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[Atla]

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

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

And there you go again insulting someone and then playing the victim, as usual.
Just who do you think you are to imply that I'm an idiot, by asking whether I think that things other than people exist?

Why can't you just act like this isn't kindergarten? Or is this really what you are used to?

[Terrapin Station]

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

And there you go again insulting someone and then playing the victim, as usual.
Just who do you think you are to imply that I'm an idiot, by asking whether I think that things other than people exist?

Why can't you just act like this isn't kindergarten? Or is this really what you are used to?

Again, why won't you answer a simple question?

[Terrapin Station]

I'm asking you the simple question I'm asking you for a reason related to what you were saying. But we need to start with the simple question first.

[Consul]

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?

The ontological question is: Are the subject, the content, and the object of experience (perception) three (totally) different things or one (totally) identical thing?
I'm still unsure what your answer is.

[Terrapin Station]

I'm actually interested in learning more about your views, by the way, but if you aren't willing to even answer a simple, kindergarten-level question, it's going to be difficult to have a conversation with you where we explore your views.

[Atla]

I'm asking you the simple question I'm asking you for a reason related to what you were saying. But we need to start with the simple question first.

Let's start with even simpler questions first. Can you count to three? Because we were talking about three things, but let's establish first whether or not those are too many things at once for you.

[Terrapin Station]

I'm asking you the simple question I'm asking you for a reason related to what you were saying. But we need to start with the simple question first.

Let's start with even simpler questions first. Can you count to three? Because we were talking about three things, but let's establish first whether or not those are too many things at once for you.

Can I count to three? Yes.

See how easy it is to answer a question like that?

Are you acting like you are because you can't imagine someone saying that both people and things that aren't people exist? (Some people would say that either one or both don't exist. I don't want to assume that you're going to answer a particular way. Hence why I'd ask.)

[Terrapin Station]

Oops, that should have read, "You can't imagine someone denying that both people and things that aren't people exist"

[Sculptor1]

Oops, that should have read, "You can't imagine someone denying that both people and things that aren't people exist"

Do you mean You can't imagine someone denying that both people and things that aren't themselves exist" ?

[Terrapin Station]

Oops, that should have read, "You can't imagine someone denying that both people and things that aren't people exist"

Do you mean You can't imagine someone denying that both people and things that aren't themselves exist" ?

No. "Things that aren't themselves" could be an ontological category that someone might posit (whatever it would amount to--I'd have to try to figure that out), but that's not what I'm asking him about.

Some people would say that if we do an inventory of everything that exists, that inventory will include:

People
Other things that are not people (for example, they might say that coffee cups also exist, and say that coffee cups aren't people).

But some people would deny this. Maybe they think that only people exist (for example, idealists might be one category of people who would say this, and they might say that coffee cups aren't different than people, but are only things that people think of as mental phenomena). Maybe they think that people don't actually exist, but things that aren't people exist (however that would work exactly for them). Maybe they think that neither exist (maybe they deny anything exists, however that would work for them, or maybe they don't classify anything as either people or things, or whatever).

I can't know exactly what his view is on this until I ask him. Apparently though he finds it offensive or insulting somehow to ask such things.

[Sy Borg]

As for grand claims made about the claustrum, just to jog your memory, here are some headlines from a few years ago:

Those are headlines, mostly created by hysterical journalists and editors trying to get attention. To repeat: there was NEVER a time when a majority of cognitive neuroscientists were converging on a consensus that the claustrum was going to solve the problem of consciousness. But there has been such a consensus around some version or other of the global neuronal workspace model, since the 1990's.

There's been plenty who have figured that they were on the verge of cracking the code; that's where the journos get their material. Researchers have been "almost there" since the 1990s too.

I personally find the idea that organisms never experienced anything of their lives for billions of years until the evolution of brains is not realistic. I think it more likely that qualia as we know it - internality - stems from the processes of life, which then evolved nervous systems to protect vital organs.

[Sculptor1]

Do you mean You can't imagine someone denying that both people and things that aren't themselves exist" ?

No. "Things that aren't themselves" could be an ontological category that someone might posit (whatever it would amount to--I'd have to try to figure that out), but that's not what I'm asking him about.

Sorry I was joking

Some people would say that if we do an inventory of everything that exists, that inventory will include:

People
Other things that are not people (for example, they might say that coffee cups also exist, and say that coffee cups aren't people).

But some people would deny this.

But they would not be being serious, really.
Have you met one?

Maybe they think that only people exist (for example, idealists might be one category of people who would say this, and they might say that coffee cups aren't different than people, but are only things that people think of as mental phenomena).

I think some people might claim that they only could be sure of their own existence. But I do not think any one needs be taken seriously beyond that simple doubt. I think the main problem here would be, the less than critical taken for granted of the realist position "If I can kick it it is real", position. Because even the most resistant to skepticism might agree that what constitutes "a thing; (the 'it')", a "kick " and "real" ought not be taken as completely obvious.
The boundary of what constitutes a "thing" is partial and interested.

Maybe they think that people don't actually exist, but things that aren't people exist (however that would work exactly for them). Maybe they think that neither exist (maybe they deny anything exists, however that would work for them, or maybe they don't classify anything as either people or things, or whatever).

I think you might be tilting at windmills here.

I can't know exactly what his view is on this until I ask him. Apparently though he finds it offensive or insulting somehow to ask such things.

[Sculptor1]

I can't know exactly what his view is on this until I ask him. Apparently though he finds it offensive or insulting somehow to ask such things.

How can people still take this position, when it was refuted by science and psychology 50-100 years ago (and it was refuted by Oriental philosophy thousands of years ago)?
Well, they still can because this position was NOT "refuted by science and psychology 50-100 years ago" and it was NOT "refuted by Oriental philosophy thousands of years ago."
It's just plain silly to postulate experiencerless experiences, self-experiencing experiences, or experiences experienced by other experiences. Experiences are events of experiencing, and experiencings are passive affections or passions (in the good old Aristotelian sense of the term "pathos" or "passio"), which cannot exist without patients that aren't passions themselves but their subjects. John Foster is absolutely right when he says that "mental items can occur only as elements in the lives of mental subjects," and that "for an experience to occur is for a subject to experience something."
Of course it was refuted. The ancient subject-object dichotomy was a fairly reasonable, intuitive idea back then. But now we know that it's either made up, or if it isn't made up, then there is no sign of it.

I decided to find out who "he" is in your last sentence. And to uncover the statement that caused the problem. I had to go quite far back to find something that was no just bickering to get to some substance. Atla in BOLD

So, Atla seems to be implying, rather than saying out right, that the subject/object dichotomy is made up (implying a myth or falsehood). His sentence ends with an "IT" so there is a little bit of ambiguity here. What, in fact, is "it". Is it the subject/object dichotomy, or is "it" the claim that it is made up? Looks like there is no sign of it being made up. In which case he would be implying that it is NOT made up.
You ask for clarity, by saying ""You can't imagine someone denying that both people and things that aren't people exist", which parses badly. Because there is no "people" that are not "people", is a contradiction.

What seems to be happening here is that Consul is making a fairly clear statement, though somewhat garbled (eg what is meant by patient?), which concludes that "mental items can occur only as elements in the lives of mental subjects, {and that} for an experience to occur is for a subject to experience something."
In my view Atla's response to this is obscure, as if he did not really read it through properly.
Am I correct is thinking that you have taken this as Atla's rejection of the subject-object dichotomy?

It seems to me that the acceptance of the subject-object dichotomy, is not tantamount to taking an ontological or epistemological position; nor does it imply an absolute assertion that such a thing is pristine or properly basic. The subject-object dichotomy is no more than a methodology to help separate desire from truth. It cannot be used to imply or assert any kind of absolute truth in the objective, nor an absolute failing of acquiring the truth in an experience (which is necessarily at heart subjective).
The subject-object dichotomy may be no more than an aspiration that we can be sure of something beyond what we wish for, or feel is true.
But one thing is for sure. An objective fact is relative.

[Gertie]

I'm suggesting that such a framing might be a way of thinking, reflected and reinforced by grammar, which might not be appropriate here.
It's a natural way to think when we look at the material world, we see subjects and objects do thing. That's our ingrained everyday way of thinking.

I don't accept the objection that the substance-attribute (object/subject-attribute) ontology is based on nothing but an erroneous projection of grammatical categories onto reality.

QUOTE>
"There is an argument against substrata that Locke did not anticipate that deserves brief consideration.
The argument is that we come to believe in the need for substrata simply because it is suggested by the subject-predicate form of our language (and also, presumably, by the (Ex) of quantification in logic). Then it is argued that some languages (and also, presumably, some logics) don't have this subject-predicate form. So, the conclusion seems to be that the notion of, and supposed need for, substrata is due only to, and suggested by, a local, parochial linguistic form.
It is very difficult to see the force of this argument. First, the claim that some languages lack anything like a subject-predicate form is not the proven linguistic fact that it is argued to be. However, the argument cannot be at all conclusive, even if this claim were true. Because, secondly, if some languages suggest a substratum and some do not, the question should still arise 'Which are right?' Then the argument for substrata, and against alternative theories, would have to be considered."

(Martin, C. B. "Substance Substantiated." Australasian Journal of Philosophy 58/1 (1980): 3–10. pp. 8-9)
<QUOTE

But it might not be the same for non-material experience. A sense of self, an experiential sense of being a discrete , unified entity located in time and space, with a specific first person pov correlated with this body, might all there is to it.
What actually is the difference between an ongoing experiential sense of self, deriving from the ways experiential states manifest I outlined previously, and a Subject-Self Experiencer?

What exactly is a "sense of self"? Is it a kind of experience or a kind of self-awareness/self-consciousness, a kind of self-belief or self-knowledge?
Whatever, my central point is simply that no matter what kind of entity I am, it's an a priori knowable, ontologically necessary truth that I as a haver or undergoer of experiences am not an experience myself but something else. My experiences depend on me as their experiencer. Its ontological dependence on an experiencer is part of the essence of an experience.

QUOTE>
"Consider a subject of experience as it is present and alive in the living moment of experience. Consider its experience—where by the word 'experience' I mean the experiential-qualitative character of experience, experiential 'what-it's-likeness', and absolutely nothing else. Strip away in thought everything other than the being of this experience. When you do this, the subject remains. You can't get rid of the subject of experience, in taking a portion of experience or experiential what-it's-likeness and stripping away everything other than the existence of that experience. Concretely occurring experience can't possibly exist without a subject of experience existing. If you strip away the subject, you haven't got experience any more. You can't get things down to concretely occurring experiential content existing at a given time without an experiencer existing at that time. This is the Experience/Experiencer Thesis:

(1) Experience is impossible without an experiencer.

One shouldn't think that stripping away everything other than the being of experience can somehow leave something less than at complete subject of experience, something that has, as such, no right to the full title 'subject'. Experience is experiencing: whatever remains if experience remains, something that is correctly called a subject must remain. One can reach this conclusion without endorsing any view about the ontological category of this subject, or indeed of experience."
(pp. 253-4)

"Experience is necessarily experience-for—experience for someone or something. I intend this only in the sense in which it is necessarily true, and without commitment to any particular account of the metaphysical nature of the someone-or-something. To claim that experience is necessarily experience-for, experience-for-someone-or-something, is to claim that it is necessarily experience on the part of a subject of experience. Again I intend this only in the sense in which it is a necessary truth, and certainly without any commitment to the idea that subjects of experience are persisting things. This is the Experience/Experiencer Thesis.
Some say one can’t infer the existence of a subject from the existence of experience (see e.g. Stone 1988, 2005), only the existence of subjectivity, but I understand the notion of the subject in a maximally ontologically non-committal way: in such a way that the presence of subjectivity is already sufficient for the presence of a subject, so that 'there is subjectivity, but there isn't a subject' can’t possibly be true.
Consider pain, a well known experience. It is, essentially, a feeling, and a feeling is just that, a feeling, i.e. a feel-ing, a being-felt, and a feel-ing or being-felt can’t possibly exist without there being a feel-er. Again, I'm only interested in the sense in which this is a necessary truth. The noun ‘feeler’ doesn’t import any metaphysical commitment additional to the noun 'feeling'. It simply draws one's attention to the full import of 'feeling'. The sense in which it’s necessarily true that there's a feeling, and hence a feeler, of pain, if there is pain at all, is the sense in which it's necessarily true that there's a subject of experience if there is experience, and hence subjectivity, at all. These truths are available prior to any particular metaphysics of object or property or process or event or state."
(p. 258)

(Strawson, Galen. "The Minimal Subject." In The Oxford Handbook of the Self, edited by Shaun Gallagher, 253-278. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011.)
<QUOTE

It needs to be mentioned that the Experience/Experiencer Thesis comes in two different versions: nonreductive realism about experiencers/subjects of experience and reductive realism about them. According to the former—which is the position I endorse and defend!—, experiencers/subjects of experience exist and they are different from their experiences. According to the latter—which seems to be endorsed and defended by Strawson—, experiencers/subjects of experience exist and they are identical with their experiences. I agree with Peter Unger, John Forrest, and others that it's ontologically nonsensical to say so, because no experience can possibly be its own subject or the subject of other experiences. Feelings cannot feel themselves or other feelings; thinkings cannot be thought by themselves or other thinkings.

Can you tell m what aspect of my Self is there if/when I'm not experiencing?

No object is an actual subject of experience unless it actually experiences something; so, for example, a dreamlessly sleeping person is not an actual subject. But s/he's still a potential subject as opposed to a stone or a clock, which inherently lacks the capacity for subjective experience.

Being a materialist and an animalist about psychological/phenomenological subjects/selves/egos/persons, who thinks that we are human animals, I think I exist independently of my experiences; so I'm still there as a material object when I don't actually experience anything due to being temporarily unconscious. I even think I'll still be there as a permanently unconscious dead animal until I'm cremated or naturally destroyed through decay.

OK, so you think the substrate is the Subject, the Self which does experiencing. To have a go at summarising -

You believe the self is located in the body, and when the body is having experiential states, becomes a Subject. (Noun doing Verb).

When in a dreamless asleep, the body is no longer a Subject, but a potential Subject, till it wakes up and starts experiencing again. But the body is still where the Self is located, even when asleep or dead, just not in Subject mode?

Hence you say you can't have an experience, without a Substrate-Self to experience it.

Are you a materialist who believes experiences are or aren't reducible to physical processes? And how does that tie in to the Experience-Experiencer dichotomy?


My position is that it is the inherent nature of experiential states which create A Sense of being a Self. So it's more like experiencing introduces 'a sense of self' to the substrate's processes.

Namely - A sense of being a discrete, unified being with a first person pov, recognising correlation with a specific body moving through space and time, navigating an 'external'/third person pov world of of objects, other subjects, stuff happening,etc.

In effect, locating 'Selfness' in the particular ways in which experiential states can manifest.


But not necessarily always. There might be less complex creatures, which don't possess the particular features of experiential states humans do, and I'd say they don't have A Sense of Self, of being a discrete, unified Subject in a world of Objects. For example a moth might (or might not) experience a difference between light and dark only, but not have this Sense of being a Self. But it would be a Subject-Self for you, because it has a body which is experiencing.


Would you roughly agree with that summary.?

[Faustus5]

Researchers have been "almost there" since the 1990s too.

No one in the mainstream of science has ever made such a claim. Not sure what you think you gain by making this kind of stuff up.