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From: stevens@prodigal.psych.rochester.edu (Greg Stevens)
Subject: Re: Greg Stevens Re: Reality, the Purpose of Life and Morality
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References: <3crovi$12e@ixnews1.ix.netcom.com> <blaine-2812942227200001@prevost.islandnet.com> <1994Dec29.155841.24793@galileo.cc.rochester.edu> <3dvhcl$6ok@ixnews2.ix.netcom.com>
Date: Fri, 30 Dec 94 00:35:04 GMT
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roose@ix.netcom.com (Richard Roose) writes:
>stevens@prodigal.psych.rochester.edu (Greg Stevens) writes: 
>>blaine@IslandNet.com writes:
>>>roose@ix.netcom.com (Richard Roose) wrote:

>>>> We have an "ABSOLUTE" yardstick by which we can 
>>>> "measure" Truth and falsehood and right and wrong and good and evil.  
>>>> With this absolute yardstick, we can for the first time in human history 
>>>> judge human actions as Truth or false or right or wrong or good or evil, 
>>>> and do it without ambiguity.

>>>What makes you so sure that "we" have a yardstick to measure reality, and
>>>reality IS defined. Defined according to what? To whom? You also speak in
>>>many dichotomies, but I do not agree that reality exists in such a simple
>>>state: left/right, wrong/correct, true/false. 

>>This is standard in the tyrrany of western science/philosophy.  There are
>>branches of science and epistemology who are trying to move towards 
>>Eastern philosophy, denying the "actuality" of such dualisms and seeing
>>the perceived world as brought forth by our personal distinctions.

>Try walking through a F****** wall, then come tell me about reality being 
>"brought forth by our personal distinctions".

Okay.  There is a wall, which is brought forth in the world I have
constructed because of the structure of my nervous system.  When certain
changes take place in my internal structure (corresponding to nerves
causing muscle tissue to contract and move my legs in a certain way),
other changes take place in my internal structure (nerves which we
interpret as "pressure sensitive" respond); similarly, there are disturbances
of certain neurons we call "photoreceptor cells" which then chemically
respond in such a way that we perceive something we call a "wall" and
interpret as solid.  In the entire space of all of the perturbations
being made to our nervous system and its compensations in reaction to
these perturbations, certain of these we distinguish as having a common
cause, which we hypothesize, and name "wall."

Do you have a problem with this?

>>>By implying that you have a yardstick, you also imply that reality is
>>>defineable to that yardstick. However, that depends upon what type of
>>>yardstick you are using. What may measure long on an Imperial yardstick
>>>will measure short on a Metric yardstick. What is the "right" measurement,
>>>then?

>How about the yardstick of science? How about the yardstick of verifiability?  
>How about the yardstick of an agreed upon standard? How about the yardstich of 
>the Laws of Nature? 

Science has been wrong before.  Verifiability is a custom that ITSELF is in
need for verification (think about it).  Agreed upon standards is what in
fact is being proposed -- where people's individual interpretations overlap,
there is reality.  But this has nothing to do with ABOSLUTE truth, it has
to do with agreement.  Laws of Nature are, in fact, edicts that humans have
described and they agree on the descriptions as a standard.  Other 
descriptions of the functioning of nature are possible and could be
consistent with the "evidence."

Anne Schaff has a good book, "Beyond Therapy, Beyond Science" in which she
asserts that the scientific dogma that "objectivity" is somehow desirable
should itself be questioned.  Gregory Bateson, in "Steps to an Ecology of
the Mind," questions many of sciences presuppositions about "objectivity."
Check 'em out.
 
>>There are views of "reality" out there based EXACTLY on this concept -- that
>>although the existence of the universe may be objective, its characteristics
>>are subjective by necessity, because they are measured by a perceiving
>>organism, and the perceptions of an organism are intrinsically dependant
>>upon the structure of that individual organism -- not only its genetics,
>>but its PERSONAL history as well.

>Amen! Amen! Amen!  What the F*** has this got to do with what the F*** is 
>actually there? (Gee you taught me a nice phrase, it works quite well.)  So we 
>all see things a little differently, so F****** what.

Since our only case we can make for properties of the outside world come
from our perceptions, if our perceptions disagree, what is the standard
we should use to resolve the conflict?  There *is* no way of accessing
"reality" besides our perceptions.  In fact, many of our perceptions aRE
only about perception, and not about reality at all.  Color perception
for example, corresponds to no properties in the "outside" universe
(see Varela, Thompson and Rosch, "The Embodied Mind" for a good
discussion of this).

Greg Stevens

stevens@prodigal.psych.rochester.edu

