On Tue, Aug 09, 2005 at 12:30:26PM -0400, daddycaylor.domain.name.hidden wrote:
> It seems to me (oh no, subjectivity!) that believing in an objective
> reality is doing the same epistemic move as Bruno's belief in
> arithmetic realism and Godel's Platonism. Isn't belief in "objective
> reality" really by definition simply saying that there's something
> CAUSING ALL of our subjective observations? If there is no objective
> reality, then it begs the question, "Where do all our subjective
> observations come FROM?" Surely not from other subjective observations,
> by definition. If you don't believe in objective reality, then your
> alternatives are: 1) try to explain repeatability of observations in
> some weird indirect way and go crazy, or 2) just throw up your hands
> and be agnostic and give up any motivation for science other than
> pragmatism, which results in a pretty dismal outcome, the same outcome
> as the 20th century philosophers: despair.
>
> Tom Caylor
>
or 3) explain repeatability as due to the constraints of the Anthropic
Principle. The AP capture what is necessary about an "objective
reality" without acknowledging an actual "objective reality".
I believe the reason behind the AP will come to light with a more
mature theory of consciousness.
Cheers
--
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Received on Tue Aug 09 2005 - 19:06:48 PDT