Criticism

[AshvinP]

False. We deny the dualism of "Experiencing" vs. Thinking in the first place. All Thinking is not other than experiencing, so there is no emergence of one from the other. The latter is generally another word for "perceiving", and Cleric already tried to explain to you the polar relation of Thinking-Perceiving (Idea-Perception), to which you responded "yes I agree" without understanding what it is you are "agreeing" to, as usual.

I agree and was saying exactly the same thing all along. What are we arguing about again?

The only thing I'm saying that this is still a metaphysics based on certain reasonable assumptions. I don't want to lie to people and tell that it is unconditional Truth not based on any assumptions. People still have a choice and freedom to adopt such assumptions or not. I personally actually do adopt them (as a contingent view but not as a religion), but that does not mean anyone else has to.

We are not doing metaphysics. Phenomenology is not metaphysics. We are arguing because you conclude Kant's dualism could be wrong or right, no one knows or could ever know until some unspecified future time. You conclude all we know of Being is "experience/thinking", and everything else is assumption and speculations. I am saying you only conclude this because your assumption that Thinking adds something on top of the world content which exists independently of it. Every time we point this out, you say "I agree, why are we arguing?", and then reassert the same flawed arguments. When we try to point out why you keep reasserting those arguments (unexamined dualism), you feel I am "harassing" you, instead of taking it as a constructive opportunity to discover depths of Thinking which will allow you to move beyond mere "subjective speculation" about Being. And so we keep going around in circles...

[Eugene I]

We are not doing metaphysics. Phenomenology is not metaphysics. We are arguing because you conclude Kant's dualism could be wrong or right, no one knows or could ever know until some unspecified future time. You conclude all we know of Being is "experience/thinking", and everything else is assumption and speculations. I am saying you only conclude this because your assumption that Thinking adds something on top of the world content which exists independently of it. Every time we point this out, you say "I agree, why are we arguing?", and then reassert the same flawed arguments. When we try to point out why you keep reasserting those arguments (unexamined dualism), you feel I am "harassing" you, instead of taking it as a constructive opportunity to discover depths of Thinking which will allow you to move beyond mere "subjective speculation" about Being. And so we keep going around in circles...

That is simply because I choose to be honest, I do not want to lie to myself and people. I am doing exactly that - delving into the depths of Thinking in my spiritual practice. It is not a "speculation" for me, it is a practical spiritual path that relies on a contingent adoption of the idealist worldview. I just want to do it honestly with clear understanding that I (and this worldview) can in principle be wrong.

Remember that this discussion started with me and Shu saying that, under idealism, there is no such thing as "unaware Being", and you criticized us. But now you are saying that "All Thinking is not other than experiencing, so there is no emergence of one from the other." (experiencing = awareness). Huh?

[AshvinP]

False. We deny the dualism of "Experiencing" vs. Thinking in the first place. All Thinking is not other than experiencing, so there is no emergence of one from the other. The latter is generally another word for "perceiving", and Cleric already tried to explain to you the polar relation of Thinking-Perceiving (Idea-Perception), to which you responded "yes I agree" without understanding what it is you are "agreeing" to, as usual.

I agree and was saying exactly the same thing all along. What are we arguing about again?

The only thing I'm saying that this is still a metaphysics based on certain reasonable assumptions. I don't want to lie to people and tell that it is unconditional Truth not based on any assumptions. People still have a choice and freedom to adopt such assumptions or not. I personally actually do adopt them (as a contingent view but not as a religion), but that does not mean anyone else has to.

We are not doing metaphysics. Phenomenology is not metaphysics. We are arguing because you conclude Kant's dualism could be wrong or right, no one knows or could ever know until some unspecified future time. You conclude all we know of Being is "experience/thinking", and everything else is assumption and speculations. I am saying you only conclude this because your assumption that Thinking adds something on top of the world content which exists independently of it. Every time we point this out, you say "I agree, why are we arguing?", and then reassert the same flawed arguments. When we try to point out why you keep reasserting those arguments (unexamined dualism), you feel I am "harassing" you, instead of taking it as a constructive opportunity to discover depths of Thinking which will allow you to move beyond mere "subjective speculation" about Being. And so we keep going around in circles...

(1) Stating that anything else other than the content of your own 1-st person experience exists is already an unprovable assumption. It is a very reasonable assumption and necessary for us to adopt in order to function, yet it is still an assumption. You can break from Hume's solipsism only by adopting certain assumptions.

(2) Another assumption is that nothing else than Thinking exists in reality. How do you ever prove that? The fact that you can never experience anything other than Thinking and its phenomena does not make such assumption automatically true. It is possible in principle that there is something more fundamental to Thinking from which Thinking (consciousness) emerges. Such assumption does run into the "hard problem", but the "hard problem" is not a proof, it is only an explanatory gap.

(1) Where have we stated that? (we haven't)

(2) Where have we stated that? (we haven't)

Also, the notion that's its possible for factors we can never experience or know in principle to be responsible for what we do experience and know is an assumption you are making. It is like the materialist who says, "well you're right that the Cosmos is finely tuned for sentient life, but... it's possible there are infinite multiverses which are not finely tuned!" The abstract, unexperiencable, unknowable possibility you are assuming to avoid the givens of Thinking experience is then somehow projected out as an "assumption" we are making...

I cannot really discuss this further with a person who has shut down all reasoning to the point of blatantly making up things about our position while accusing us of being dishonest. Clearly you have lost all interest in actually discerning the truth of the matter. So this is my last response to you.

[Eugene I]

(1) Where have we stated that? (we haven't)

You are stating that there are experiences existing in Thinking that are "subconscious" (i.e. not directly experienced) to us as individuals (beings) in our current 1-st person experience. That is an assumption.

(2) Where have we stated that? (we haven't)

You state it by denying the existence of non-thinking matter or energy or whatever else from which thinking may emerge, or which may exist independently of thinking (like in substance dualism). Just like here below where you automatically assume that materialism is 100% wrong. The assumption here is that the fact that "something" is unexperiencable automatically means that it is necessarily nonexistent. This is clearly an unwarranted assumption.

Also, the notion that's its possible for factors we can never experience or know in principle to be responsible for what we do experience and know is an assumption you are making. It is like the materialist who says, "well you're right that the Cosmos is finely tuned for sentient life, but... it's possible there are infinite multiverses which are not finely tuned!" The abstract, unexperiencable, unknowable possibility you are assuming to avoid the givens of Thinking experience is then somehow projected out as an "assumption" we are making...

This is a good argument against materialism, but in no way a prof that it is undeniably wrong. You conflate the arguments of reason with proofs.

[Eugene I]

PS: another assumption in any version of idealism that thinking (consciousness) can exist beyond human and animal forms. As JW and Jim Cross pointed may times, this is not even a scientifically proven fact, but only a metaphysical assumption.

Every time I say that these are assumptions and other philosophies like materialism could be true, you accuse me as if I am a materialist. I am not, I am actually an idealist, but I just want to be a honest idealist.

[Martin_]

The Kantian dualism is a metaphysical statement. Correct?
If someone says "You are assuming in Kantian dualism!" then they are doing Metaphysics. Correct?

[Ben Iscatus]

Eugene, it seems you're temporarily off the hook. Do you want me to invite back that neutral monist who insists "value" is the ontological primitive?

[Eugene I]

Eugene, it seems you're temporarily off the hook. Do you want me to invite back that neutral monist who insists "value" is the ontological primitive?

That guy religiously believes that his "neutral OP" is absolute truth, just like Ashvin religiously believes that "nothing than experienceable Thinking exists". I'm arguing that in fact both are just legit variants of metaphysics, but as long as they don't understand their implicit assumptions, it makes their positions to be religions, not philosophies.

On the other hand, as opposed to JW, I do not see anything wrong with adopting certain metaphysical views based on certain assumptions about reality, as long as we remain honest to ourselves and explicitly understand and state that we are making certain assumptions contingently. Just like in science, we need to make assumptions and adopt certain worldviews and models of reality for practical purposes. Such models are pragmatic views, "working hypotheses", they allow us to progress further, but we should remain open to the possibility that in the future we may find out that the current models are wrong and we may adopt better (more appropriate or accurate) worldviews. This happens in science all the time. But if we take one of such models religiously without remaining open to the possibility that it may be wrong, we would lock ourselves into a stagnant religious system of beliefs that impede our further progress. Our knowledge about reality is in fact evolving and maturing historically over time, and remaining non-locked into stagnant worldviews is the only way to make sure we never stop this evolution and never get stuck in stagnation. IMO BK's idealism is a good and legit metaphysical worldview, and SS is arguably even better, but the fact that they are "good enough" does not make them automatically to be absolute truths. Same applies to materialism or the "neutral OP" monism. Reality may, and most likely will turn out to be much more rich and deep than these views tend to believe.

There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.

[Martin_]

Eugene, it seems you're temporarily off the hook. Do you want me to invite back that neutral monist who insists "value" is the ontological primitive?

You mean Robert M. Prisig?

(Intentionally derailing the thread. sorry. don't bite)

[Ben Iscatus]

Reality may, and most likely will turn out to be much more rich and deep than these views tend to believe.

I agree. But I'd add: we tend to adopt a worldview that naturally resonates with us. I don't think we can just reason our way to a different worldview, because reason is not our primary motivator. Cultural trends inhabit our minds, rise up and emerge at the appropriate time of our archetypal story. There are bound to be many "dead-end" beliefs, which, however sensible, will never be selected as the main cultural narrative.