I don't see the first sentence as any sort of metaphysical argument at all. It is simply a statement of what he believes.AshvinP wrote: ↑Mon Dec 20, 2021 9:56 pmJim Cross wrote: ↑Mon Dec 20, 2021 6:15 pmAgree that Tam should have addressed BK's version.Soul_of_Shu wrote: ↑Mon Dec 20, 2021 5:40 pm Well, if you've been paying attention at all, BK has gone to great lengths in books, papers, blog posts, and interviews to make a comprehensive case for why he has delineated his take from Berkelely's take, explicating why and how he significantly diverges from it. Not sure BK is even aware of Lanza's version, but I suspect he would also argue that it's lacking. Nor can BK's version be easily lumped in with Vedanta or Buddhist versions, whatever tangential comparables there may be. And while there is some common ground to be found with Hoffman, there are also some hard to reconcile differences—i.e. Hoffman doesn't limit conscious agency to metabolizing lifeforms. So given that Tam Hunt makes no mention of BK's work, and may well not have delved into it at all, which no doubt BK would argue is distinct from the versions that TH is critiquing, if he were to thoroughly investigate it, and they were to actually have a nuanced discussion about it, for all we know he might be more amenable to it. Now, of course, we will await the case to be made that TH should just bypass BK's version, and all of those other versions he refers to, and go directly to Steiner's version, if he wants to understand what idealism truly is.![]()
However, you say BK is different from Berkeley, I don't see how it is significantly different since it still requires a mind-at-large which, although different from God, is still something for which there is no evidence nor any certain sure way to obtain evidence.
This topic was created somewhat as a response to Czinczar's post but I didn't want to take that topic off-topic so I created this.
Idealists make a good point, which Tam and I agree with, that all we know of the world is in our consciousness. The problem becomes in trying to extend that observation to any broader understanding of the world. A critique of materialism does not by itself become an argument for idealism. The core problem, which Tam identifies, is explaining "intersubjective" agreement.
Do you see the blatant dualism being employed in the very first sentence? Tam writes, "First, I want to establish where I agree with these thinkers: I agree that the world we know, each of us in our heads here and now, is entirely created in our minds, presumably by our brains and the various senses that feed into our brains." So she is not only importing dualism into her argument but into the arguments of "these [idealist] thinkers" as well.
Perhaps you agree with subject-object dualism. But the point is, do you see why assuming a metaphysical position at the very outset of a philosophical or scientific inquiry makes the rest of the reasoning worthless? And, if you or anyone else did not spot this dualism until after I pointed it out here, they should really ask themselves how often they fail to spot metaphysical assumptions when evaluating philosophical or scientific arguments.
The topic is debunking idealism and the core argument relates to intersubjective agreement or what BK calls shared world.
Why do we agree on how the world works if there is not something common different from our own personal subjective experience?
Do you have anything to offer on that question?