one thing cannot be a sum or aggregate of things" is incorrect insofar as one thing (as a whole) can certainly be a sum or aggregate of other things. But what I meant to say is that one thing of kind K cannot alone be a mereological sum, aggregate, bundle, or collection of things of the same kind K. For example, one elephant cannot be a herd of elephants, one flower cannot be a bunch of flowers, and one experience cannot be a bundle of experiences.

You'd need to support how this is a necessary aspect of Hume's bundle theory, since that's what Unger is commenting on.

[Consul]

I just saw that my statement that "one thing cannot be a sum or aggregate of things" is incorrect insofar as one thing (as a whole) can certainly be a sum or aggregate of other things. But what I meant to say is that one thing of kind K cannot alone be a mereological sum, aggregate, bundle, or collection of things of the same kind K. For example, one elephant cannot be a herd of elephants, one flower cannot be a bunch of flowers, and one experience cannot be a bundle of experiences.

Footnote:
In formal mereology we find the following equation: x + x = x. That is, everything is identical to the sum of it and itself, which is a sum with only one element. Such strange sums are formally well-defined, but they are ontologically irrelevant and vacuous. From the perspective of serious ontology, such formalistic pseudo-sums or pseudo-bundles are nonentities.

[Terrapin Station]

??? No.

At any rate, I was asking you a question, not making any sort of statement.

I'm asking if you think that both people and other things (than people) exist. Do you think this or not?

I wasn't saying that you were making a statement.
Again, let's get this straight: are you actually asking me, whether or not I think that only people exist?

I don't know how I can ask you what I'm asking you any more plainly.

Do you believe that people exist as well as things that aren't people?

So ask yourself "Do I believe that people exist?" If your answer to that is "yes," then you can keep going. If your answer is "no," then your overall answer is going to be "no," and we can proceed from there.

Then ask yourself, "Do I believe that things other than people exist?" If you answer to that is "yes," then your overall answer is "yes." If your answer to this is "no," then your overall answer is "no."

If your overall answer is "no," you could say whether you believe that one of those things (people or other things) exists but not the other, or whether you don't believe that either exist.

[Consul]

These conceptual distinctions reflect real differences! The monistic equation the seer (subject) = the seeing (content) = the seen (object) is ontological nonsense.

They are all (parts of) the same process. But I really hope you didn't literally equate them?

No, of course not, since I'm the one insisting on their nonidentity. Of course, different things can be part of the same process; but being part of the same doesn't mean being the same.

[Atla]

I wasn't saying that you were making a statement.
Again, let's get this straight: are you actually asking me, whether or not I think that only people exist?

I don't know how I can ask you what I'm asking you any more plainly.

Do you believe that people exist as well as things that aren't people?

So ask yourself "Do I believe that people exist?" If your answer to that is "yes," then you can keep going. If your answer is "no," then your overall answer is going to be "no," and we can proceed from there.

Then ask yourself, "Do I believe that things other than people exist?" If you answer to that is "yes," then your overall answer is "yes." If your answer to this is "no," then your overall answer is "no."

If your overall answer is "no," you could say whether you believe that one of those things (people or other things) exists but not the other, or whether you don't believe that either exist.

Do you understand that this isn't kindergarten, Terrapin Station?

[Terrapin Station]

I don't know how I can ask you what I'm asking you any more plainly.

Do you believe that people exist as well as things that aren't people?

So ask yourself "Do I believe that people exist?" If your answer to that is "yes," then you can keep going. If your answer is "no," then your overall answer is going to be "no," and we can proceed from there.

Then ask yourself, "Do I believe that things other than people exist?" If you answer to that is "yes," then your overall answer is "yes." If your answer to this is "no," then your overall answer is "no."

If your overall answer is "no," you could say whether you believe that one of those things (people or other things) exists but not the other, or whether you don't believe that either exist.

Do you understand that this isn't kindergarten, Terrapin Station?

Sigh . . . why can't you just answer a simple question rather than being snarky?

[Atla]

They are all (parts of) the same process. But I really hope you didn't literally equate them?

No, of course not, since I'm the one insisting on their nonidentity. Of course, different things can be part of the same process; but being part of the same doesn't mean being the same.

Can you even remotely grasp what is being said here? That they are part of the same process, but there are no different categories here?

[Consul]

No, of course not, since I'm the one insisting on their nonidentity. Of course, different things can be part of the same process; but being part of the same doesn't mean being the same.

Mereologically speaking, one can draw a distinction between total identity and partial identity (and correspondingly between total difference and partial difference), and say that a (proper) part of a whole (with at least two proper parts) is partially identical to the whole by overlapping with it. There is partial identity where there is mereological overlap; and there is total nonidentity where there is no mereological overlap, i.e. no sharing of parts.