in an interview with john searle (http://reason.com/archives/2000/02/01/reality-principles-an-intervie), the renowned philosopher stated his case for realism in simple, but somewhat casual terms:
The problem that all these guys have is that once you give me that first premise--that there is a reality that exists totally independently of us--then the other steps follow naturally. Step 1, external realism: You've got a real world that exists independently of human beings. And step 2: Words in the language can be used to refer to objects and states of affairs in that external reality. And then step 3: If 1 and 2 are right, then some organization of those words can state objective truth about that reality. Step 4 is we can have knowledge, objective knowledge, of that truth. At some point they have to resist that derivation, because then you've got this objectivity of knowledge and truth on which the Enlightenment vision rests, and that's what they want to reject.
"all these guys" in the first sentence refers to contemporary anti-realists, many who can be classified as postmodernists and/or post-structuralists. i will now prove that his conclusion is correct, and that while his steps aren't necessarily explained so as to smoothly transition from one to the next, that all criticisms of them can be disproven or effectively doubted. after each step, i will bullet point criticisms of the step with "-", followed by my rebuttals with "*".
Step 1, external realism: You've got a real world that exists independently of human beings.
- not provable because of brain in a vat and other epistemological tricks
* these are just that -- tricks. i don't think anyone except someone who is considered delusional would consider himself/herself to just be a brain in a vat or have been a victim of descartes's demon his/her whole life.
- reality is some sort of changing system that prevents us from ever accessing it objectively in a meaningful way
* this questions what we consider objective, external reality to be in order to fit a rigid and conventional definition, not whether or not an objective, external reality in any form or version -- thus a flexible and liberal definition applies -- actually exists. a reality that is in constant flux so as to prevent us from having words in a language to accurately refer to objects and states of affairs in the reality prevents us from accessing that reality in a meaningful way. so at a certain point, a changing reality makes it impossible for us to obtain objective truth about it, but that does not mean we have subjective truth; rather, we have no truth at all. however, reality is not in such a state of flux so as to be completely unfathomable (except in the most literal and extreme sense of the word in which for reality to be fathomable, it would have to be a perfect, complete ontology), otherwise science would not be stable enough to constitute science since the application of abstraction and mathematics would not be functionally possible. there is a possibility of our present reality changing enough to interfere with science in a few cases, one of which is basically theoretical although possibly with negligible effects when considered in our present reality and another of which is very much an issue in our present reality. if reality is changing enough so that the power structure prevents us from obtaining functional knowledge about reality (it is a given that the power structure, in shaping the course of history, affects *pure* factual and situational knowledge, but factual and situational knowledge are different from knowledge that can be used as part of a process to produce new knowledge because factual knowledge does not produce new knowledge and situational knowledge does not produce new knowledge beyond the boundaries of the exact situation) -- e.g., assume a universe in which science must be established by a certain time in order to gain accurate scientific knowledge of the past, and once the certain time passes, the establishment of science becomes useless for this purpose -- then power does irreversibly affect knowledge. however, in our present reality, this does not appear to be the case per se, but there are instances where power has threatened or eliminated our ability to seek knowledge, such as the diminishing number of species in the rainforest, etc. so, in general, knowledge is viewed as something that has a temporal "blank check" of sorts and can be built upon from the bottom up as time progresses, but there are a few exceptions wherein power places temporal limitations on knowledge. (if one were to consider that only certain individuals were capable of attaining knowledge for mankind and these people either died too young or were never born, then you could argue that these are examples of temporal limitations, but in actuality, they are just the natural limitations reality places on us, and while we can always have some objective truth about reality, the magnitude of the truth (i.e., the amount of objective truth about reality and/or the degree of accuracy about reality) -- thus creating a limit on knowledge and a gap between knowledge and the theoretical knowledge possible by an omniscient being of everything in the universe -- will always be less than we desire it to be, with circumstances just slightly raising or lowering the ceiling.
- kant's thing-in-itself: Kant used the phrase Ding-an-sich (thing-in-itself) to refer to objects as they were or would be completely independent of our observations or thoughts about them.
According to Kant, it is impossible for us to acquire any knowledge of a thing-in-itself. Instead, we must theorize as to what their true nature is based upon our observations and experiences of them.
* the impossibility for us to acquire any knowledge of a thing-in-itself would seem to present a problem for us to truly access and know reality (those who refute this by saying that to know that something exists is to know it are making an erroneous distinction: they are confusing knowing of something (simply knowing the existence of something via a sign and its referent but not knowing anything about the referent other than what the sign designates such that one cannot explain the existence of the something in great detail or functionally use the something in the context of other things) with knowing about something (knowing the something/referent in detail -- its characteristics and its relationships to other things -- such that it can be functionally used in the context of other things)). the following clarifies this in more detail:
But, unlike later idealists, Kant does not say that the mind creates objects but only the conditions under which objects are perceived and understood. According to Kant, "we can know a priori of things only what we ourselves put into them." The attempt to preserve a realist orientation leads Kant to distinguish between the appearances of things (phenomena), as conditioned by the subjective forms of intuition, and the categories of the understanding and things-in-themselves (noumena). In brief, mathematics and science are true because they are derived from the ways in which the mind conditions its percepts and concepts, and metaphysics is an illusion because it claims to tell us about things as they really are. But since the mind constitutes the appearances and their intelligibility, we can never know noumenal reality (as it exists apart from mind) with any certainty.
so, we are left with the following dilemma. on one hand, kant, believes in realism. however, since we can never know noumenal reality with any certainty, then we can never actually prove realism as it stands as just a belief. the idea then is to justify this belief as being highly probable based on theoretical scenarios involving noumena.
1) our consciousness prevents us from fully accessing reality. would having a "perfect" consciousness akin to a god's eye view solve this problem?
2) testing things inherently changes them, so if we had a truly non-invasive way of testing things -- a la god as the experimenter and thus a god's eye view -- would this solve the problem?
3) we can't ever know every single aspect of a thing at any given moment. this is an inherent limitation of science and science assumes a certain amount of stability within the thing. would a god's eye view solve this problem?
4) we can't ever know every single aspect of a thing unless we follow that thing's "becoming" from its beginning to end, usually a span lasting beyond our lifetime. would a god's eye view solve this problem?
now, upon reviewing the four points, it becomes apparent that the problem of phenomena can be solved if we approach things from a god's eye view as phenomena is no longer a confounding variable and we have clear and unadulterated access to noumena. it is also helpful to remember that conventional science is conducted as if we are trying to interpret things through a god's eye view, and science has come to determine some very accurate assessments of our universe, thus reinforcing an ability to "objectively" access reality and giving us an idea of what a perfect access to reality -- a god's eye view -- would entail. now, what would happen if we were to contest the accuracy of a god's eye view -- would it be possible for god to be unable to access noumena? in order for this to occur, the only way for one to know something would be to be the thing itself. but if you do not possess a mind, how can you know that you exist? this idea is ridiculous as it would be useless to be a rock, for example, for the rock does not know it exists, so in advocating that a god's eye view does not suffice for accessing noumena and that only noumena can access noumena, one is proposing the idea that in order to know something you have to be it, which is a terrible mistake to make in confusing "to know" and "to be". two horrible implications result from this: 1) by reducing "to know" to "to be", one is reducing knowledge to existence, and in doing this (as i have explained in another blog entry titled "criticism of discourse") you are reducing philosophy to "everything just is", which is a very problematic approach as it renders reason and empiricism as useless, and 2) since people can only know themselves, everyone by default is a solipsist. now, applying this concept of only noumena being able to access noumena to people, according to kant, you are experiencing phenomena of yourself and perceptions of other people, but other people-in-themselves around you from your vantage point are noumena. however, from their perspective, they are phenomena and you are noumena. thus, people fit both categories but are labeled differently depending on whether they are first or third person perspective. so, in other words, even though people are both phenomena and noumena, they can only access each other through phenomena. thus, you can know yourself through phenomena, but you can never access your being through noumena even though you are a thing-in-itself to yourself. so, if even a conscious person cannot access his/her own noumena, then it must follow that noumena cannot access noumena, and thus if a god's eye view is also unable to access noumena, then nothing can access noumena and thus being, which is entailed by the concept of noumena, cannot access itself. since the idea of "access" differs between phenomena and noumena, with phenomena being "to know" and noumena being "to be", the "being" entailed by noumena cannot be justified or supported by any evidence, so the certainty of noumena's existence cannot be determined. so, the only solution is for a god's eye view to be able to access noumena as well as phenomena, and furthermore, for a god's eye view to be able to access both noumena and phenomena aspects of people, as the perspective from the mind of a person no longer the determining factor as to what constitutes phenomena and what constitutes noumena because a god's eye view is able to unify the consciousness of all people into a collective first person so that they are no longer noumena to each other (their noumena with respect to themselves, while still being unable to be accessed by them, can be accessed by a god's eye view); previously, from an individual's first person perspective, other people were noumena because they were, in essence, "philosophical zombies", a problem that can be circumvented by creating a collective first person consciousness. thus, since a god's eye view can access with absolute certainty both phenomena and noumena, there is nothing that cannot be accessed in reality. now, the assumption with this argument is that there exists a god's eye view in theory. both reason and empiricism operate using this principle and would be rendered useless by an argument that there is not a god's eye view. so, in conclusion, it makes sense to believe that there is an external reality because it is compatible with a god's eye view argument, and the alternative of denying an external reality by contesting a god's eye view does not make any sense because it renders reason and empiricism as useless and calls into question the very existence of the thing -- noumena -- whose existence and our resulting inability to access it was the basic premise for casting complete doubt on our ability to positively verify the existence of an external reality in the first place. thus, neither choice in any way changes the certainty that we can know an external reality exists, but both choices cast tremendous doubt on our ability to disprove an external reality both from a functional and a theoretical perspective using kant's concept of noumena.
- german idealism (mainly hegel)
* i think karl popper succinctly put it best: "German Idealism is oracular, according to Popper. 'It confronts us with its dictum. And we can take it or leave it.'" as such, i don't believe that there is any real evidence by german idealism against the existence of an external reality that needs to be systematically refuted.
- marx's epistemology: "perception (is) an interaction between us, the subject, and the material object. this object (the world around us) becomes transformed in the process of being known. our perception does not discover the truth of the world, just its appearance. thus our knowledge too cannot be the truth. instead, our knowledge consists of practical methods by which we can manipulate and gain control over the natural world. our knowledge of the world is not passive, it is purposive. it is a two-way process -- active and reactive -- in line with the dialectic. the synthesis of scientific knowledge we thus gain enables us to impose patterns of order and to manipulate or anticipate the workings of nature. this process does not arrive at the truth, as it is usually conceived. 'the question of whether objective truth can be attributed to human thought has nothing to do with theory, it is a purely practical question. the truth is the reality and power of thought, which can only be demonstrated in practice.' this leads marx to his famous conclusion: 'philosopher have previously only interpreted the world, but the real task is to change it.'"
* in short, there are two problems with marx's idea. first of all, marx does not take into account that science does not always turn out as hypothesized (for example, an experiment might conclude that there are some things we can't ever know -- thus revealing that nature has a certain established power over us -- and this does not fit with marx's idea of science continually progressing and empowering people to exert power over nature), and even if it does, through its implementation via technology, it is hard to control technology's effects on society as part of some grand, overarching plan of power. second, marx assumes that people if the results of science turn out as hypothesized, then people will be "satisfied" in that it will give them greater power and control over nature. however, this fundamentally misjudges one of the main tenets of human tendency: ultimately, people don't know what they want, and other people often don't know what is best for those people either. for example, are people really "happier" in exerting power over nature now that they all have cell phones, or are there some people who have disdain for cell phone culture, who hate being interrupted on a frequent basis, and who hate how cell phones are used in public places wherein people do not abide by previous standards of etiquette? certainly, there are at least some people who long for the days when we didn't have cell phones and life was "simpler" and people acted more politely. i think freud once mentioned something along the lines of that if we didn't have technology to do certain things, then we wouldn't desire to do those things. marx, however, believes that we do desire to do certain things regardless of whether or not we have the right technology at present to do so. i believe there is somewhat of a middle road, with more people having marx's mindset than freud's (although the limitations on people's imaginations and ability to conceive abstract possibilities is rather limited, so their desires for new technology do not stem from some sort of desire and sophisticated schema to conquer the universe as much as they become frustrated with an immediate limitation of current technology and wish a simple amendment could be made), but for reasons different from marx's as just mentioned. also, people don't have the foresight to see the drawbacks of improved technology, so retroactively speaking, i don't think you can make a good case for people wanting unbridled technology; i think people want technology at least on a level that makes day to day living, but whether this means they would be satisfied with technology from the 1950's, the 1980's, or the 2000's is really dependent upon each person's individual tastes and this is where marx's idea that humans unilaterally want to exert power over nature using science becomes highly questionable at best. notice that all of the dates i gave were at least a century after marx's first major work, so it makes sense that marx would have a difficult time fathoming how technology could have drawbacks as well as benefits as he couldn't foresee how technology could make life more chaotic, frazzle people's psychology, and create meaningful cultural movements of a brief time span, thus causing people to suffer from the "death" of these cultures as, unlike in marx's time when most cultures people were raised with were relatively static and remained for the duration of their lives, technology in the twentieth century caused cultural movements to change in rapid succession from decade to decade, and even year to year (arguably month to month, week to week, or day to day for certain cases). the third problem is that marx did not take into account that science could be applied on humans as well as objects, which creates a reflexive situation with a few pitfalls. for one, in studying consciousness and establishing results as being in this medium, we have established results in phenomenology -- a form of idealism -- instead of materialism, thus contradicting marx's dialectic. second, if psychology as a scientific discipline is about exerting power over the self, since the self is an object in this case to marx, then if we can control the self, since everything is idealist and there is no materialist aspect, we can control the world. this contradicts marx's own notion of "human tendency", which marx seems to believe is superior in its raw form to begin with over nature, thus justifying mankind's attempt to exert power over nature instead of to co-exist with nature or let nature exert power over mankind. so marx is faced with a dilemma: is the ultimate power in controlling ourselves or is it in controlling everything else around us but ourselves? (he cannot choose both, as this would result in a compromise decentering power, and in doing so, making science primarily a process of understanding instead of finding ways to exert power.) finally, psychology as a natural science would reveal certain characteristics and tendencies of the mind evidenced through human behavior, but nowhere in this evidence is there a plan to "manufacture" power over the self the way one could use science to "manufacture" power over nature via technology; certainly there are techniques to channel emotions and so on, but these are ways, usually forcing the person to be self-conscious on some level, of dealing with the effects of psychology, not altering psychology at its root. the only way to alter psychology at its root is to alter the environment during the development of someone (preferably early in life). thus, whereas marx believes that "human tendency" is superior to nature and is meant to conquer nature, the actual reality is that "human tendency" is nothing but a by-product (along with genetics) of nature, thus being a reflection of its environment. so contrary to marx's belief, we do not control nature according to our liking, but nature controls us and any attempt to control nature is ultimately done out of environmentally-induced causes. thus, if we don't attempt to control nature, this is due to the environment's effects on forming our "human tendency" and resulting in us making our choice, if we do attempt to control nature, this is also due to the environment's effects on forming our "human tendency", and if we attempt or do not attempt to control our own psychology, that is also due to the environment's effects on forming our "human tendency"; in short, we are at the mercy of nature no matter how we choose to address it, it is just that some ways appear to give us power over nature, but this appearance is illusory because "we", as both people and people making decisions, are inextricably linked with our environment from the moment we enter the world, and thus for every decision we make, there is at least some element of the environment involved in determining our decision-making process. thus, returning to the posed "dilemma", either option marx would have to choose from would be inherently flawed due to the aforementioned reason. also, going back to altering the root of our psychology, psychology as a science would reveal that there are certain situations in which a person who is totally uninformed about formal psychology would have a more preferable response according to the notion of exerting power over the self than someone who is educated about formal psychology. thus, ignorance is preferred for psychology in certain situations, which makes the idea of psychology as a progressive science a futile effort by marx's standard, yet it is a standard that can be inferred from his own philosophy of science. so in this sense, marx's idea of using science to exert power over its object of study is self-refuting. this is not to say that a form of marxism cannot prevail in the future, but it does mean that marx's philosophy of science will have to be substantially amended. second, marx believes that for knowledge to be objective, it cannot be partial, but must be whole and complete. however, this makes no sense if you sit and think about how it pertains to "reality" around you. assume that for all the objects in your surrounding that they exposed everything about themselves up to that point (thus they are not just "appearances", but actually exist as truths in-and-of-themselves), but if that had no bearing on the future, then knowledge would be completely useless, for nothing you knew about the past or present could be applied to the future. as such, we would not ever be in a state of knowing things, but in a constant state of experiencing things. thus, for whole and complete knowledge to exist, you would need things to expose everything about themselves so that everything that could be known about them about their past via their expression in the present, would bear 100% predictive power for the future regarding themselves. but since things interact with each other, in order for 100% predictive power to remain plausible for objects, then all objects must have 100% predictive power pertaining not only to themselves but also to their interactions with everything else in the world. thus, marx is implying that one would need a complete theory of everything, a perfect scientific ontology in order for knowledge to be objective. thus, marx's ideas about what constitutes objective knowledge are completely impractical and unattainable, which is why he resorts to his functional approach that points out that we cannot know everything and should behave for what best suits our purposes. from a functionalist perspective, what best suits our purposes presupposes things about reality that we cannot prove. in this sense, the limitations on knowledge put me in agreement with marx, but it is how we react to those limitations that causes us to differ. marx believes "what best suits our purposes" amounts to mankind gaining power over nature, but i believe that "what best suits our purposes" pertains to the pursuit of knowledge, and adding this knowledge to an expanding knowledge base for the sake of learning about our universe. now, it is true that there are always political and other connotations attached to knowledge, but i have explained in a previous post why this doesn't make the knowledge any less objective. furthermore, while my approach doesn't prove materialism to be correct, it means that we make certain assumptions about reality until proven otherwise, and that these assumptions entail that there is an "external reality" out there and that we do in fact perceive it, and in perceiving it, we access truths, albeit in a limited fashion, instead of projecting truths onto reality in an attempt to conquer it.
step 2: Words in the language can be used to refer to objects and states of affairs in that external reality.
- words aren't descriptive/accurate enough to, in referring to the assumed external reality, convey proper information about that reality
* we have symbols (math, etc.) and measurements using science and technology in addition to words
- rejection of correspondence theory of truth
* my blog entry as a rebuttal (see under february 2010: "revised: answer to an age old question (the correspondence theory of truth)")
- words are not pure in their perception, thus saying a word in a low voice and then saying the same word in a high voice will induce different mental states in the listener, and since there are different mental states there are different interpretations of reality. in this sense, words don't objectively refer to things but refer to things with "strings attached" -- they refer to things ("the message") but with strings attached ("the messenger"), so the messenger influences a person's perception and interpretation of reality in addition to the message
* my response assumes an organization of the words, which is actually step 3, but it is still pertinent to the claims of step 2. while it is true that different mental states will be induced, the epistemic objectivity and success level of communication is not determined by mental states, but by a person's reflection of that mental state manifested through a response either via language (although this is not totally concrete because a language response entails a person's own syntax/voice, which then creates another mental state in the other person affected by the speaker's syntax/voice) or behavior (more definite). for example, the phrases "put the paper on top of my desk" and "on top of my desk -- put the paper there" induce different mental states in the listener due to the different syntax, but they mean the same thing. if a person responds the same way to both phrases by putting the paper on top of the other person's desk, then the ambiguous interpretation of reality created by the differences in syntax is negated as the single meaning identical in both phrases is clearly understood and responded to as expected through the behavior as a response. thus, it can be concluded that the different mental states are "trivial truths" regarding epistemology, as the metaphysical ontology of the behavior is identical in response to both phrases and thus must be a reflection of the identical meaning in the two different phrases, thus proving a connection between words and reality.
- behavior proves nothing because everything is a text
*do i really have to respond to this?
- behavior response is still different for each phrase, reflective of different mental states, it's just that the differences are undetectable in the behavior responses.
*ok, this is basically saying that we have defined reality to the point where "everything just is", which basically makes all western philosophy worthless.
- we are incapable of accessing reality because we are "embedded" in it
* ontological subjectivity (the mind) does not preclude epistemic objectivity (to know). while this is obviously not 100% concrete, it does mean that anything that does not follow it is basically negligible unless one places such importance on them that our conceptual foundations are undermined and we head in the direction of "everything just is".
And then step 3: If 1 and 2 are right, then some organization of those words can state objective truth about that reality.
- there is not a 100% correlation between words and accurately depicting reality because inherent syntax causes different mental states for different sentences that can be reduced to mean the same thing, and since reality is interpreted and there are different mental states, there are different interpretations of the same reality, and thus no objective truth can be determined
* see my earlier response regarding syntax for step 2.
- while step 2 is correct at a basal level, a) it does not adequately convey qualitative/metaphysical issues or highly conceptual issues that cannot be demonstrated in a response via simple behavior, b) it does not account for quaila when humans are in abnormal and/or intoxicated states, c) human experiences are far too complex to be able to be reduced to what step 3 claims is possible and true, and d) how do we define who has authority over who can state objective truth about reality and who cannot?
* a) analytic philosophy originally abandoned all metaphysics in order to address this problem. however, all this did was more narrowly define what we had "complete" access to in reality. our levels of access to reality become more objectively restricted when we delve deeper into qualitative/metaphysical issues as things become more subjective and open to interpretation. however, that doesn't mean that at least some amount of objectivity doesn't remain, for that objectivity is what we cling to for establishing objective truth, and out of that, objective knowledge. the parts that are subjective we must simply accept as being that and thus admitting we have restricted access to reality in those areas. as for highly conceptual issues, while it is true that syntax does intermingle with semantics in some manner once you reach a certain level of linguistic complexity, the fact that ideas of comparable sophistication in math and science can be actualized and proven demonstrates that meaning is not lost at high levels and that for high levels of language, there are subtle various interpretations of an objective truth, comparable to how a color, say blue, is still blue but has various shades (navy blue, sky blue, etc.). as such, we can still establish blue as objective, and then leave the various shades as problems that remain to be solved just like we leave some of the subjective aspects of qualitative/metaphysical alone for the time being.
b) this is an epistemological issue, one that posits that the subjectivity of qualitative experience interferes with the ability of language to describe objective truth about reality. a good analogy for this would be how one perceives the world through a different lens when he/she wears sunglasses as opposed to not wearing them. certainly there is a noticeable and universal shift involved, but does it actually impair one or cause one to perceive reality differently so as to believe in external reality as different? i don't think it does, or if it does, it is to a negligible extent.
c) another epistemological issue. what this basically amounts to is does one's schema of the world based on experiences that form an underlying belief system prevent one from using the system of language to obtain objective truth about reality? while i don't doubt the astounding complexity of an individual's life experiences and the vast diversity of experiences among a population, i do believe that there is a common socio-cultural currency/norm. why? well, quite simply, our society, in order to function, requires the vast majority -- virtual all -- of people to behave in ways that follow certain written and unwritten guidelines; these include, but are not limited to law, traditions, customs, manners, "common sense", etc. if language did not allow us access to objective truth in reality, then communication would be lost. imagine a situation in which a 20 year old white, privileged college student interacts with a 60 year old immigrant minority taxi driver, asking the driver for his opinion about a certain restaurant of that driver's cultural heritage. certainly, what the two people bring to the table in this conversation is markedly different; the student has had little exposure to this kind of food and culture and approaches it with a healthy curiosity, while the driver has grown up on this food and with the surrounding culture, cooks the food at home on a regular basis, has a sibling who runs another restaurant that cooks that kind of food, has had important life events (marriage, etc.) involving this kind of food, his native language is that of the food's culture and differs from the language native to the 20 year old that both are speaking in their conversation, etc. however, despite their differences, they are able to engage in a meaningful discussion about the food, discussing its qualities (smell, texture, spice, etc.), its nutritional value, which food is served at the different meals, and also things culturally related to the food, like what kind of music they play at the restaurant, and practical matters, like what the food costs. so it is obvious that there is at least some exchange of information that reveals objective truth about reality. on the other hand, during the conversation, while the 20 year old views the food as a new adventure or hobby of sorts with healthy but not overwhelming interest, the 60 year old participates in the discussion as if the food were a central part of his life experiences and defined who he was, giving him an identity, and so forth, and as such, he plays the role of wise teacher in the conversation, whereas the student plays the role of a student (except this time in an informal way, outside of the classroom). so certainly each person's schema affected the way this exchange of information took place and was affected by what took place, and what each person experienced through the conversation as a result of their prior experiences is something that is unique to each person, that cannot accurately be portrayed through language, and thus remains inaccessible as far as each person constitutes part of the other person's objective reality. however, each person was able to use what they brought to the table to engage in an exchange of information via language that was a societally-functional interaction, thus resulting in some sort of common ground wherein objective truth about reality was obtained by both parties involved. now, a little twist on this brings up age as a deciding factor. the 20 year old and 60 year old are both considered healthy, normal adults, but how do we treat children and seniors? well, seniors are basically healthy, normal adults unless they have a severe neurological disorder or have become senile -- it really depends on the specific case before you can make a fair judgment though. as for children, they have access to objective truth in reality, but only on certain levels. for example, children are smart enough to learn things in school, right? but on the other hand, they do possess a different schema of reality, so whereas an adult knows that the santa claus at the mall is a man dressed up in a santa outfit, children believe it is the "real" santa. so yes, you do have to take these things into account, and that is why minors under 18 are not legal adults -- because their schema of things is not completely sufficient enough for them to access objective truth in reality to the point where they can be depended on to function at a societal level.
d) ok, this, at first glance, is the most difficult point to defend of all, but after a thorough examination, and feel i have effectively rebutted it as well as any of the other points. the first obstacle is as follows: if you take the immensely liberal intellectual interpretation (there is a famous piece about this in psychology from the 50's or 60's, but his name and the title of his work escape me), there is no such thing as abnormal behavior. as such, clinically insane people who spend hours talking to inanimate objects are stating as much objective truth about reality as anyone else. ok, so the easy way, apparently, to rectify this is to classify these people as clinically insane -- which they are -- and designate them as having some sort of problem with their mind that prevents them for accessing objective truth in reality. now, the problem appears to have been solved, except that someone has to have the authority over diagnosing which people have psychological abnormalities (and to what degree) and which people do not. now, everyone in authority has personal biases and agendas, so certainly we can't trust them to evaluate people's mental states, can we not? well, i disagree here for a few reasons. first of all, we have authority in academia. for example, math teachers almost always have the correct answers for the problems, and students often do not, yet we do not question the authority of math teachers regarding who has the final say over the correctness of the math problems, and thus the ability to access objective reality in that discipline, do we not? but of course there is a glaring problem with this example, for it is much easier to judge the validity of math answers than it is to judge someone else's mental state. to this, i would reply as follows: yes, decades ago when behaviorism was the overriding paradigm in psychology and the only way you could diagnose someone was by evaluating their behavior, even though it was done using a set criteria, it was not an exact science and certain people could be misdiagnosed. however, as time has passed and technology has improved and psychology has incorporated new approaches, we have discovered that virtually all psychological disorders are "biologically-rooted". furthermore, the ones that are of a clinical nature usually have a remarkable biological abnormality, as opposed to someone who is just mildly depressed and is given an anti-depressant to increase the amount of serotonin in his/her brain. now, not all diagnoses are done using brain scanning technology, but the mere fact that it can be used to diagnose clinical psychological problems serves as a scientific precedent that we have great reason to classify these people as not having access to objective truth in reality. now, does life drive the rest of us crazy? sure, of course it does; to deny this would be incredibly dishonest. however, does it prevent us from accessing objective truth in reality using language? i would say no. while life certainly does present us with an array of experiences -- say, which can be represented by all the colors in a rainbow -- these experiences are what constitute are schemas of the world, which are a reflection of our identity, and our very being and existence. however, as i demonstrated in point "c)", the schemas of the 20 year old and the 60 year old were markedly different, yet this did not prevent them from accessing objective truth in reality in their conversation. so while we are ultimately rainbows of a sort, we interpret the world through light, both literally and figuratively. the figurative example here is that while as individuals we may have different shades of that light through which we project our rainbows -- some lighter and some darker -- we still need light in order to access our rainbows -- thus, we cannot access our schemas without access to objective truth in reality -- and the different shades of light are analogous to shades or tints -- the shade or tint of the light through which we view the world (our "lens") is a subjective aspect, but nevertheless we all have amounts of light to varying degrees, and the mere existence of the light serves as objective currency. thus, the shades of light still do not prevent us from seeing things properly except in the most extreme cases (in which case a person is experiencing a state of temporary insanity/intoxication, etc.), but rather allow us to access objective truth in reality using language in spite of the subjective tints.
- frequency of use/non-use of language and with whom the language is used have an effect on a person's ability to use that language to access objective truth in reality
* while i would say that this affects a person's long-term schema, both linguistically and experientially, and a person's short-term cognition via language processing, i would say that neither significantly interferes with a person's ability to access objective truth in reality. my above point with "c)" can be applied to the long-term schema aspect, although it doesn't discuss the linguistic applications, but since i am too lazy to describe those in detail, just assume for the sake of my argument that their potency is roughly equivalent to that of experience in a person's schema. as for short-term cognition, this really delves into psychology of language, and while i would agree that they can temporarily prime someone to be more inclined to use certain words over others, thus affecting one's thinking, i would say that it is analogous to my point in "b)" in which wearing sunglasses basically does not change one's outlook on reality, except that for the point here, the sunglasses are temporary, only being applicable for the period where short-term cognition is affected by one's particular use of language in situations depending on whom he/she is conversing with and what the purpose of the conversation is about.
Step 4 is we can have knowledge, objective knowledge, of that truth.
- knowledge is socially-constructed, and thus subjective
* to say that knowledge is socially-constructed is to claim that the organization of words giving us objective truth about reality is also socially-constructed, which is an attack on step 3 and which i sort of defended in the rebuttal point starting with the phrase "while i would say...". i will defend steps 3 and 4 from attacks of socially-constructed subjective knowledge as follows:
the problem with attacking step 4 is that you are advocating that humans are incapable of possessing knowledge, period. you are declaring that humans are incapable of possessing knowledge because you are denying that a single human can use words to reflect reality from a god's eye view (imagine a world in which only a single person exists, and he/she makes notes about the world in his/her language and uses those notes to help him/her think and behave in a certain way), and instead you are saying that the only way words have meaning is because we make words have meaning, requiring a minimum of two people for communication. thus the premise for language has changed from that of being functional for one consciousness to that of being what is agreed upon by many consciousnesses. even though language retains its functional purpose, what happens is constructivists place emphasis on agreement/consensus to the point where either functional purpose is pure coincidence or is viewed as of secondary importance to consensus, and furthermore, as an effect of consensus rather than a guiding cause. constructivists get away with this because language evolved among groups of people and not just with one person, so they can claim the real world as evidence of their theory and show that it supports their viewpoint (however, you can also view it through the other perspective using the same evidence, plus you can make a strong argument that language acquisition during the early years of a person's life are functional instead of socially-constructed because the person has little to no memory of what is happening and thus can't consciously socially construct the language he/she is processing (from i what i can tell, since social constructions are said to define our humanity, and we would not be normal humans without consciousness, all mental states and language activities occurring prior to the development of consciousness in a person cannot be considered to be socially-constructed, only socially-dependent)), whereas philosophers can't put to a real world situation of a single person existing and using words for his/her own purposes without interacting with other people and thus their proof is only theoretical. also, the fact that multiple people communicating was necessary for the evolution of language (informal) and that language acquisition requires exposure to other people speaking it does not mean that language can't act as a set, formal system used solely by one person; it is analogous to taking the training wheels off of a bicycle wherein the training wheels stage is when it is necessary for language to arise and evolve through its use by groups of people, but the stage when the training wheels are taken off is when language is a formal, established system that can be fully comprehended and used by a single person for his/her own purposes. and the idea that words don't have any inherent meaning by themselves is to mischaracterize words because you're only looking at words through the lens of a brute physical world (which wouldn't be possible without words and symbols meaning something) or you're relying upon constructionism (see above for why constructionism is wrong regarding this point because words obviously have a functional meaning in early language acquisition and the person using the words is to young to have developed normal consciousness, and thus his/her use of language is not socially-constructed). to look at words through the lens of a brute physical world is to reject anti-realism (thus debunking some of the arguments that words are inherently meaningless), but more importantly, is to deny that words are human creations that fulfill a purpose; to say that words don't mean anything means that you are either implying that any perceived functional capacity for words is purely by mistake and intelligibility is a complete coincidence, thus denying that humans have the capacity to comprehend the functional capacity that words have, which is to deny that consciousness is able to play any meaningful role in accessing reality. thus, according to this point of view, 1) we, or more specifically, our consciousness is restricted from accessing reality, if indeed there is a reality "out there", which means that 2) our consciousness is all we know and can access, and if there is more to reality than what is in our minds -- our consciousness -- we are at the mercy of whatever exists beyond our consciousness since our consciousness has no ability to access what is beyond it. about the only somewhat sensible thing one can do is deny the existence of a permanent/concrete/absolute meaning for words, and by having meaning undergo constant change/flux/evolution in two or more people's individual minds as they think and interact with their environment and as people interact with each other, there is never at any time a single, static reference point for the meaning of a word as the dictionary states. however, there is an approximation that can be fulfilled, which would be viewed on a graph with meaning as the y axis and time as the x axis, giving us a horizontal line with an approximate slope of x = (any number for y) (flux would be indicated by the line "wiggling" around the straight line and evolution would should a gradual increase or decrease of the slope of the line. i wish there were a better way i could convey what i am conceiving regarding the properties of this line and believe it could be done using a function of sorts. but since i am unable to enact this at present, i will do the best i can using an example of limits. for example, the horizontal line can be viewed as a limit as y approaches "any number for y" from both sides of the line (both top and bottom), although unlike conventional limits wherein the value of y either increases at a certain rate or decreases at a certain rate as x goes to infinity, these limits would allow for both increases and decreases as long as they remain within set boundaries that run parallel to the horizontal line but are not too distant from it. so, in this abstract sense, words do have concrete abstract meaning in the same way that .9999999 bar = 1.
- knowledge is subjective due to paradigm shifts, discontinuities, contextual dependencies, etc.
i think i will leave searle's own account of kuhn to cover paradigm shifts:
Two of the most commonly cited authors by those who reject the Western Rationalistic Tradition are Thomas Kuhn and Richard Rorty. I will digress briefly to say a little about them. Kuhn, in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, is supposed to have shown that the claims of science to describe an independently existing reality are false, and that, in fact, scientists are more governed by crowd psychology than by rationality, and tend to flock from one 'paradigm' to another in periodic scientific revolutions. There is no such thing as a real world to be described by science; rather each new paradigm creates its own world, so that, as Kuhn says, 'after a revolution scientists work in a different world.'
I think this interpretation is something of a caricature of Kuhn. But even if it were a correct interpretation, the argument would not show that there is no real world independent of our representation, nor would it show that science is not a series of systematic attempts, in varying degrees successful, to give a description of that reality. Even if we accept the most naive interpretation of Kuhn's account of scientific revolutions, it does not have any such spectacular ontological consequences. On the contrary, even the most pessimistic conception of the history of science is perfectly consistent with the view that there is an independently existing real world and the objective of science is to characterize it.
now, as for other hurdles facing "objective knowledge", i would argue that just because the notion that we -- mankind -- have experienced "progress" in history is misguided doesn't mean that knowledge isn't objective. for example, consider the discipline of philosophy, at least through kant. just because more recent philosophers have rejected some of the ideas of previous philosophers and thus there isn't a steady accumulation of knowledge in only positive respects doesn't mean that a) the previous knowledge, even if "disproven", wasn't helpful in establishing a foundation which more recent philosophers have used to question the claims espoused by that very foundation, and b) the knowledge of those previous philosophers wasn't objective. furthermore, although there hasn't always been "progress" through philosophical discourse over the centuries, its problems have been more accurately defined and a greater variety of possible nuanced solutions has emerged; as such, specialization has occurred. furthermore, i don't see how, at least in the discipline of philosophy, context presented an obstacle in obtaining objective knowledge. did it influence how philosophers approached their inquiries and findings? most certainly it did, and to deny that there was not a culture both inherent to philosophers (a culture of philosophy) and that societal cultures did not play a role (a large number of philosophers in the enlightenment period being german, and that this affected how german philosophers approached philosophy as opposed to british or french philosophers) is just plain incorrect and believing traditional philosophical tenets in the most austere interpretation. however, once again, does the fact that philosophers approached things through different "lenses" make their knowledge subjective? well, as i mentioned earlier, does wearing sunglasses make you interpret reality differently? for virtually all intents and purposes, i would say that it does not. furthermore, as there is the argument that there is far more variation within a culture than between cultures, i would argue that the individual differences among philosophers probably was greater than the differences between approaches across cultures, so if we are to label knowledge as subjective simply because knowledge was generated by humans, then ultimately the validity of knowledge can be reduced to ad hominems instead of rational analysis through discourse. now, i believe that my description of knowledge production for philosophy was standard operating procedure up through kant, and the beginnings of the supplanting of traditional philosophy with alternative approaches had its roots in german idealism, followed by nietzsche being the real first true renegade philosopher and the precursor to all of these "post-" movements. so i truly believe that if you follow the philosophical approaches prior to german idealism that you must accept the idea that knowledge is objective, but once you start placing emphasis on philosophy after that, particularly that of the 20th century wherein traditional philosophy fragmented, then you most likely will be led to believe that either knowledge is subjective, or that it is impossible to determine with knowledge is subjective or objective.
- all knowledge is subjective, some knowledge is subjective, or all knowledge has some subjective aspects
* my blog entry "all knowledge is objective"
- all knowledge can be reduced to forms of power
ok, first of all, if i grant that this is true, then i must also grant that every other reduction of knowledge is true as well: all knowledge can be reduced to culture, all knowledge can be reduced to economics, all knowledge can be reduced to atoms in our brains, all knowledge can be reduced to words and symbols, etc. so if knowledge can be reduced to anything, then is it really knowledge, e.g., is the ontological distinction of knowledge necessary any more or is knowledge just a convenient term or metaphor for describing other things? basically, by saying that knowledge can be reduced to anything else, you are admitting that knowledge doesn't exist. now that we see the pandora's box that this opens up, let's assume that knowledge can't be reduced to anything other than power. the problem with this idea is that, just like the argument that knowledge is socially-constructed, it assumes that the functional purpose of knowledge takes a back seat to the role it plays in social institutions and society at large. by defining knowledge as tool of the elite, a product of social institutions, and a conduit for the exertion of power in society, one must assume that knowledge is dependent on society for its existence, not the other way around, and to reduce knowledge to power, one must assume that only the former is true and not the latter. again, the former can be "proven" true by post-structuralist accounts -- that is fine. however, the latter can be proven by the theoretical scenario of mankind's extinction with the existence of only one adult in the world. without any other people, all social networking and avenues for exerting power have collapsed; the person is completely isolated. as such, the only application for this person's knowledge is for survival, and then assuming he/she can establish an acceptable baseline for survival, exerting power over the natural world. now, it is true that the social world is an extension or outgrowth of the natural world, but let's return to the phase wherein the person is simply in survival-mode. certainly the power struggles over knowledge that he/she had experienced while learning as a part of society when it existed plays a role in his/her capability to survive. for example, assume the person, in following social norms, led a normal suburban existence, and thus had invested far more time in school in learning a foreign language than in surviving in the wilderness. as such, the person, existing as a reflection of power exchanges in society, does not know the minimum required skills for surviving in the wild and almost starves to death. however, upon finding a book about wilderness survival, he/she is able to learn those skills in time to hunt/fish/gather things to eat, and from there is able to improve his/her living conditions. now, one might argue that the book, in containing language and symbols, is also a conduit of power leftover from society, which i can agree with to a certain extent. however, can one really argue that the leftover traces of power in the book take precedence over the functional knowledge the lone person gained from reading it and demonstrated through implementing those skills in order to survive? unless you like debating based on disingenuous technicalities, i would think not. so, in proving that the functional aspect of knowledge can override the social aspect -- power -- we have proven that knowledge is objective. now, one can still make an argument that in contemporary society, the power struggles take precedence over functionality regarding knowledge. however, because of my theoretical example, you cannot claim that knowledge is not objective. rather, what you can claim is that knowledge is being misused -- that we place too much emphasis on knowledge that is not necessary and we do so for reasons of power instead of functional reasons. and i can certainly agree with that last statement to some extent.
now, a few things to conclude this piece. for one, social constructions are a "postmodernist" idea (at least from what i've read), not a conventional philosophical approach, and as such, their very existence can be called into question -- do they really exist, are they an approach that is done more out of convenience than out of what evidence suggests, or are they merely a passing trend that will one day be replaced by some "post-postism's" new and more fashionable concoction? searle actually believes that the idea of social constructions reinforces the notion of an external reality instead of disproving it. a different article reviewing one of searle's books on social philosophy states:
Searle's second line of defense of Realism is to argue that any alternative to Realism assumes the very truth of Realism. (1) For example, to claim that an individual's world is a construction based on certain features of the brain is to assume that brains exist and have certain features. To claim that certain realities are socially constructed is to assume that there exist social beings coming to certain agreements. To claim that everything exists in some context or other is to assume that various contexts exist. And it makes no sense to reply that brains, social beings, or contexts are themselves constructs; who or what would they be constructed by or out of?
Furthermore (2) for example, that the five dollar bill is a social construction requires that there be the piece of paper, or whatever, that is taken, by agreement, to be that piece of money. Social realities are overlays on physical realities, requiring those physical realities for their own reality.
And, finally (3), for the social construction to succeed, it must bring into existence a (social) *reality*, a *real* five dollar bill, for example, which constitutes the *fact* that this is a real five dollar bill and makes *true* the statement, "This is a real five dollar bill."
in addition, it must be noted that searle actually does not believe one can prove that an external reality exists, but that we are compelled to make that assumption. the article continues:
Searle points out that these considerations do not show that there is a real world. They merely show that anything we say commits us to the Realist assumption that there is a real world. Nor do they tell us anything about what that world is like or what we can know about it.
Searle ends by asking why it is important to defend Realism. After all, he says, don't all of us, whatever our views, take our cars to the mechanic and brush our teeth, as if cars and teeth really exist? He thinks that the rejection of Realism is dangerous in tending to undermine rationality and open the gates to anti-rational forces. "Philosophical theories make a tremendous difference to every aspect of our lives."
in examining searle's four steps, i investigated arguments both pro and con for each step and concluded that while the steps, as explained by searle, do not necessarily follow smoothly and are open to attack, when the attacks are analyzed, the rebuttals in favor of searle's points help nuance them in a much more precise and sophisticated fashion and the ambiguity invited by searle's brief description of each step decreases enormously, causing the transition from one step to the next becomes much more seamless with a much smaller gap between steps. so, i have arrived at three conclusions from my work: 1) there is almost undoubtedly an objective, external reality, 2) we should operate as though there exists an objective, external reality even though it can never be absolutely proven to exist, and 3) knowledge is objective because we can have objective knowledge of the objective truth of that assumed objective, external reality.
