[Serious Phil] Seeing the Bat in the Inkblot

[Joseph Polanik]

SWM wrote:

 >Peter D wrote:

 >>SWM wrote:

 >>>Peter D wrote:

 >>>>SWM wrote:

 >>>>>Peter D wrote:

 >>>>>>SWM wrote:

 >>>>>>>The issue of "insight" here comes into play vis a vis seeing
 >>>>>>>consciousness in one way rather than another.

 >>>>>>That says nothing. You are replacing one one visual term
 >>>>>>with another. The issue is to do with how lieterally these
 >>>>>>terms are to be taken, what epistemological upshot they
 >>>>>>have.

 >>>>>We've discussed all that many times already. The issue is whether
 >>>>>we can think of consciousness as reducible to what isn't, itself,
 >>>>>conscious or whether we are bound by the picture of consciousness
 >>>>>that presents itself to us on introspection as being an irreducible
 >>>>>basic in the universe.

 >>>>No, this isn't about consc specifically.

 >>>That WAS the subject under discussion and under dispute!

 >>No, the subject under discussion was the Wittgensteinian use of
 >>visual metaphor.

 >I wasn't talking about Wittgenstein and metaphor. I was talking about
 >Wittgenstein and the range of uses found in linguistic practices and
 >THAT was to do with how we talk about consciousness. As you often say,
 >"stop trying to change the subject".

you started this exchange with a comment about 'insight' and ended by
denying that you were talking about Wittgenstein and metaphor. if anyone
changed the subject it was you.


 >>>>>This just points to the fact that different levels of discussion
 >>>>>are in play, levels you apparently confuse. If every instance of an
 >>>>>argument or a reason involves an instance of seeing

 >>>>I dispute that it does: your don't get to assume that.

 >>>I claim that. I don't assume it. In fact, I would defy you to produce
 >>>an instance of any argument or reason (part of an argument) where
 >>>understanding what is said plays no part.

 >>What I dispute is that there is a 1) special, sui generis of 2
 >>incommunicable, just-have-to-get it understanding involved in every
 >>argument.

 >Dispute away. And yet there is. You yourself note that we can't explain
 >what it is like to see red or taste saltiness to another (it is
 >subjective). ... Similarly getting what a word means or seeing the
 >implications of an argument are not shareable although they are
 >conveyable (as anything is) to the extent that we have some common
 >basis between us.

visual metaphors usually suggest 'seeing' as in sensing or perceiving;
but, we need to be alert to the possibility that 'seeing' is projecting
--- as when someone sees a bat or a cat in an inkblot.

Joe


-- 

Nothing Unreal is Self-Aware

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