Tuesday, July 3, 2012
Sunday, July 1, 2012
The Problem of Perception.
Introduction
In this note, I am going to articulate and defend the arguments presented by John Foster levied against common notions of perception as exhaustively encompassed in two summary, hypothetical, positions. By hypothetical, I mean, that the positions articulated are representative of all existing positions in their various forms as they relate to the area of perception.
These views are known as the Fundamentalist View and the Decompositionalist View.
The Fundamentalist argues for a sort of direct realism, that our perceptual experience of an object is directly and completely caused by the object being perceived. Thus, the psychological state associated with perceiving is in itself perceptive. Thus the perceived phenomenal experience is exactly and directly informed by the external object.
The Decompositionalist approach on the other hand, argues that this phenomenal experience is rooted in a psychological state that is not itself perceptive. That is, what directly causes the phenomenal experience, is a state of mind that mediates the relationship of our phenomenal experience and external reality. Thus, the physical object is not the direct and constant cause of our perception, rather it is our own mind or brain that is the direct cause of our actual perceptual experience.
These views are exhaustive for either the perceptual relationship is psychologically fundamental or it must psychologically decompose, of the views that predominate the western world and sit in opposition to any sort of immaterialism, these views are the only two.
Now to Outline John Foster’s, and therefore my own, argument…
1. The Fundamentalist View And Its Problems.
A) Overview.
The fundamentalist argues that the object of our perceptual experience is the cause of that experience. The fundamentalist denies that the mind of man acts mediatorially in altering the phenomenal content of our experience.
Or as the layman would say it;
“What we are seeing is a reality ‘out there,’ and what we are seeing is identical with how it actually is, because the reality of ‘out there,’ is the cause of what we are seeing.”
Therefore this state is fundamental (hence the term ‘fundamentalist’). Our phenomenal content (what we are perceiving) IS DIRECTLY derived from our perceptual contact with the reality being perceived.
Thus, this notion of perception DOES NOT believe that the phenomenological content is a representation of the reality perceptually contacted, but identical. The objects existing out there are causing, directly, my phenomenological experience under Fundamentalism.
B) The Problems; Phenomenological Content and Perceptual Contact.
The Primary problem with the Fundamentalist or direct realist view, is that its position about how our phenomenal experience is formed is based on the dogmatic epistemic assumption that this experience is directly dictated by genuine perceptual contact with outside objects of experience. There objects are static in relation to their effects on our experience. Therefore, as the objects are is how we are perceiving them, this alone guarantees genuine contact, what they are IS what is being seen.
B1- If our phenomenological content is based on our perceptual contact, then what are hallucinations? This is something that the Fundamentalist view cannot even attempt to answer, if our phenomenological content is ONLY caused by our perceptual contact with ‘real’ objects, than it follows that my phenomenological content of a hallucination must be in correspondence to some REAL objects causing this experience.
B2- The next problem is non-veridical perception, for if our phenomenological content directly corresponds to an existing external object, then it follows that when a stick is put in water, it is actually bent. Likewise if I were to look at my child through a wavy piece of glass, it would follow that my child is actually a disproportionate monstrosity at that time. Likewise when I look at white flowers under a green light, the greenness of their petals must be said to exist in the object.
These examples demonstrate the main problem with this sort of direct realism as held under the fundamentalist view, and if we cannot distinguish hallucination and non-veridical perception from the rest of our experiences justifiably, than we are left with the worst sort of skepticism.
2. The Decompositionalist View and Its Problems.
A) Overview.
The basic position of Decompositionalism, is one that is common in modern philosophy since Kant, it is the position that it is the mind that forms our perceptual experience out of the raw uninterrupted sense data gathered from without. Therefore what causes our perceptions is an non-perceiving psychological state.
This view, besides being made famous by Kant, was further developed in American Neo-Pragmatism and the very popular theory of Naturalized Epistemology (developed by W.V.O Quine).
B)The Problems; Mediation and Correspondence.
The primary problem with the decompositional view is that it prevents perceptual correspondance to objective reality.
Because Decompositionalism argues that the mind is the center of human perception it does solve the problem of hallucination and non-veridical images, unlike Fundamentalism, but it fails in an opposite way in failing to account for the authenticity of our perceptual experience. How is it that we know that my phenomenological content is identical with the source of that content?
No answer.
There is no way to know if that which I am perceiving is in any way descriptive of reality. It could very easily, be all in my head, since what I know of reality is completely interpreted and mediated by a non-perceptive psychological state that forms my phenomenological content based on categories of thought existing in my mind or brain.
The threat of solipsism should be apparent, so to curb this threat, most who held to this theory attempted to explain how these mediating categories came into existence. Kant was unable to do this, but the Naturalist epistemologists argued that these categories of human thought derived from the process of random mutation and natural selection (Darwinistic evolution). This of course, though giving an explanation (whether justified or not) of where these categories originated, offers no explanation as to why this in any way guarantees that our perceptual experience (phenomenological content) is in anyway descriptive of how things are in themselves. Kant’s problem of the noumenal v.s phenomenal haunts even modern philosophers on this account (see the problem of qualia). Not to mention, that a naturalized epistemology begs the question in claiming a scientific (and therefore metaphysical theory) to explain how Decompositionalism works, when in fact, decompositionalism makes the nature of reality, and there naturalism, an unknowable. This circularity is vicious and traps the proponent in instant and total skepticism, not to mention solipsism.
These problems, in my opinion, make both of these views untenable.
There is one alternative that solves this problem. It is a view that denies the existence of these so-called ‘external objects’ altogether and makes existence completely and totally interconnected with perception when it comes to our phenomenological content (this escaping the issues of Fundamentalism), and likewise this content is not created by our minds, but as the determinate nature of our experience implies, we have no power over it, but are passive receivers of this perceptual world (thus escaping the issues of Decompositionalism). It is this view, as prescribed by John Foster, George Berkeley, and Jonathan Edwards, that I will present in a later notes.
Until then…
Thanks for reading. J Adam Johnson
Thursday, June 21, 2012
J Adam Johnson's Tri-Perspectival Transcendental Argument For The Existence of God.
P1: Knowledge Is Only Possible, If God Exists.
P2: Knowledge Is Possible.
C: God Exists.
P2-(is assumed as accepted based on its necessity.)
Relevant Contents:
P1-A The Necessity of Ontological Grounding For Human Knowledge.
P1-B The Nature of Knowledge and Its Ontological Grounding in God.
P1-A will be presented first in three parts. P1-B will then be presented in several parts as well. In concluding the above two segments, combined with the assumed premise of P2, the conclusion will follow automatically in the conclusion of this note.
P1-A: The Necessity of an Ontological Grounding For Human Knowledge.
Some Introductory Remarks;
What I mean by the title of this argument, is that human knowledge requires an ontological or metaphysical base or grounding. I would also say that this works inversely, that ontological/metaphysical claims require certain epistemic positions, but since we are discussing my proof for God from knowledge, discussing how knowledge necessitates a metaphysical grounding will be more relevant.
Obviously, my argument for this is Presuppositionalist, it was devised by Greg L Bahnsen in his posthumous book "Presuppositional Apologetics; Stated and Defended," but Greg L Bahnsen derived this theory off of the analytic philosopher Roderick Chisholm in his works "The Problem of Criterion" and "What Is Truth?" (Though with very different conclusions.) Those articles may be of great help as well.
Essentially, we have two questions by Roderick Chisholm, that he feels, are interdependent and require the admittance that all philosophical positions on knowledge are circular. But instead of admitting skepticism (which he even acknowledges as the only 'rational' conclusion), he argues that we must accept our circularity and just arbitrarily pick the position most in line with common sense (hence he chooses the realism of Thomas Reid over the skepticism of David Hume as the most 'acceptable position.')
The Argument.
A) What do we know? (or what is the extent of our knowledge?)
B) How are we to decide in any particular case whether we know? (or what are the criteria of knowing?)
These were Chisholm's original questions, but to keep in line with our definition of knowledge, we will translate them using JTB (Justified True Belief) and a hypothetical item of knowledge, we will callproposition X.
A) What is justifiably believed and true?
B) How are we to know whether proposition, X, is justifiably believed and true?
Continuing on this line of thinking, we must understanding that claims of knowledge in propositional form, always have implications as to the nature of reality, this is because a true proposition asserts a certain state of affairs to be the case.
Hence we have another translation of the original questions, which help to show further the relation between knowledge and reality.
A2) What do we justifiably believe to be, and is, an existing state of affairs?
B2) How do we decide whether we have justification for believing a proposition, X, and that X accurately states the existing state of affairs?
It should be noted that A2 and B2 are compounded questions that must be broken down and reveal some interesting characteristic
A2a) What do we have justification for believing?
A2b) What is the existing state of affairs?
B2a) What will count as justification for believing some proposition, X?
B2b) By what means do we determine whether X states the existing state of affairs?
Concluding Thoughts and Summary.
What we can conclude from breaking down these questions (A2 and B2) is that they further reveal the interdependency of metaphysics and epistemology. For instance A2 turns out to not be a strictly epistemological question, for it involves as metaphysical question (A2b). A2 has mainly to do with what is in fact a true belief while B2 has to do with justified belief, therefore what we have is interesting. We see that answers to B2a and B2b as epistemological questions can not be made without a dependence on, and implications for, A2b as a metaphysical question.
This is because what constitutes a proper criterion of justification will be selected in an attempt to explain the nature of reality as it is explain in A2 as an ‘existing state of affairs.’ This is because what is true has implications for what is real, for truth explains with certainty how things ARE. Justification for that truth, lends support therefore to what the nature of reality turns out to be, but this justification criterion is dependent on A2b, what constitutes a basis for knowing something TO BE TRUE depends on a belief about an existing state of affairs (hence, B2b).
What therefore is determinable, is that if we were to know beforehand the existing state of affairs, it would inform us as to what knowledge could be and in regards to that same matter of truth (state of affairs).
What can be concluded from this then, is simple, any claim of knowledge assumes a certain state of affairs while attempting to speak of a certain state of affairs.
As an example using Plato, in order to prove that reality was dualistic (his metaphysic), he appealed to a theory of human intutition (epistemology), that presupposed a dualism (his metaphysic)…and round and round we go.
What my conclusion to this is therefore, is that by examining the nature of human knowledge, we can determine what its ontological grounding must be. By the nature of knowledge, I am not speaking about what one worldview arbitrarily determines to be its justification (therefore presupposing a certain metaphysic in an equally arbitrary fashion), but rather what any one knowledge claim for every human being, is necessarily comprised of. This of course will lead to my discussion of P1-B.
Thus, P1-A states that knowledge requires a certain state of affairs, this being demonstrated by the fact that any worldview system naturally encompasses this circularity, and that in attempting to answer A1, B1 must likewise be answered and vice versa.
However, instead of arbitrarily picking a worldview, or admitting skepticism, if one were to examine the nature of human knowledge as common to all men, one would be able to decide on the state of affairs that properly completes and therefore makes possible, this human knowledge.
You may ask questions and or rebut at this point before we move on to P1-B
P1-B
This argument will first argue that the nature of human knowledge is Trinitarian by nature and therefore requires a Trinitarian ontology as a grounding, and that likewise, the nature of man’s knowing requires even more of this ontological grounding. These sets of proofs will then, in sum, meet the definition of God under Christian Theism.
I am going to now assist with some quick term descriptions to help out with the largest of these little proofs, that knowledge is Trinitarian.
Existential Knowing- This refers to the self, that is, knowledge of the self, appraisal and apprehension by the self (consciousness), and emotional-inclination towards the acceptance of a proposition. I will often used “The Self” as a shortened way to describe this manner of knowing.
Situational Knowing- This refers to information gathered by experience, sensory information bundled into percepts. This includes, sensations, objects of experience, observable phenomena, etc. I will often use “Experience,” “Sensory Experience,” “Observation,” and “Empirical Knowledge” as a shortened way to describe this manner of knowing.
Normative Knowing- This refers to the apprehension, application, and assuming of certain universal laws of thought. This includes the law of logic/identity (A is not non-A), the assumption of regularity, mathematical laws, ideal concepts such as ‘circleness,’ and ‘dogginess,’ etc. I will use the terms “Universal,” “Laws,” and various combinations of such to described this form of knowing in shortened form.
A) The Three Perspectives.
1. Every item of knowledge is fully situational, in that sensory experience of objective particulars are necessary for it.
2. Every item of knowledge is fully normative, in that certain laws of thought, assumed as universal and regulatory, are implicit in the item of knowledge.
3. Every item of knowledge is fully existential, in that every knowledge claim is subjectively approved and affirmed and is therefore related to the knowing self.
B) The Interdependency of the Three Distinct Perspectives.
D1; The situational perspective is unintelligible apart from the normative, without the application of laws ( I.e. the law of non-contradiction), no distinctions could made in regards to experienced reality.
D2; The normative perspective is unintelligible apart from data gathered by experience of the situational perspective (I.e. the law of non-contradiction, which is unknowable apart from its transcription and application).
D3; The existential perspective is unintelligible apart from the normative, for the self without normative law fails to distinguish object and subject.
D4; The law without self and not properly distinguished from self, becomes either unknowable, or if identified with the self, abstract to the point of being unintelligible. Therefore the normative is necessary for the existential perspective to be distinct and operative.
D5; The existential perspective is unintelligible apart from one’s situation, for the self can only be realized if it is conscious of objective reality (the situation).
D6; The situational perspective depends on the interpretive faculties of the self to be known, therefore the situational perspective depends on the existence of the existential perspective.
C) The Ontological Grounding For Human Knowledge; Is God.
1. The Grounding is Trinitarian.
P1. Any one item of knowledge is Triune (as demonstrated in the above arguments P1-B; A-B).
P2. Human Knowledge Requires an Ontological Grounding (as demonstrated in P1-A).
C. The Character of this ontological grounding is Trinitarian.
2. The Grounding is Active, Purposeful, and Self-Revealing.
P1. Human knowledge is active, continual, and dependent.
P2. That which is inert, itself dependent, and passive cannot be the cause, source, and provider of an active and continual stream of knowledge to dependent beings.
C. This ontological grounding is continuously active, self-revealing, and totally independent.
3. The Grounding is Omniscient.
P1. All Human Knowledge is based on the aforementioned ontological grounding.
P2. A thing cannot give what itself does not have.
C. This ontological grounding has all knowledge.
4. The Grounding is Omnipotent.
P1. All knowledge requires, the self, experiential information, and universal laws.
P2. The ontological grounding, as the source of knowledge, therefore is the source of laws, self, and experience and how they are presented to make items of knowledge.
P3. To be the source and organizer of experience, law, and self is to be in control of such.
C. This ontological grounding is omnipotent.
5. The Grounding is Omnipresent.
P1. To be the source of a thing is to be present at the source.
P2. Knowledge is continuously coming into the minds of men.
P3. Knowledge encompasses sensible experience, universal laws, and the self.
P4. The ontological grounding therefore is continuously present in our experience, in universal laws, and in the self.
C. The ontological grounding is therefore Omnipresent.
Christianity alone teaches of an omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent, self-revealing Triune, continuously active, supreme mind, called God. This being revealed specifically in the Canon of the Holy Bible.
This proof is based on what is called, general revelation. The nature of human thought requires the existence of an omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent, self-revealing, Trinitarian, supreme Mind. Likewise the fact that it is not universally accepted supports the scriptural teaching that man knows of God from nature, but suppresses that knowledge in unrighteousness (Romans 1)
Only in Scripture does one learn the cause of this self-deception (from the fall into sin), the way of salvation, and the manner of holy living unto God and what is due Him in worship.
By Faith we believe the testimony of scripture and therefore have a right to claim the universal phenomena of human knowledge.
Credo Ut Intelligam; I believe that I may know. - St. Augustine.
This concludes my argument.
Sunday, March 18, 2012
Friday, March 9, 2012
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