From: John Clark (jonkc@worldnet.att.net)
Date: Mon Dec 20 1999 - 10:11:20 MST
Dan Fabulich <daniel.fabulich@yale.edu> Wrote:
> I "know" what broken glass is;
Don't keep me in suspense, tell me for god's sake!
>at least, I use the term correctly as far as anyone else can tell.
Oh, that's what you mean. How disappointing.
>I "know" about all sorts of things out there in the physical world.
Hmm, an external physical world independent of me, interesting theory.
> I hope you're not trying to enunciate logical positivism, there. Logical
> positivism, you'll recall, is the philosophy of language which states that
> unless a statement is empirically verifiable, it is meaningless.
> Unfortunately for the logical positivists, the statement of logical
> positivism, the statement that "unless a statement is empiricially
> verifiable, it is meaningless," is not empirically verifiable.
In dealing with philosophy (but not Science) I don't demand that every
idea be empirically verifiable but I do demand everything have contrast,
otherwise I just don't know what you're talking about. Saying "everything
is X" or "everything is not X" is meaningless, at least I don't know what the
hell it means. If I saw everything as white I'd be just as blind as if I saw
everything as black.
>Anyway, when I say that some thing is real, I mean that it exists
I see, and when you say that some thing exists you mean that it is real.
Round and round we go. Forget definitions, give me contrast, give me
examples. I'll give you one, horses exist unicorns don't.
>That's my original argument, if you recall: nobody could tell the
>difference if qualia existed or not.
Well of course they can't tell you, qualia is inexpressible.
>Occam's Razor therefore tells me to throw them out
As I said before, forget deduction, induction, proof and Occam's Razor;
direct sensation is far more fundamental than any of them.
>as a totally useless idea.
Sensation is not an idea and it doesn't matter if it's useful or not, we have it anyway.
> Pop quiz: If consciousness is perfectly correlated with intelligence, why
> talk about consciousness at all?
I don't, except when somebody claims there is a distinction between the two,
then I argue. It's fun.
> Why does consciousness matter?
It matters because I don't think I'd enjoy being dead.
>I don't want you to AFFIRM that it matters
Oops, sorry.
>but to justify that claim.
Oh that's easy. I feel that way because that's the way my brain is wired.
John K Clark jonkc@att.net
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