How much does the physical influence perception and, therefore, philosophy.
Before answering, consider that philosophy started as a search for knowledge. It happened in every culture able to pass on its ‘discoveries.’ Isaac Newton is the father of western science because he could show, mathematically, that his theory of gravity was ‘true.’ Descartes is the father of western philosophy because he couldn’t prove any of his theories, mathematically or otherwise–although he tried.
Philosophy, then, became a way of abstract thinking that really couldn’t be mathematically proven–it could only be intuitively accepted.
Note: I’m borrowing this idea from Daniel Dennet’s [u]Consciousness Explained.[u]
How much of the intuitive is actually physical?
If the human eye, as Dennet says, can only focus on a given point, and peripheral vision isn’t concrete beyond a certain radius of that focal point, how much of what we see is actually within our conceptual understanding? How many of the missing pixels do we fill in to make a complete picture and how do we choose the pixels?
-Most of the world we perceive is generated in our minds, in fact, it’s a miracle that we can distinguish between “the dream world” and the thing we call “reality” inasmuch as we do… When you look at a tree, you “know” automatically that you are looking at a tree even before you’ve looked at it more closely, every branch, every leaf, from all sides - you approximize and then believe that it’s a tree… It’s easier that way and far less time consuming - and once nature decided that it works, that it’s good enough, we incorporated in our daily routine and forgot about it. But it still doesn’t change the fact that we see with our brains (visual cortex) and the brain can see everything, even things that aren’t there to be seen. Visualwise, the brain is a highly sophisticated Photoshop apparatus that embelishes and adapts the received image to match the memorized pattern. It does a good job most of the time, except when strong emotions are in play - that’s when it gets really creative, and if it can’t adapt the image to his preferences - it reboots automatically…
I’ll try again. We have eyes. For most of us, those physical features work to give us all the colors and shapes of our perceived world. (Since I’m not blind, I won’t go into that at the moment.)
Our eyes focus on a certain point that is of interest to us at the moment; we also ‘see’ other shapes peripherally. Our minds often disregard the peripheral; it’s of no real interest to us, so why should we ‘waste’ our ‘brain time’ filling out the details?
How does being either ‘far sighted’ or ‘near sighted’ change our perceptions? How does macular degeneration affect one’s perception of the world? How does blindness?
Aren’t our perceptions basic to our consciousness and isn’t our consciousness the basis of the creation of our philosophies?
Having also read Consciousness Explained, the insight I gained was the importance of benign neglect to the functioning of consciousness.
The brain doesn’t need to fill in missing pixels - it just decides that the lack of precise information can be ignored. This is why our retinal blind spot doesn’t bother us for instance.
To widen the discussion, I think many people with irrational beliefs have an intellectual ‘benign neglect’, and it’s not always a bad thing.
Will you explain, please, how your last sentence applies only to people with ‘irrational beliefs?’ I’ve found people with rational beliefs also give in to ‘benign neglect’ if it furthers their cause.
I’m trying to answer your last sentence. Otherwise, yes, the brain decides to ignore certain peripheral portions of what it ‘sees,’ because that vision isn’t important to its focal point. The focal point is most important–both physically and metaphysically.
I still struggle through many of Dennet’s conceptions, because understanding him seems to demand a grasp of so many different sciences.
But I’m working on it.
As far as these forums go, it seems most people are concerned with thought alone, and not how the physical properties of the mind shape thought.
In the meantime, I’ll continue to be the Freshman who hopes someday to be your graduate assistant.
Sometimes it’s that lack of precise information that ought not to be ignored.
An irrational belief, for instance, as someone posted somewhere in here about a man who killed his wife or girlfriend because he found her with another man - because he ‘believed’ she belonged to him (a form of slavery) - would not in my book be considered an ‘intellectual benign neglect’.
All irrational beliefs which can be seen by a rational mind are full of illusions/delusions. Maybe it’s more important to train the brain and mind to fill in those missing pixels, instead of giving it an excuse to see less of a picture.
Our subconscious is capable of perceiving and picking up certain physical information which we may not see, be aware of, because of our blind spot, and limitations, and showing it to our conscious mind but I think we need to be made aware of this. A puzzle can’t be seen or known in its entirely unless we have all of the ‘pieces’.
Why do you say that, Jonquil? I’ve not read either of them so I’d really like to know. What do you ‘like’ about Chalmers and Peat that you ‘dislike’ about Dennett?
"Sometimes it’s that lack of precise information that ought not to be ignored.
An irrational belief, for instance, as someone posted somewhere in here about a man who killed his wife or girlfriend because he found her with another man - because he ‘believed’ she belonged to him (a form of slavery) - would not in my book be considered an ‘intellectual benign neglect’.
All irrational beliefs which can be seen by a rational mind are full of illusions/delusions. Maybe it’s more important to train the brain and mind to fill in those missing pixels, instead of giving it an excuse to see less of a picture.
Our subconscious is capable of perceiving and picking up certain physical information which we may not see, be aware of, because of our blind spot, and limitations, and showing it to our conscious mind but I think we need to be made aware of this. A puzzle can’t be seen or known in its entirely unless we have all of the ‘pieces’."
I didn’t promote the neglect of irrational thinking as always a good thing. (Did you benignly neglect the “not always” in my post when framing your reply?)
As examples; a racist who ignores his irrationality is clearly not benign in his neglect., but how about the ‘irrational positive thinking’ that enables many to minimize their failures (benignly ignore them) and accentuate their successes, and thereby lead happy and positive lives?
I’m assuming that everything seen (any sensory input, for that matter) is ‘registered’ somewhere in the brain; however, if the brain doesn’t think it’s important to the subject at hand, it doesn’t take the time to do anything more. The peripheral gets taken to the attic or shoved into a ‘don’t need it’ pigeon-hole where it can sit until it gradually dissolves into nothingness in the conscious mind.
How does this mental selectivity contribute to an individual’s view of the world?
Have I slipped into solipsism?
Mines, you realize I used Dennett only to introduce the thread.
I don’t believe the conscious brain chooses what to remember/store 99% of the time - that would be the job of unconscious processes. What’s more; for simple efficiency reasons, there’s no need to store anything that has no further use - even temporarily.
I know there is a point of view that proposes everything is stored in memory, and it is the recall that is selective, but I don’t fully agree with it.
On either basis, mental selectivity would be largely unconscious.
There is another type of mental selectivity of course, that is fully conscious, allied with bigotry; “I hear only what I want to hear” - is that what you meant?
We can usually program our brain to remember what to remember and what to sort out, if we find something interesting I see brainless bimbos able to write a PhD about their silly useless things, but what falls our of their interest area they would be clueless. One may say they’r predispositioned for such, but that will be contradicted by mass hysteria, girls will usually swear on their lifes that they’ll never wear such fugly shoes and color of clothes …etc, but when the fashion dictators preaches new kind of fashion, these women who before swore holy oaths never to wear the infashion, yet will jump the wagon through group think and mass hysteria.
