Of course, in establishing the existence of objective reality, it might be helpful to define exactly what I mean by "objective reality." The short answer is the idea that reality exists independent of the mind, and the facts of that reality exist irregardless of anyone's particular ideas or beliefs about them. For instance, the idea that the round world exists regardless of whether everyone believes it's round or even if everyone believed it was flat (as they once did). The world is what is, outside of the mind.
Of course, that's just the simple answer, and you're not home free yet. Empiricism, for example, admits the existence of the physical world, but holds that anything non-physical: abstractions, concepts, ect. are only products of the mind. At first this almost seems appealing. Existence appears to be a pristine field of pure snow untrampled by messy human ideas. The problems soon rear their head, though. It restricts the mind's contact with reality strictly to the sensory level. Anything higher than that is sort of kept in a hermetically sealed bubble. Love? Freedom? You can't see them. You can't touch them. Into the bubble they go. Then you start getting bogged down in the details. You find a rock on the beach. Well, "rock" is a concept. Into the bubble it goes. So you find a thing on the beach. Well, this idea that the thing is a separate entity from its surroundings is a mode of perception. Into the bubble it goes. From Hume you get to Kant, and pretty soon you notice, "Hey, time and space aren't physical things." So into the bubble they go, and this pristine world collapses in on itself, imploding in the mind, and empiricism is devoured by its own internal logic.
So naturally, I don't want to make that mistake. No, by objective reality I mean not merely physical matter but also the properties, relationships, workings, and physical laws of that matter. Causality is an idea, but it refers to a real phenomenon exhibited by matter.
This is at least a basic idea.
I read the first paragraph so far, and want to raise an observation. A reality that exists independently of the mind can only be inferred, like the far side of the moon (before any rockets took pictures of it). It's not the same kind of reality as the face of the moon we see every day.
ReplyDeleteI would say that an inferred reality requires an inferrer, just as an observed reality requires an observer.
What is the foundation of this bizarre insistence of yours that things don't exist unless someone sees them?
ReplyDeleteAs to the rest of your post, I would raise another point: that the justification for separating the physical world from concepts is extremely tenuous, and likely to crumble completely when you look at it closely.
ReplyDeleteAs I observed in my first comment above, the idea that there is an objective world independent of the mind is itself an abstract idea which requires a mind in order to be formulated.
So I don't see a difference between the idea of an objective external world and any other idea that we are capable of creating through thought.
Well, try to prove that they exist without someone seeing them.
ReplyDeleteDo you think the dark side of the moon suddenly came into being when we observed it? How could anyone discover something if it doesn't exist until they see it? If I come home and find that a table fallen over, does that mean that the table doesn't fall over until I walk in and see it? In short, why do I have to prove that something exists, in order for it to exist?
ReplyDeleteYou have an odd way of looking at things.
My point is not that things don’t exist without someone seeing them. It is that the concept that things do exist without someone seeing them is a concept, one that is inferred from evidence.
ReplyDeleteIndeed it is such an important concept that it is taught by mothers to their infants via the game of peek-a-boo, till the baby realizes eventually that the mother has not ceased to exist when she hides from view. The concept of the continued existence of the mother is the first example of inferred reality that the baby learns.
It is of course possible that in the course of the game of peek-a-boo, the mother could die whilst hiding. A rare occurrence, no doubt and one which does not invalidate the importance of the game.
As for the point you raise about the rest of my post, that was the point I was trying to make.
ReplyDeleteI'm sure there was a time when Man looked up at the sky and had no idea that there was a dark side to the moon. I guess it took a lot of astronomy to discover that there was a side in permanent darkness. We know it now of course, and since we played peek-a-boo with our mothers, we are well and truly conditioned to the idea that things exist even when we are not looking at them. It’s an essential feature of human behaviour, of course. But it might be absent in a baby born with brain damage and unable to learn through the game.
ReplyDeleteDoh! I slap my forehead and realize I have been pushing at an open door. Yes, it is precisely the point you have been trying to make. We have each made the point, and agreed on the point.
ReplyDeleteThat’s peer review for you.
I agree with the peek-a-boo thing, of course, but then why say that an inferred reality requires an inferrer. That still sounds like it implies that the dark side of the moon is contingent on us to exist. If anything, the peek-a-boo thing proves the opposite, the the moon, light side or dark, persists regardless of us.
ReplyDeleteIt is still only an inference, though. If I leave my keys on the kitchen table and lock myself out of the house, I may comfort myself with the thought that the keys will still be there when I manage to break in. But I don’t know that and I might be wrong. Someone else might break in before me.
ReplyDeleteScientifically, we know that no one can steal the dark side of the moon. So we are in no doubt about it.