mfbukowski Posted November 28, 2017 Posted November 28, 2017 5 hours ago, clarkgoble said: Mark I'll just go back to the old principle of pragmatism. For a difference to be a difference it must make a difference. The question really is whether there's a difference here. I think it's clear there's a difference in our views of experience which pretty well undergirds all the rest of the discussion. Well for me it's the dualism I always see in your positions that is not compatible with Mormonism in my opinion- as I said in that other thread a few minutes ago Mind and matter are one in Mormonism and intelligence creates reality as humans ( a Human God) mentally organizes matter from matter unorganized. I think that this happens through language. "And the light and dark were called the "first day"- (paraphrase) where the definition of "first day" actually defines what we see as a "day" This of course I see as metaphorical, but again seeing multiple paradigms at once it could be literal and a metaphor at the same time, it makes no difference to me so there is no distinction between one or the other. Mind and matter to me are one because both are artificial linguistic designations. I think semiotics has within itself a built in dualism not warranted in Mormonism. I like the idea that reality as we know it is a mental (ie spiritual) state and I find that highly compatible with Mormonism whereas I do not see that at all in Peirce. Yes- abduction- but to me that is just confusing jargon and not necessary. I think that James and Dewey and Rorty pretty much did away with that.
mfbukowski Posted November 29, 2017 Posted November 29, 2017 (edited) 2 hours ago, mfbukowski said: Well for me it's the dualism I always see in your positions that is not compatible with Mormonism in my opinion- as I said in that other thread a few minutes ago Mind and matter are one in Mormonism and intelligence creates reality as humans ( a Human God) mentally organizes matter from matter unorganized. I think that this happens through language. "And the light and dark were called the "first day"- (paraphrase) where the definition of "first day" actually defines what we see as a "day" This of course I see as metaphorical, but again seeing multiple paradigms at once it could be literal and a metaphor at the same time, it makes no difference to me so there is no distinction between one or the other. Mind and matter to me are one because both are artificial linguistic designations. I think semiotics has within itself a built in dualism not warranted in Mormonism. I like the idea that reality as we know it is a mental (ie spiritual) state and I find that highly compatible with Mormonism whereas I do not see that at all in Peirce. Yes- abduction- but to me that is just confusing jargon and not necessary. I think that James and Dewey and Rorty pretty much did away with that. So essentially as John 1 says all that was created was created by "The Word" which is also seen as The Messenger- the message personified in Jehovah. For me that is literally true- The Word creates all of reality that we can "know." It defines all of reality as we know and speak of it. "Preach the gospel always, when necessary, use words" So words do not create all we can experience and do wordlessly. Our Human Man of Holiness essentially does what we do on a larger scale- we create and define our own realities through Language- the word, but this is seeing through a glass darkly. Seeing the sunset in all it's richness and all the awe and beauty all perceived at once cannot be put into words- that is the "face to face" part So now we see through a glass darkly- the glass is a mirror- Rorty's false mirror of reality. We do not see reality directly- we see it largely through the glass darkly- ie through language and representation. Mirrors are representations of reality not reality "in itself" So direct experience as of a sunset, wordlessly = "things as they are"- "face to face" Things as we say them and often when we think linguistically in words = through a glass darkly- a dark alleged representation of things as they are Scripture of course is written in human words which must be "reconstituted" in our hearts by "likening" the scriptures to us. Perhaps an analogy would be a sound recording which "represents" the performance - yet imperfectly- and we take that imperfect "mirror" of the represented performance and reconstitute it in our minds and hearts from the soundwaves and the digital signal or vinyl recording into a mirror of the performance- though it is still a glass darkly God "speaks" to us in testimony perhaps sometimes in words but mostly wordlessly in a wave of warmth and love and peace- to me that is experiencing Him directly yet of course not in his fullness. We say "I know the church is true" which is in a context - a language game understood by others who use the same language game and is true in that context- because they too have experienced it. What we are verifying is that I have had that testimony experience and I know with all my heart that the message is "sweet" to me. Just as one cannot describe the real experience of red to a blind man, one cannot explain the reality of a testimony to one who does not know what it is. The best way we can express that profound experience is to mumble words which do not really make sense "I know the church is true"- but yet in the context of the community to whom those words are uttered, it communicates perfectly. Just as Wittgenstein's example- the words "brick" and "trowel" and "mortar" do not communicate anything until you are in the context of helping a bricklayer who wants you to hand those things to him when he says the word- then it becomes a complete natural language that enables people to build a wall or a house with a three or four or ten word vocabluary in the language game. Anway, enough Edited November 29, 2017 by mfbukowski
mfbukowski Posted November 30, 2017 Posted November 30, 2017 Except for this. Quote I am what is sometimes known as a "qualia freak." I think that there are certain features of the bodily sensations especially, but also of certain perceptual experiences, which no amount of purely physical information includes. Tell me everything physical there is to tell about what is going on in a living brain, the kind of states, their functional role, their relation to what goes on at other times and in other brains, and so on and so forth, and be I as clever as can be in fitting it all together, you won't have told me about the hurtfulness of pains, the itchiness of itches, pangs of jealousy, or about the characteristic experience of tasting a lemon, smelling a rose, hearing a loud noise or seeing the sky. This is essentially the whole Nagel article in one paragraph. Jackson does most of it in 3 pages. A bit simplistic but works for me as an intro to seeing the world this way http://rintintin.colorado.edu/~vancecd/phil201/Jackson.pdf
clarkgoble Posted December 1, 2017 Posted December 1, 2017 (edited) On 11/28/2017 at 3:20 PM, mfbukowski said: Well for me it's the dualism I always see in your positions that is not compatible with Mormonism in my opinion- as I said in that other thread a few minutes agoMind and matter are one in Mormonism and intelligence creates reality as humans ( a Human God) mentally organizes matter from matter unorganized. Just to be clear to me matter is congealed mind and mind is effete matter. I don't distinguish the two which more or less commits me to a type of panpsychism albeit not the kind Orson Pratt espoused. Likewise, commenting on your Nagel quip in the other thread, I think 1st person, 2cd person and 3rd person accounts are irreducible to each other but all three are all ways in everything. So what you are calling dualism might just be that element of three irreducible categories. This gets at the materialist/physicalist charge as well. I consider myself materialist but thing material is more complicated than most analytic philosophers who think it's reducible to 3rd person descriptions in physics. I reject that conception. Edited December 1, 2017 by clarkgoble 1
mfbukowski Posted December 1, 2017 Posted December 1, 2017 1 hour ago, clarkgoble said: Just to be clear to me matter is congealed mind and mind is effete matter. I don't distinguish the two which more or less commits me to a type of panpsychism albeit not the kind Orson Pratt espoused. Likewise, commenting on your Nagel quip in the other thread, I think 1st person, 2cd person and 3rd person accounts are irreducible to each other but all three are all ways in everything. So what you are calling dualism might just be that element of three irreducible categories. This gets at the materialist/physicalist charge as well. I consider myself materialist but thing material is more complicated than most analytic philosophers who think it's reducible to 3rd person descriptions in physics. I reject that conception. Ah three Ways in Everything I like the Trinity.
clarkgoble Posted December 1, 2017 Posted December 1, 2017 41 minutes ago, mfbukowski said: Ah three Ways in Everything I like the Trinity. I think first person accounts (idealisms of various sorts ranging from plato to Kant to Hegel) and third person accounts (most realisms, physicalism) get discussed a lot in philosophy. The 2cd person gets neglected although it pops up obviously in Peirce but also Heidegger and Derrida (as middle voice) and then also parts of medieval philosophy. Ontologic dualism always struck me as treating these as separate worlds. Arguably Spinoza at least tries to unify them as a kind of monism.
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