Posted: Nov 03, 2013 11:13 pm
Little Idiot wrote:SpeedOfSound wrote:Little Idiot wrote:SpeedOfSound wrote:
Again my answer is no. Not to be difficult.
A reduction in science, say to reduce water to molecules and atoms, yields new information in greater depth. It turns out that the reduction is actually an expansion of knowledge.
You and Jimmy both offer reductions of experience and observation. In philosophy reductions seldom work out. They create nonsense instead of new knowledge. They leave out details that actually matter.
The same problem occurs in naive premise for logical arguments and the result is nonsensical conclusions.
If experiencing the environment was the normal state of my life, meaning it was reduced mode of my living, I would be a thermostat not a human being. Ideas about representation and sense data fall in the same way.
A stream of experienced cartoon data is not how I came to be; not how I come to know things and be certain of them.
say the phrase 'interactive immersion in a rich and consistent environment' three times.
Surprised you religious types don't know this stuff.
And how do you get this 'interactive immersion in a rich and consistent environment' without experiencing the environment?
Obviously I have no problem with 'interactive immersion in a rich and consistent environment' as a description of our experience of the environment, we are not passive observers, our environment is interactive, we are deeply immersed - but if you say we don't experience the environment then you are introducing a huge error as opposed to a deeper more accurate understanding of what our experience is and how our experience is.
If I am on the corner talking to the garbage man, in some very odd conversation I would imagine, I may say "I experience the environment". But this is the philosophy forum, not the garbage landing.
Do you understand how reduction works in science and how it doesn't for these discussions?
I understand reduction as viewing a complex system as no more than the sum of its parts, and I understand that you are making a claim that it doesn't work in philosophy, but I fail to see what that has to do with your claim that you do not experience an environment when I asked you about that.
If you read what I actually said up above and what your actual question was (which you conveniently left out) you will see that I made no such claim. Try again.