I decided to revive this thread in order to respond to what some people have said in the
Whys and Hows thread, so as not to bring that particular thread too far off-topic. So, er, here goes.
Emy wrote:
If you're going to make the claim that there is subjective reality, which we each experience individually, and question the existance of an objective reality, underlying everything, then you have to posit some sort of "collective reality" which is described by science.
No. You're still relying on the idea that the subject exists. As I've said before, I deny the existence of the subject just as I deny the existence of the object. There is just experience - the pre-processed, pre-judgment, pre-conceptual bedrock that underlies absolutely everything. It could be just as accurately called objective as subjective, because both terms are equally inadequate, presuming as they do some sort of pre-organized, unified entity (the universe in the case of objectivity, and the subject/self in the case of subjectivity).
(Actually, to be honest, I don't even believe that pre-conceptual experience itself exists as a pure, foundational metaphysical entity. That's where we'd be getting into the Derridean notion of the fictionality of the moment and such. However, to simplify things, and for the sake of argument, I'm pretending that experience can be treated as a foundational semi-metaphysical entity.)
I have a question for you, however: how does the idea that there is an "objective reality" behind our perceptions explain our world any better than the idea that we are living in a collectively-created reality? I don't quite ascribe to either position, but it seems that, if anything, the "collective-reality" explanation is more logical(*), if only in the fact that it eliminates one entity (the objective world underlying humanity's perceptions) from our model. Assuming both ideas describe our observation equally well (and if someone disagrees with this assumption, please give me a reason for it), Occam's razor would imply that we should choose the latter option.
Reality is a bit hard to flesh out conceptually, as concepts are basically always going to be at least one step away from that reality, being essentially generalizations.
Quote:
um... You can't discuss whether truth has any philosophical meaning unless you agree on a definition, and you can't argue the definition without agreeing that there is something for it to define. So you're not having any kind of arguement, you're just playing word games.
If i'm wrong, please re-state your case a little more plainly.
How am I playing word games simply by stating that truth is a fictional concept?
Quote:
Icy: The most effective model is the most "true" in the sense that it accurately predicts the largest number of things which are experienced by every subject participating in the "collective reality".
Ah, but even the medieval Christian model of the universe explained the observed reality perfectly. (Well, having observed certain things since then, we'd have to make a few alterations (just attribute any contrary observation to mass hallucination!), but still.) I could just say that everything happens totally at random, and that would explain everything that happens as well. Any regularities I see might just be coincidences.
The reason we don't do this is that we have things like Occam's razor telling us that we should use the least number of entities possible in our explanation. This is a totally arbitrary rule that we really have no reason to believe in,
unless we just admit to ourselves that we are not pursuing the truth at all in any form, but are actually just pursuing explanations that will be more convenient and effective than other explanations. Science assumes that all reality can be reduced to a unified set of simple rules. In other words, when given two explanations, one that is very complicated and involves several rule sets governing different aspects of reality, and one that uses relatively few rules in a single rule set to govern every aspect of reality, we should choose the latter.
There is absolutely no reason for us to do this, other than the fact that it is convenient for us. Thus, science may be a more convenient way to explain reality, but there is absolutely no reason we should assume that it is any more accurate than any other explanation. If anyone can actually tell me why we should assume reality is as simple as possible, and is governed by a single rule-set, then please do so. Keep in mind that saying "well, things happen in a regular way, and unified laws can quite easily be made to explain our observations" is not a valid argument, as it still assumes that we
should choose the explanation that involves unified laws. I realize that
not doing so would seem patently ridiculous, but is there any real reason it should seem that way aside from the fact that we, as human beings, have a strong prejudice
against such an idea?
Wark wrote:
As far as the effecient reality vs. Reality, I will only say that the effective reality is proven based on lower, more fundamental realities, until your left with such basics as 2 + 2 = 4.
But see, that's a tautology. We define 2 as "1+1", and we define 4 as "1+1+1+1". Thus, "2+2=4" is "(1+1)+(1+1)=1+1+1+1 ---> 1+1+1+1 = 1+1+1+1", which is essentially the same as saying "A is A".
madadric wrote:
Now that we know what you think after reading a bunch of books, tell us what your experiences have taught you. Has the reality you have experienced subjectively given you any reason to doubt that there is a constant reality that you share with other minds who also exist in this constant reality?
A better question is: has it given me any reason to
believe the above? The answer is no. The only reason I'd believe it is because my intuition tells me to, or society tells me to. All the books I have read have taught me nothing that I could not realize if I had enough time and spent enough effort analyzing my own assumptions, and the validity of those assumptions.
(*) In this case, when I say "logical," I'm talking about what I'll call "effectiveness-based" logic, the same logic whose validity I attack later on in the post.