gourimoko
Fighting the good fight!
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1) Philosophers often refer to science for their premises as questions of science and philosophy intermix all the time. Attempting to remove scientific fact from philosophy is an exercise in futility. You're doing this because the science does not back up your claim that there is a definite universal reality - we do not know if that is true.
#1: place-marker; you'll need to read #2 first, then come back to #1.
2) You say subjective perception is not reality, when this is completely contradictory to what we understand about the world around us. You don't really provide any proofs to your argument, you just state it as factual and keep moving. Whereas, scientifically, proofs can be applied. Here's one that completely contradicts your argument:
Whenever someone references "the Universe," 99% of the time they are referring to our Universe, which is also known as the Observable Universe. This is an area of spacetime defined by what we on Earth can and cannot perceive and interact with. From a positivist standpoint, this area is the Universe for all practical purposes. This area is defined by a region of spacetime with the Earth at it's very center. So whenever someone asks you, "where is the center of the Universe" simply say "go look in the mirror."
In physics, you - the observer - are the center of the Universe; and this isn't theoretical physics, but a concept that has existed for thousands of years. The region that defines the edge of the Universe is known as the light horizon and represents the maximum distance allowed for any causal link between us, and any other particle in the universe. Anything beyond this horizon, for any practical purpose, does not exist within our reality as it would not meet the criteria for something that is "real."
#1 cont'd) Now that we've covered #2, we can come back to your "if a tree falls" scenario. I think you, in a rush to prove your own preconceived beliefs, completely misunderstand the question at hand. If a tree falls in a forest and no one observed it; then we have no idea if it fell or not. It might not have; therefore, we cannot say with certainty one way or the other if it fell. That is a truism, it isn't up for debate.
The other question is, did it make a sound? The answer to that question is the same as the answer to the first, "it might have." You jump to the conclusion that it did make a sound, without considering it may not have. You assume it fell violently, but it might not have. You assume it fell fast, but it might have fallen over 100 years centimeter by centimeter.
What you're missing is the differentiation between logical inference and logical deduction by measuring the past.
This is obvious if you take the question at hand and use propositional calculus to try and find a conclusion. You immediately see that you cannot, with any certainty, answer the question using deductive reasoning. Instead, you have to infer a possible or perhaps probable conclusion on some set of agreed upon data.
Going back to the nature and structure of the Universe. We believe the Universe extends out, infinitely, beyond the light horizon. But since we cannot see anything over the horizon, and never will be able to, we have to infer the existence of all the objects that might exist beyond it. But what this means is that our Universe is completely subjective to our perception of it (based on our position and force vectors).
Again, the nature of reality itself is not as you describe it.
#3: You cannot, by way of deductive reasoning, disagree with a conclusion if the premises of the argument are agreed upon. You again misunderstand basic logic if you think this is possible.
If person A asserts arguments x,y,z to person B; and person B agrees with those assertions; if the argument stands as logically valid, and the conclusion is contained within the scope of the premises, then person B must agree with person A - regardless of their preconceived notions.
That's what deductive reasoning and logic is, that's what it's all about. Finding truth. We talked about this before and I know you don't really get these concepts because you think debate is about simply voicing your own opinion to an audience, rather than seeking the truth; but philosophically, that is not the case.
Again, the entire purpose of logic, propositional calculus, deductive reasoning, critical thinking, is to use abstractions of fact to derive and deduce the truth. Preconceived notions irrelevant here, because to agree on facts means you agree on those preconceptions.
Lastly: you assert, again, that one cannot logically debate morality; but this is farcical. The entire study of ethics, in it's entirety, is the application of logic to morality. There may not be a universal ethic; but this doesn't mean we cannot use logic to derive a common ethic. Again, I think you fundamentally do not understand these concepts from an academic perspective and that's what's holding you back.
You need somewhat more than an elementary understanding of these concepts to make bold assertions about what is or isn't true or possible, or what is or isn't factual. I'm quite educated on these topics, an expert in some, and I wouldn't think for a second to state with certainty some of the conclusions you've come to.
tl;dr:
You said: I object to the "perception is reality" cliché because it implies that every perception is equally valid and worthy of respect, and that we each have our own "reality". Perspectives that distort what actually happens/exists are delusions, not "different realities".
But your objection isn't grounded in logic. We have known with certainty for almost 100 years that the observer is as important as the observation. We have our own reality because our own Universe is centered around us, the observer, thus by definition, if reality and the universe are analogous then reality is centered around the observer.
You assume there is a universal "actual" reality, which is a concept abandoned in science a long time ago. Any grad student could easily defeat your argument with the simple thought experiment:
Alice and Bob live together and share identical wristwatches that tell time with precision. Alice works as an airline stewardess. Alice gets on a round-trip flight from New York to Miami and back. When Alice returns home, she and Bob look at their clocks and disagree on what time it is. Who is right, Alice or Bob?
#1: place-marker; you'll need to read #2 first, then come back to #1.
2) You say subjective perception is not reality, when this is completely contradictory to what we understand about the world around us. You don't really provide any proofs to your argument, you just state it as factual and keep moving. Whereas, scientifically, proofs can be applied. Here's one that completely contradicts your argument:
Whenever someone references "the Universe," 99% of the time they are referring to our Universe, which is also known as the Observable Universe. This is an area of spacetime defined by what we on Earth can and cannot perceive and interact with. From a positivist standpoint, this area is the Universe for all practical purposes. This area is defined by a region of spacetime with the Earth at it's very center. So whenever someone asks you, "where is the center of the Universe" simply say "go look in the mirror."
In physics, you - the observer - are the center of the Universe; and this isn't theoretical physics, but a concept that has existed for thousands of years. The region that defines the edge of the Universe is known as the light horizon and represents the maximum distance allowed for any causal link between us, and any other particle in the universe. Anything beyond this horizon, for any practical purpose, does not exist within our reality as it would not meet the criteria for something that is "real."
#1 cont'd) Now that we've covered #2, we can come back to your "if a tree falls" scenario. I think you, in a rush to prove your own preconceived beliefs, completely misunderstand the question at hand. If a tree falls in a forest and no one observed it; then we have no idea if it fell or not. It might not have; therefore, we cannot say with certainty one way or the other if it fell. That is a truism, it isn't up for debate.
The other question is, did it make a sound? The answer to that question is the same as the answer to the first, "it might have." You jump to the conclusion that it did make a sound, without considering it may not have. You assume it fell violently, but it might not have. You assume it fell fast, but it might have fallen over 100 years centimeter by centimeter.
What you're missing is the differentiation between logical inference and logical deduction by measuring the past.
This is obvious if you take the question at hand and use propositional calculus to try and find a conclusion. You immediately see that you cannot, with any certainty, answer the question using deductive reasoning. Instead, you have to infer a possible or perhaps probable conclusion on some set of agreed upon data.
Going back to the nature and structure of the Universe. We believe the Universe extends out, infinitely, beyond the light horizon. But since we cannot see anything over the horizon, and never will be able to, we have to infer the existence of all the objects that might exist beyond it. But what this means is that our Universe is completely subjective to our perception of it (based on our position and force vectors).
Again, the nature of reality itself is not as you describe it.
#3: You cannot, by way of deductive reasoning, disagree with a conclusion if the premises of the argument are agreed upon. You again misunderstand basic logic if you think this is possible.
If person A asserts arguments x,y,z to person B; and person B agrees with those assertions; if the argument stands as logically valid, and the conclusion is contained within the scope of the premises, then person B must agree with person A - regardless of their preconceived notions.
That's what deductive reasoning and logic is, that's what it's all about. Finding truth. We talked about this before and I know you don't really get these concepts because you think debate is about simply voicing your own opinion to an audience, rather than seeking the truth; but philosophically, that is not the case.
Again, the entire purpose of logic, propositional calculus, deductive reasoning, critical thinking, is to use abstractions of fact to derive and deduce the truth. Preconceived notions irrelevant here, because to agree on facts means you agree on those preconceptions.
Lastly: you assert, again, that one cannot logically debate morality; but this is farcical. The entire study of ethics, in it's entirety, is the application of logic to morality. There may not be a universal ethic; but this doesn't mean we cannot use logic to derive a common ethic. Again, I think you fundamentally do not understand these concepts from an academic perspective and that's what's holding you back.
You need somewhat more than an elementary understanding of these concepts to make bold assertions about what is or isn't true or possible, or what is or isn't factual. I'm quite educated on these topics, an expert in some, and I wouldn't think for a second to state with certainty some of the conclusions you've come to.
tl;dr:
You said: I object to the "perception is reality" cliché because it implies that every perception is equally valid and worthy of respect, and that we each have our own "reality". Perspectives that distort what actually happens/exists are delusions, not "different realities".
But your objection isn't grounded in logic. We have known with certainty for almost 100 years that the observer is as important as the observation. We have our own reality because our own Universe is centered around us, the observer, thus by definition, if reality and the universe are analogous then reality is centered around the observer.
You assume there is a universal "actual" reality, which is a concept abandoned in science a long time ago. Any grad student could easily defeat your argument with the simple thought experiment:
Alice and Bob live together and share identical wristwatches that tell time with precision. Alice works as an airline stewardess. Alice gets on a round-trip flight from New York to Miami and back. When Alice returns home, she and Bob look at their clocks and disagree on what time it is. Who is right, Alice or Bob?
