Brian asked:

I’m bringing Bertie’s teapot to earth and placing it on a table. If eight strangers sit around it with pencils and sketchpads and each produces a drawing which, though different from the others because of the angle of view, is consistent with the existence of a teapot created by known human technology, why is this not proof of the physical existence of the teapot?

Answer by Jürgen Lawrenz

I don’t know Bertie; I suppose he is your favourite green Martian. But even if I got this wrong, if he brings an object with him, the situation is clear cut (in short: we are not proposing a Matrix-type illusion or virtual reality, but I’ll discuss this too).

The drawing is prima facie proof that the teapots exists. Eight normally sensitive people with good rendering skills doing it independently of each other leave you no choice but to accept their testimony.

Even more so if you fill the pot with tea and they drink.

All life forms on earth survive on the strength of this sense certainty. Many don’t even have nerves, but still survive because they have other means of ‘proving’ the existence of food and foes, heat and cold etc.

If you programmed a computer to render the teapot it would produce a similar drawing as one of the draughtsmen. If you throw the teapot at the monitor screen you’ll break it.

So this establishes beyond all reasonable doubt the existence of the teapot.

Your question plays on certain dubious theories that are constantly bandied about in the literature of perception which presuppose, without good evidence or sufficient reason, that what we see may not be ‘real’, that all perceptions are manufactured by the brain and that we live in a permanent state of illusion. The thesis of the brain in a vat is of that ilk, and so is the presupposition behind the movie ‘Matrix’.

I don’t wish to sound dogmatic, but the fact is that we don’t have an adequate theory of life, nor an adequate theory of the mind. While this state of affairs persists, anyone can step forward with any conjectures they like. The brain in the vat theory sounds like radical nonsense to me, but you need not take my word for it. Ask any theorist who believes in it to give you a comprehensive account. But you won’t get one, and that’s the real problem.

To return: The proposition that all our perceptions are kinds of illusions is as threadbare of sense as they come. If all humans see objects the same way, then the word ‘illusion’ is meaningless and should be removed from the dictionary. But this is unnecessary because the use of that word in such a context is simply misuse.

What a bat can see may not be ‘real’ in the same way as what you see, but the bat can eat it and so can you, and you will both survive. By eating you prove the existence of whatever food you digest.

It is a different matter if you are asked to give proof of what this food or, in your example, the teapot ‘really’ looks like, independent of the way the draughtsmen and the computer draw it. This is because the teapot produces ‘phenomena’ which your senses pick up. But this is an insignificant problem – even though it seems to bother a lot of people. The point is simply that your eyes can hardly pick up the pot bodily. They can only perceive the radiation reflected from it and manufacture an internal (2D) representation. But you can pick up the pot with your hands (touch); and if you smash it, you can hear the sound.

You see from this that nature has equipped us to perceive RELEVANT information from the teapot to ensure that we perceive something that actually exists, has a certain form, occupies a certain space etc. What is NOT relevant to us for the time being, is its atomic constitution. But we can ascertain this as well, with appropriate technology.

So if you wish to cast doubt on the reliability of our senses to discern real objects, you have to find pseudo-objects. E.g. illusions, hallucinations, virtual reality etc. But these are categorically different kinds of perceptions than those which help you and every creature on earth to orient themselves, navigate and survive.

In sum: Our perceptions are exceptionally reliable. You will find on closer scrutiny of the literature that writers often confuse what your eyes see and your ears hear, with what you judge the phenomenon to have been. If you see the teapot in bad light, you might judge that you are seeing a miniature UFO. But don’t blame your eyes for this! In Shakespeare’s day people used to ‘see’ ghosts. How come we don’t see them any more? It is because ‘seeing’ is a cooperative construct of your eyes and brain; and what your brain makes you ‘see’ can well be a ghost, if you are conditioned to seeing certain phenomena as ghosts. This is what illusionists, virtual realists and other entertainers of this kind exploit. All you need to know about this, however, is that these are peripheral, exceptional cases. If we really were forced to live by them, we would soon be extinct!

Jürgen Lawrenz at PhiloSophos.com

Ramala asked:

What should be the role of philosophy in the 21st century? As we know, it is the era of technology. People have been moved so much by the technological breakthrough, a person with philosophical background naturally gets embarrassed in proving the relevance of his subject in the present day world. What should be the best way to stand with his subject?

Answer by Peter Jones

To me the real issue is not that this is a technological age, we could say that it has been one since Roman times, but that it is an age of quantum mechanics, relativity, dark matter, the Higgs field, string theory and so forth. Philosophy has failed utterly to keep up with these weird developments and now finds itself becoming increasingly irrelevant to the sciences. The attitude of physicists to philosophy is often straightforwardly dismissive. It is, as you say, embarrassing. More worryingly, it means that these days many professional physicist are hopeless philosophers, not feeling the need to investigate it or even seeing the point.

So perhaps the best thing 21st century philosophers could do is to get down to work to bring it up to date. I think there are signs that this is beginning to happen, but, as you point out, there is clearly a long way to go. As to how this is to be done everyone will have their own opinions. While it languishes in the 19th century, however, it will remain irrelevant and difficult to defend.

These comments would not apply to the philosophy of the East, which is a whole different ball game, but I’m guessing you did not mean to ask about that.

In the end there seems to be only one stand to take as a philosopher in any time or place, which is to strive diligently to understand how the world works.

Peter Jones received the ISFP Fellowship for his dissertation ‘From Metaphysics to Mysticism: Exploring the Case for a Neutral Metaphysical Position’

Thupten asked:

Can you explain how Hume justifies the existence of an external world?

Answer by Geoffrey Klempner

To readers of Hume’s Treatise of Human Nature this might seem like a rather strange question, given that Hume, in his philosophical system of ‘impressions and ideas’, seems to cast the very idea of an external world into doubt. We can’t even say we have the idea of an external world to sceptical about, given that the attempt to define an external object as one which ‘continues’ to exist when not perceived, and exists ‘distinct’ from perception, is flatly contradicted by the only evidence or basis for belief that we have, the nature of our subjective ‘impressions’ (‘On Scepticism With Regard to the Senses’, Book I, part 4, section ii).

Hume’s only solution was to leave such ‘cold, strained speculations’ behind and play a game of backgammon with his friends. At least, so goes the standard account.

But the standard account sits rather badly with Hume’s broad picture of the nature of his investigation. He is putting forward a ‘theory of human nature’, in the spirit of investigators of the time, like Newton with his ‘theory of motion’. Human nature can be studied by the philosopher, in a not dissimilar way to the study of the motions of the planets.

This is the very opposite of a ‘sceptical system of philosophy’. Hume saw his project as a contribution to human knowledge, opening our eyes to the truth about our place in the world, as governed by natural laws, not of motion, but of psychology.

And there is the clue: belief in an external world isn’t capable of rational justification. We just do believe in an external world, and every action we do proves this belief.

However, Hume wasn’t content to leave matters there. The most fascinating part of his philosophy is his ‘theory of fictions’, where he to some extent anticipates Kant in describing the way the human mind ‘constructs’ of external objects by means of the imagination, ideas that cannot be logically justified but which ‘work’ nonetheless. These ‘fictions’, when viewed from the standpoint of reason, have contradictory properties. As ideas, they clearly depend on us, and yet at the very same time they purport to represent ‘objects’ which exist independently.

Hume would say, what this shows is that philosophers have to once and for all learn their place. In place of reason and justification, there is naturalistic explanation. The external world doesn’t need to be ‘justified’.

http://www.philosophypathways.com/vita.html

Ray asked:

What is Hegel’s dialectical process composed of?

Answer by Martin Jenkins

Thought constitutes what is real. What is real is actual and what is actual is real. The real is the living mind of God. Human consciousness is to be unified with the mind of God when it achieves the level of the Absolute Idea. Here, human ‘subjectivity’ is reconciled with ‘Objectivity’ and this goal is undertaken by thought in Dialectic. Hegel’s main works The Phenomenology of Spirit and Encyclopaedia of the Philosophical Sciences outline this movement of collective human consciousness (Geist) towards its reconciliation with the Absolute Idea.

Hegel identified human Understanding as operating within ‘identitarian’ thought: exemplified by the traditional Laws of Logic: Identity [a thing is what it is and not anything else], Non-Contradiction [Cannot simultaneously maintain that it is raining and not raining] and Excluded Middle [either the night is black or it isn’t, there is no in between]. This left Understanding open to limitation, as the phenomena of the world do not limit themselves to such logical criteria. So much so that Understanding in its logical rigidity fell short of fully understanding things.

Thought has thought and thinking as its content. As such, it encounters contradictions [#11 Shorter Logic] in the ‘non-identity’ of its thoughts, in their counterparts. Unlike traditional logic which abhors contradictions, they are welcomed by Hegel. Thought is compelled to overcome such contradictions, to work and find a solution for them. Hence:

‘To see that thought is in its very nature dialectical and that, as Understanding, it must fall into contradiction – the negative of itself – will form one of the main themes of the Logic’. [ibid]

It is speculative Reason that overcomes contradictions by overcoming tensions, contradictions thereby moving thinking onto a cumulatively higher level to the one thus overcome. This is the famous Aufgehoben: speculative reason overcomes the contradiction, superseding both terms and preserving what is positive in both in a higher, progressive synthesis.

In section #79 of the so called Shorter Logic or to give its correct title: The Logic: Part One of the Encyclopedia of the Philosophical Sciences [the other two being Nature and Spirit], Hegel stipulates the three aspects of his Logical Doctrine:

a. The Abstract or that of the Understanding

b. The Dialectical or that of Negative Reason

c. The Speculative or Positive Reason

Abstract Understanding sets out to comprehend subject matter but encounters problems in the guise of contradictions. Reason highlights the limitations of the fixed, either/or thinking of Understanding. This is the Negative moment of the process. The negative moment is simultaneously positive as Speculative Reason provides Positive solutions. The best of the negative and positive moments are combined and preserved in a progressive, synthesis.

I recommend reading the ‘Lord and Bondsman’ in the Phenomenology and ‘Being, Nothing, Becoming’ at the beginning of the Shorter Logic. These exemplify Hegel’s Dialectic.

Martin Jenkins received the ISFP Fellowship for his dissertation ‘Aristocratic Radicalism or Anarchy? An Examination of Nietzsche’s Doctrine of Will to Power’. He is a Pathways Mentor.

Blake asked:

What do you believe the soul looks like?

Answer by Geoffrey Klempner

In the early days of film photography, when the workings of a camera and the process of exposure and printing were still a mystery to many people, certain individuals gained notoriety in the Spiritualist world for taking photographs of ‘ectoplasm’.

Funnily enough, the ectoplasm photographed flowing out of the sitter’s head or body looked remarkably like crumpled white bed sheets.

According to the theory, ectoplasm isn’t the soul or spirit itself, but seems to have been conceived as a material which covers or drapes the soul, enabling it to become visible, or semi-visible.

We can smile at this, but I’m not going to venture an opinion on the ectoplasm theory. It might be true. One would need more that a photograph or two to provide convincing evidence. However, the real question is whether the idea of the soul as something you could, in principle, see by some means – a special camera perhaps, or specially designed glasses – makes coherent sense.

Descartes in the Meditations contemptuously dismisses the popular idea of the soul as a, ‘breath of wind, a vapour’, on strict logical grounds. A thinking substance can have none of the properties of extended substance. Extended substance has spatial position. Thinking substance experiences, perceives, thinks, wills etc. Defined as thinking substance, a soul can have neither extension nor spatial position. Nor does the theory of mind-body interaction require this. The locus of interaction (which Descartes hypothesized to be the pineal gland in the brain) is not, literally, the place where the human soul is located. It is merely the place where it ‘acts’, bringing about changes in the physical world, and being affected by physical changes.

Spiritualists don’t have to agree with this, of course. They can insist on the older notion of the soul or spirit as a quasi-physical entity, capable of passing through walls, but also, when the occasion requires it, having the power to tap a table.

Descartes’ response would be the same as his response to materialism as a theory of the soul. I can doubt whether there exists a spatial world without doubting my existence. If I have a soul body or ‘spirit’ located in space, then that would be another kind of ‘extended substance’. In which case, I must have two souls, my Cartesian non-located soul or thinking substance, and my soul body, the substance that gets draped with ectoplasm at seances.

Wittgenstein remarks somewhere that the human face is the best image of the human soul. This is actually in line with popular representations of the soul body or spirit. How would you recognize a loved one’s soul when you saw it unless you could see his/her face? The Cartesian soul, on the other hand, as pure thinking substance cannot have an appearance – or can it? Those who are religious believe that God can see one’s soul. If God can see my soul, surely He knows ‘what it looks like’?

The answer isn’t obscure or contrived: A virtuous soul looks virtuous. An evil soul looks evil. If there exists a God who is able to ‘see’ your soul, then he does so in a similar way to the way you see yourself when you introspect, only without all the concealing layers of self-deception. What does that look like? It’s something everyone does, even if we don’t always see through the lies. There is something it is like to introspect. But it doesn’t look like anything.

http://www.philosophypathways.com/vita.html

Christopher asked:

Doesn’t everything that evolves have to have intelligence/consciousness? In order for an organism to evolve/adapt to its environment so that it ‘knows’ what traits will make it more fit?

I don’t view evolution as some metaphysical entity and I’m trying to avoid any metaphysical explanation like ‘god’. I’m thinking more in terms of Leibniz’s idea of monads existing in all things, because it could be theorized that consciousness exists at an atomic or cellular level, therefore all things containing cells would have consciousness and be capable of evolving. Also, if a cell can grow/change/reproduce on its own, can’t that be considered evolution itself.

Answer by Craig Skinner

There are three different questions here, and I shall deal with each in turn:

1. Doesn’t everything that evolves have to have intelligence/consciousness?

2. Can a cell’s growing be considered evolution?

3. Could all physical entities be conscious?

1. Definitely not. Evolution by natural selection is a mechanical process whereby succeeding generations of an organism fit their environment better. The mechanism is differential reproduction of inherited random variations. Most variants (genetic mutations or recombinations) are neutral, some are detrimental, a few are advantageous. The latter enhance survival and reproduction, thereby spreading in the gene pool which gradually changes (evolves)due to accumulation of beneficial variants. Organisms don’t ‘know’ what traits will make them more fit, all kinds of variants randomly occur, mostly useless or lethal, but those that happen to be advantageous become selected.

The whole process is ‘blind’ and doesn’t need a designer (‘watchmaker’ in Paley’s famous 19th century analogy), hence the title of Dawkins excellent introduction to the topic. Of course the theory itself has matured since Darwin’s day to include molecular details of inheritance, epigenetics, and much else, but I wont go into that.

2. It’s a matter of terminology. Change occurring in all individual members of a species as they age is called ‘development’. Changes occurring in a species over many generations due to accumulation of genetic variants is called ‘evolution’. Thus I developed successively from gamete into embryo, foetus, baby, child, adult, old man. My species and Pan paniscus (chimps) evolved from the same ancestral species.

3. Yes all entities could be conscious. The idea is that consciousness is VERY dim in say electrons or atoms, minimal in plants and most animals, appreciable in mammals, amounting to self-consciousness in humans. As matter gets organized, so its consciousness gets organized too. This ‘panpsychism’ is an alternative to ’emergence’. In the latter view, consciousness is felt to be a ‘higher level’ property emerging when matter is organized in particular complex ways (brains), but is not present in the electrons, atoms, molecules or neurones themselves. Both emergence and panpsychism (favoured by Leibniz as you say, also by Whitehead) are contenders (among others) in attempts to explain consciousness. But whether panpsychism is true or not has no bearing on evolution by natural selection as far as I can see.

There is no need to postulate any ‘striving’ by the elements of the natural world towards increased organization and higher consciousness. I don’t think electrons, for instance, get tired of orbiting in simple atoms for billions of years and strive to be part of more interesting structures such as trees or bees. I know that views about all creation striving to become closer to God, or to reach the omega point, or about the universe becoming self-aware, have been advanced by Whitehead, Teilhard de Chardin, and proponents of the Final Anthropic Principle, but I’m underwhelmed by such views.

Craig Skinner at PhiloSophos.com

Answer by Jürgen Lawrenz

In principle your idea is sound, although you throw steel balls and eggs into one basket as if there was no difference between them.

Cells: Yes. Atoms: No. The first are living entities, the second chemical elements. The latter behave in mechanical, predictable ways; the former have decision-making powers (as primitive as you like, yet they remain utterly disparate from chemical elements).

As far as Leibniz is concerned, you need to be aware of a subtle distinction. His monad (singular) is a merely theoretical entity–a descriptive convenience. After all, he says that all are created at once. What they share is a striving for existence, which ineluctably means collectivisation. They also have the attribute of force common to them, although this force must be understood in four ways to account for the variety of existents: namely active and passive, primitive and derivative. The result of collectivisation depends on the mix of these attributes, and Leibniz constantly stresses that so-called ‘matter’ always has some entelechial force in it – ‘as little as you like’; and this is not alive in any sense. On the other hand all living things contain a quantity (‘as little as you like’) of matter.

But I’ve written a whole book on the subject and don’t feel like compressing what’s important about it into a handful of words that are vulnerable to misunderstanding. If you’re serious about following this up, check out Ch. 4-5 of my book, and especially the diagrammatic representation on p. 120. It’s all there.

Strangely enough, I’ve also written a book on the other aspect of your question, the issue of intelligence in evolution. You might profit from reading (at least) the introduction.

I don’t think there is much literature on this subject, so again: if you’re serious, this is the place to start. Good luck!

Jürgen Lawrenz at PhiloSophos.com

Answer by Shaun Williamson

You don’t answer scientific questions by philosophizing or guessing. Leibniz didn’t have the advantage of knowing about Darwin’s theory of Evolution by means of natural selection. You need to study the theory of evolution in detail before you get into the wild theorizing.

Being conscious means having sensory awareness of the world and to have sensory awareness of the world you need sense organs and a nervous system.

Plants e.g. flowers and trees have no sense organs or consciousness but they have still subject to the process of evolution. So the answer to your question is ‘No you don’t need intelligence or consciousness in order to be subject to the laws of evolution’. Things don’t evolve, they are evolved by forces outside their control (well mostly outside their control).

Please study the theory of evolution in detail before you start thinking about it. So far it seems that you simply don’t understand the basic ideas. Things don’t evolve themselves, they are subject to the laws of evolution. thing.

Shaun Williamson developed the Ask a Philosopher cgi script question.pl. He did his postgraduate studies on the philosophy of Wittgenstein.