Ryan and everyone interested,
Thanks Ryan very much for your comments! This thread has subsided and I hope to
give you more attention. Understand that I have much to say here, so I have not
done my homework on studying your other posts. In the near future, I hope to
comment more on *your* alternative outlook. But for now I give my response...
"You then say [the mind] is able to infer with some certainty that the outside
world ... is as it appears."
Without re-reading what I said, this is not what I meant to say. Perhaps we
completely agree but let me clarify. I don't say that the sky itself is blue or
that roses themselves smell sweet.
I'm merely proposing that there must be *some* kind of structure existing
outside experience. For example, the mere fact that you and I are conversing
makes it *seem* that reality is dualistic. If it is given that *you* are
experiencing this exchange, it is almost proven that there is an external
structure. However irrefutable that fact is that "I" experience, there is no
mechanism of experience that can relate my experiences to your experiences.
There must be something we share.
See how this works! I could have said that there is experience -- with no
mention of "I". As soon as it is assumed there is your experience of this
dialogue (and this is only assumed by me), the word "I" becomes unavoidable.
"It is only because we assume that there is more to everything than everything
that there is an ' I '."
In a way, I think this dualistic empiricism is like the MOQ but with relaxed
assumptions about the levels. Someone said that DQ is a brush that paints
reality. This description creates a dualism -- brush and painting. Because I
don't go along with the rest of it, I simply replace DQ with "external
structure".
You might be thinking, "OK, I know what you mean but so what?" To this point,
perhaps I have not said much. I have not read enough metaphysics to know where
I stand among my contemporaries. I do know -- from Pirsig -- that there are a
lot of materialists around, but I have no idea how many people are dualists --
away from the sense of God, spirit, holy ghost, etc. You are more
metaphysically versed than myself and I would love to know what philosophers
would think of dualism as I have described above.. I would also greatly
appreciate any input of how this relates to Kant/Locke/Descartes.
If the groundwork is laid, it is actually the implications of this dualism that
I am most excited about. Specifically, it opens the doors to a satisfactory
notion of "self"!! From there, I can go on a very long journey, but -- as you
mentioned -- we have to be clear from where we are starting.
Also before I go any further, it is necessary that I comment on "a priori
knowledge".
This is hilarious, but I now see you [Kant] of doing that which you just
proposed of me! We can't know anything definite of the specific properties of
the external structure! I go back to Pirsig that reality is indeed patterned.
I have no idea -- a priori -- of anything. Will a house fall when I dig
underneath -- most probably! But perhaps -- for some unknown reason -- gravity
does not apply to the space under my house.
The *law* of gravity I think would be better called the *great generalization*
of gravity. No one has proved gravity will always exist everywhere -- without
some sort of assumption. Because reality has never shown us otherwise, the
generalization is -- therefore -- great!
I hope now you understand why I frequently use "intuition". This might be
basic, but logic seems to be an organization of assumed patterns. I use
"intuition" to stress the assumed part.
To be my own devils advocate, I remember in my one and only philosophy class
that a priori knowledge labeled the statement "all widows were once married".
One does not have to go out and interview widows to know this. But thinking
now, even this has an -- albeit an extremely subtle -- assumption. One *does*
have to go out in reality and observe that "A=B implies B=A". This "axiom of
reflexivity" is merely assumed but is necessary to hold logic and mathematics
together. "Use it" I say, but let the mind by open that -- no matter how
intuitive it seems -- it is an assumption. The axiom of reflexivity is obvious
exactly because we experience reality that way!!
I think, Ryan, that we are on the same wavelength. Can we proceed onto "self"
and then onto "morality". I hope you see that for me everything about dualistic
empiricism really fits together. I really need help with "attention" and "will"
(which are of the same).
To give you a hint of where I am heading, I think we need to get away from
"static level this" and "dynamic that" towards a more open, introspective,
personal and sensitive understanding of our experiences and how we relate to
each other.
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