What could make morality objective?

[Atla]

Well it's easy to argue for any kind of anti-realism, when one is not trying to make any sense.

I guess the irony here is that QM may indeed suggest a form of anti-realism, and one can try to argue for that while also making sense, but such a topic is 10 levels above VA's understanding.

[Skepdick]

Well it's easy to argue for any kind of anti-realism, when one is not trying to make any sense.

I guess the irony here is that QM may indeed suggest a form of anti-realism, and one can try to argue for that while also making sense, but such a topic is 10 levels above VA's understanding.

Sense to who?

I explained this thing that no philosopher can understand to a 15 year old yesterday.

Perhaps you are the problem?

[Atla]

Well it's easy to argue for any kind of anti-realism, when one is not trying to make any sense.

I guess the irony here is that QM may indeed suggest a form of anti-realism, and one can try to argue for that while also making sense, but such a topic is 10 levels above VA's understanding.

Sense to who?

I explained this thing that no philosopher can understand to a 15 year old yesterday.

Perhaps you are the problem?

No I'm not the problem. Also, you can't even make sense when talking about the weather, so it doesn't matter what you "explained".

[Skepdick]

No I'm not the problem. Also, you can't even make sense when talking about the weather, so it doesn't matter what you "explained".

Yep. Nothing makes sense in this world anymore.

Also. Should I get off your lawn?

[Veritas Aequitas]

The "cannot be absolutely mind-independent" point is critical for philosophy because it will support the existence of objective moral facts [FSK-conditioned]

1 Pending evidence for the existence of anything non-physical, whatever the mind is - it's rational to assume it's physical. So the expressions 'mind-dependent' and 'mind-independent' mean 'human-body-dependent' and 'human body-independent'.

If you want to use 'human body-independent' that is your discretion at the risk of directing the human-body focus on the anus.
When the term mind [not Descartes Dualism] is used, it is implied the mind is within the human body with its main activities in the brain in the head.
You cannot accept this more realistic definition of mind because you are so stuck with an primordial ideology of philosophical realism.

I don't agree with 'human-body-dependent' since this can be very misleading.

2 Therefore, VA claims that reality cannot be absolutely independent from the human body - and has provided no evidence or sound argument to support this claim. The fatuous 'humans are part of reality' is the best VA has to offer. This is mysticism pretending not to be.

Your what is fact. i.e. feature of reality that is just-is, that is the case which is absolutely mind-independent claimed without proof is really metaphysical and mysticism, thus illusory and nonsensical.

Basically, reality cannot be absolutely independent from the human mind [human conditions].
Show me an instance where the realization of reality [simultaneous emergence] can be realized without the association of the human mind.

Also note this;
Mind-Independent Things; a Scandal [Insult] to Philosophy
viewtopic.php?t=40182

3 The function of the modifier 'absolutely' in 'absolutely independent' is unclear. If the implication is that reality is 'relatively independent' from the human body, then that relationship has to be explained. Again, inspection under the hood reveals nothing more than mysticism.

I have already explain a '1000' times.
An ANTI-philosophica_realist [Kantian] is at the same time an Empirical Realist who believe in 'reality is mind-independent' that it is only relative.
I have to use 'absolutely' to differentiate from the 'relative'.

Anti-P-Realists Believe in a Mind-Independent Reality, BUT ..
viewtopic.php?t=40222

You are trying to escape by not addressing the above thread?

4 The actual purpose of VA's ridiculous metaphysical speculation is evident above: 'it will support the existence of objective moral facts'. But since 'objective' and 'factual' are nearly synonymous terms, the expression 'objective fact' is a redundancy; there are no subjective facts, let alone moral ones.

Your thinking is too ignorant shallow and narrow;

I have explained the necessity to differentiate between fact and objectivity';

There are Two Senses of 'What is Fact'
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=39587
Two Senses of Reality
viewtopic.php?t=40265
What is Philosophical Objectivity?
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=31416
Two Senses of 'Objective'
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=39326
Scientific Objectivity
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=39286
What is Moral Objectivity?
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=30707

Your inability to understand the above is you are trapped within an evolutionary default to be stuck to primordial ideology of Philosophical Realism;

PH's What is Fact is Illusory
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=39577
Why Philosophical Realism is Illusory
viewtopic.php?t=40167
PH's Philosophical Realism is Illusory
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=39992

5 Therefore, VA's argument amounts to this: 'Reality is not absolutely independent from the human body; therefore, there are moral facts'. And the idiocy is evident.

It is idiotic for you to claim the argument of mine is idiotic, when your ground is illusory [
Note the list of arguments I have provided above.]

[Veritas Aequitas]

Should be yes.
As I had stated one can speculate on things that are potentially knowable if they are 'empirical-rational elements.
"Potentially knowable" is merely a possibility they may exist and knowable, but it does not confirm they do exist.

You think there are knowable things in the universe that humans don't know about. That is what 'Yes' means. Do you think things in the universe that humans don't know about - at the moment.

Let's remember that earlier in your positions the Moon did not exist when not looked at, even after it fit in an FSK.
Here PH is asking you about things that have never been seen/experienced but may well be found out about in the future.
This is not even being agnostic about whether things can exist even if no one has perceived them yet.
You think things like that do exist...if you keep answering yes.

Strawman and ignoring what I had stated.
Yes, only refers to;
VA: As I had stated one can speculate on things that are potentially knowable if they are 'empirical-rational elements.
"Potentially knowable" is merely a possibility they may exist and knowable, but it does not confirm they do exist.

I see you don't seem to grasp the above.

If they are found in the future, then they are FSK-ed thus cannot be absolutely mind-independent.

Do you think there are knowable things in the universe that humans don't know about - at the moment?

To which you answered, twice now, yes.

Note again it is potentially knowable if they are 'empirical-rational elements. NOT merely knowable things.

If you have defined 'empirical-rational elements', please link me. That would seem to indicate nearly anything.

Prior to Kant there was the Empiricism versus the Rationalism camp. Kant's CPR argued the empirical should be complementary to the rational to realize reality to be more realistic. Thus the empirical must be supported by rationality, i.e. critical thinking of the higher order.
'Empirical-Rational' elements refer the elements dealt within Kant's Critical Philosophy.

Note Kant' famous quote;
"Thoughts without content are empty, intuitions without concepts are blind."
i.e.
"Thoughts [reason] without content [empirical] are empty, intuitions [sensibiliy, empirical] without concepts [reason] are blind."

As I had stated a possible twin of IWP could exists in a planet 1000 light years away.
Why is this not a valid possibility to be known when all the elements are empirical-rational?
It is a matter of producing the empirical rational evidence for verification and confirmation.

Well my twin would be a perceiving, thinking being.
But could a twin of the stone that is my backyard exist on a planet 1000 light years away.

(And again you are granting with 'could' the possibility. This means that things that are currently unknown may be out there. Even that is a concession. But further you say 'yes' when he asks if you think there are those things. That's not 'they could exist', that's you saying that you think they do exist, despite not being, at this time known)

Yes, "a twin of the stone that is your backyard could possibly exist on a planet 1000 light years away"

I NEVER stated 'they do exist' but only they could possibly exists because the elements involved are empirical-rational.
When the whole set is empirical-rational we have to accept the possibility of its empirical-rational existence, we cannot claim it is 100% impossible.
While we must accept this possibility in this case, the possibility is likely to be 0.000000000000....1%.

I had mentioned it is not bare perception, a human-based FSK is conditioned upon a 13.5 billion years history.

So, it wasn't enough for humans or neanderthals to see the Moon for it to exist, they had to have an FSK - a framework and system of knowledge?

Every organism has its basic FSR[realization].
A sonar bat will have a FSR that realize the reality of the moon differently from humans and who is to say the human FSR of the moon represent the ultimate reality?

Yeah, that's what I meant in relation to bare attention. But an FSR is not an FSK.

I often used FSK [implied FSR therein] with reference to humans who are capable of human knowledge.
Non-human organisms do not have a FSK per se but only a FSR.

So, how did we reproduce without DNA? It must have been by a different process, because DNA is central to reproduction.

The above are weird questions.
You are conflating hindsight with foresight.

Before the discovery to DNA, the reality of reproduction of humans was conditioned to the science-biology FSK then [1500] which was relatively realistic to the knowledge then.
Then [1500], no biologists would have asked 'how did we reproduce without DNA?'
We can qualify this human-based reality as reality-1500.
Relative to the science-biology FSK then [1500], DNA did not exist at all.

Now in 2023 is confirmed via the science-biology FSK, DNA exists as conditioned to the science FSK, thus cannot be absolutely mind-independent. We label this human-based reality reality-2023.
As can be inferred, reality-2023 is more refined that reality-1500 in this sense but both reality cannot be absolutely mind-independents.
Thus is possible we may have reality-2500 which could be more refined than reality-2023.

This is weird since I was not there 500 years ago.
If you are asking me, did those gut bacteria existed 500 years ago, then I say, they do not exist.

Thank you. That's exactly what I have been asking.

So, this would mean humans digested their food in a manner very different from today. And given how gut health is dependent on good bacterial flora AND this affects the brain and other body systems, this means humans were quite different then. Do we have any evidence that humans back then had a different digestive process?

Same problem as above,
you are conflating hindsight with foresight.

[Veritas Aequitas]

xx

[Veritas Aequitas]

'There are knowable things in the universe that humans don't know about at the moment.'

Your question is based on philosophical realism grounded on an illusion which ASSUMED without proof there are knowable things in the universe.

In answering to your question, I qualified which is critically necessary;
As I had stated one can speculate on things that are potentially knowable if they are 'empirical-rational elements.
"Potentially knowable" is merely a possibility they may exist and knowable, but it does not confirm or even assume they do exist.

But...
'Features of reality don't exist unless and until humans know about them.'

To avoiding insulting your intelligence you need to address this;
viewtopic.php?p=663115#p663115

How many 'million' times do I need to remind you of this;

Reality: Emergence & Realization Prior to Perceiving, Knowing & Describing
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=40145

I have also stated 'million' of times, "Our knowing them in the ways we do doesn't bring them into existence."
VA: Knowledge & Descriptions CANNOT Produce Facts [bring them into existence]
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=39925

It is our 13.5 historical human existence [not knowing or describing] that enable things to emerge and be realized as a human based thing via the specific FSR-FSK, then subsequently perceived, known and described.
This point will trigger your evolutionary default's cognitive dissonance thus it will take whatever your defense mechanism to repel it; for some [not you] it is the killing of those who oppose philosophical realism.

And you know this damn well. You're just stuck with having to maintain a fake and feeble antirealism - so that you can cobble together a useless argument for moral objectivity. Nul point.

You are the one who is stuck with an evolutionary default of primal psychological states to insist upon an absolutely mind-independent reality and thing via your ideology of philosophical realism which is grounded upon an illusion.

You have yet to counter my following challenge to you;
PH's What is Fact is Illusory
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=39577
PH's Philosophical Realism is Illusory
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=39992

I suggest you research on the Psychology of Philosophy from the beginning up the present to get an idea of what I am getting at.
A simple contrast is Philosophical_Realism is an evolutionary default which is primal like that of say Newtonian Physics while ANTi-Philosophical_Realism [Kantian] is like that of Quantum Mechanics.

[Atla]

So, how did we reproduce without DNA? It must have been by a different process, because DNA is central to reproduction.

The above are weird questions.
You are conflating hindsight with foresight.

Before the discovery to DNA, the reality of reproduction of humans was conditioned to the science-biology FSK then [1500] which was relatively realistic to the knowledge then.
Then [1500], no biologists would have asked 'how did we reproduce without DNA?'
We can qualify this human-based reality as reality-1500.
Relative to the science-biology FSK then [1500], DNA did not exist at all.

Now in 2023 is confirmed via the science-biology FSK, DNA exists as conditioned to the science FSK, thus cannot be absolutely mind-independent. We label this human-based reality reality-2023.
As can be inferred, reality-2023 is more refined that reality-1500 in this sense but both reality cannot be absolutely mind-independents.
Thus is possible we may have reality-2500 which could be more refined than reality-2023.

Virgin-birth-FSK-FSR-proper, duh

Also, VA likes to bring up Kantian mind-dependent time, and also QM nonlocality, but those two establish that reality-1500 should probably be the same as reality-2023 and reality-2500, because linear time is an illusion. Past and future are more like extensions of the present. This would be the 639th instance of VA shooting himself in the foot. Only our knowledge of reality should have changed over (linear) time, too bad VA also rejects a difference between our knowledge of reality and reality.

Again, there's a possible universal anti-realism according to QM, but that's really high level philosophy. One of the insights it starts with, is the insight that QM observer-dependence is probably not the same thing as mind-dependence, but the two may be related some way, to some degree.

[Iwannaplato]

Strawman and ignoring what I had stated.
Yes, only refers to;
VA: As I had stated one can speculate on things that are potentially knowable if they are 'empirical-rational elements.
"Potentially knowable" is merely a possibility they may exist and knowable, but it does not confirm they do exist.He says 'Do you think there are things that are knowable that we do not know about yet. You said 'Yes.' That means you think there are things that are knowable, that we haven't found, experienced, seen, yet.

I see you don't seem to grasp the above.

No need for comments like this.

If they are found in the future, then they are FSK-ed thus cannot be absolutely mind-independent.

yes, I get that. That's not what I am focused on. If they exist now, which a yes to his question entails, then they exist now independent of minds. You said yes, that you think there are things that we do not currently know about but which exist.

Yes, to make an objective claim about them at some future time, we will need to integrate them in some FSK. But you answered that there were things that we do not know now but are knowable.

Note again it is potentially knowable if they are 'empirical-rational elements. NOT merely knowable things.

If you have defined 'empirical-rational elements', please link me. That would seem to indicate nearly anything.

Prior to Kant there was the Empiricism versus the Rationalism camp. Kant's CPR argued the empirical should be complementary to the rational to realize reality to be more realistic. Thus the empirical must be supported by rationality, i.e. critical thinking of the higher order.
'Empirical-Rational' elements refer the elements dealt within Kant's Critical Philosophy.

Note Kant' famous quote;
"Thoughts without content are empty, intuitions without concepts are blind."
i.e.
"Thoughts [reason] without content [empirical] are empty, intuitions [sensibiliy, empirical] without concepts [reason] are blind."

I don't see a definition of 'empirical-rational elements' here.

I NEVER stated 'they do exist'

And I never said you did. What you did say, by answering yes to his question is that you think they exist. Do you think....Yes. That means, when you answer yes, that what comes after Do you think in his question is what you think. So, I can then conclude that you think what is in question form there.

Do you think it is raining? Yes. This means You think it is raining. You have that belief. That's what answering yes to a do you think question means. And you later confirmed this.

So, how did we reproduce without DNA? It must have been by a different process, because DNA is central to reproduction.

The above are weird questions.
You are conflating hindsight with foresight.

No, I am talking about ontology. Things/processes, according to you only exist if they are integrated in an FSK. DNA only became that in the late 20th century and was, in fact, not even perceived, let alone integrated via some epistemology in an FSK.

So, it could not existed before that, in your non-realism.

I understand easily that it was not known before that. The issue is not whether neanderthals or early Cromagnon people or even the ancient Greeks had a good argument for the existence of DNA. I know they did not.

I am talking about the existence of the DNA. You have claimed that things do not exist if they are not integrated in an FSK. And even then that they do not exist when no one is perceiving them.

Well, no one was perceiving DNA or integrating it in an FSK or even an FSR before the 20th century. So how did it manage to exist in those time periods?

Before the discovery to DNA, the reality of reproduction of humans was conditioned to the science-biology FSK then [1500] which was relatively realistic to the knowledge then.
Then [1500], no biologists would have asked 'how did we reproduce without DNA?'
We can qualify this human-based reality as reality-1500.
Relative to the science-biology FSK then [1500], DNA did not exist at all.

Right, of course. But did it exist. Was is a functioning part of human reproduction?

And note that you see these as weird question but look below. You say there were no gut bacteria 500 years ago. So, there was no DNA. Because we knew about neither nor had we perceived them, let alone put them in an FSK.

This is weird since I was not there 500 years ago.
If you are asking me, did those gut bacteria existed 500 years ago, then I say, they do not exist.

Thank you. That's exactly what I have been asking.

So, this would mean humans digested their food in a manner very different from today. And given how gut health is dependent on good bacterial flora AND this affects the brain and other body systems, this means humans were quite different then. Do we have any evidence that humans back then had a different digestive process?

Same problem as above,
you are conflating hindsight with foresight.

Nope. I am not saying people back then could claim that their was DNA. They couldn't. A realist would say of course there was DNA and gut bacteria back then. A realist would even say, but a person back then had no justification for believing in gut bacteria or DNA, because they had no empirical research or empirical anything to back up such a claim. But the DNA was functioning back then. We know now a realist would say, that there are gut bacteria and there is DNA and there was back then. And even though people back then could not perceive it and had no FSK to even conceive of these things within, DNA and gut bacteria existed and performed the functions, in those people back then, even though they did not know about it.

Right there up above, you distinguish yourself from realists on this issue. You say there were no gut bacteria back then.

So, how did their digestion work without them?

And note: you directly say there were no gut bacteria back then. You didn't say 'They could not have known about them.' or 'Belief in them would not have been justified back then.' It has nothing to do with hindight. I am not saying that they should have believed back then. I am focused on your ontological claim that there were no gut bacteria then. (and it doesn't matter for me whether they were mind independent or mind dependent. Since you are claiming they did not exist, this doesn't matter. Further, I am not asserting they did exist. I am responding to your claim that they did not exist back then and then wondering how this would have affected digestion)

[Skepdick]

Right there up above, you distinguish yourself from realists on this issue. You say there were no gut bacteria back then.

So, how did their digestion work without them?

This is the sort of question which originates in a mind which doesn't seem to understand.

HOW does X work; or WHY does X work will give you theoretical answers. Answers that at one point in history didn't exist, answers that were once considered correct, but are now no longer, and answers that we consider incredibly precise today that may turn out to be wrong yet again; or simply overthrown by yet more precision.

But it's a fact that their digestion works irrespective of the story we told ourself as to how and why it did or does so at any given point in history.

[Veritas Aequitas]

Nope. I am not saying people back then could claim that their was DNA. They couldn't. A realist would say of course there was DNA and gut bacteria back then. A realist would even say, but a person back then had no justification for believing in gut bacteria or DNA, because they had no empirical research or empirical anything to back up such a claim.
But the DNA was functioning back then.
We know now a realist would say, that there are gut bacteria and there is DNA and there was back then. And even though people back then could not perceive it and had no FSK to even conceive of these things within, DNA and gut bacteria existed and performed the functions, in those people back then, even though they did not know about it.

Right there up above, you distinguish yourself from realists on this issue. You say there were no gut bacteria back then.

So, how did their digestion work without them?

And note: you directly say there were no gut bacteria back then. You didn't say 'They could not have known about them.' or 'Belief in them would not have been justified back then.' It has nothing to do with hindsight. I am not saying that they should have believed back then. I am focused on your ontological claim that there were no gut bacteria then. (and it doesn't matter for me whether they were mind independent or mind dependent. Since you are claiming they did not exist, this doesn't matter. Further, I am not asserting they did exist. I am responding to your claim that they did not exist back then and then wondering how this would have affected digestion)

As I had stated you are conflating foresight with hindsight grounded on philosophical realism re mind-independent ontology.
On this basis you assumed there are absolutely mind-independent gut-bacteria then 500 years ago and now in 2023.
It is the same you did with DNA & digestion or anything you will consider within history.

An as ANTI-Philosophical_Realist I do not accept ontology [philosophical realists'] at all. Such an ontology is Metaphysical, illusory, non-nonsensical and meaningless.
Your response indicate you are forcing me to accept your illusory metaphysical ontology. [the perennial irritation].

There is no mind-independent ontological basis for my interpretation.
As such, to me, there are no absolutely mind-independent gut bacteria then 500 years ago.

From the empirical realist basis, I can accept on a hindsight, historical and theoretical basis, there are gut bacteria 500 years ago based on foresight knowledge, but this is ultimately subsumed within Idealism [Kantian] thus cannot be the "absolutely mind-independent" of philosophical realism.

As I had stated before, the philosophical realist's stance of absolutely mind-independence is an evolutionary default embedded deep in the brain, it is so primal, dominant and forceful that you [& other philosophical realists] are unable to understand the more evolutionary advanced position of the ANTI-philosophical_Realist's stance.

Instead of ontology [illusory] I have to bring in psychology [more realistic] to explain the above.

Philosophical_realists are driven by an evolutionary default with very dominant primal that hinder their learning and cognition to a very shallow, narrow, dogmatic, rigid knowledge base, becomes very ideological and fortified with a strong defense mechanism.

What is needed for philosophical_realists to understand the broader, deeper and more realistic aspects of reality is the "deep learning" [& other modern methods of processing knowledge, encoding, etc.] of AI which human already had been doing naturally.
There is a ton of research on this subject out there in the internet.

[Peter Holmes]

From the empirical realist basis, I can accept on a hindsight, historical and theoretical basis, there are gut bacteria 500 years ago based on foresight knowledge, but this is ultimately subsumed within Idealism [Kantian] thus cannot be the "absolutely mind-independent" of philosophical realism.

So, of course, there were bacteria long before humans knew about them - and DNA, and quantum events, and so on - all of the stuff that it's only rational to call 'reality'.

And, of course, we humans have to perceive, know and describe this reality - including our bodies, including our 'embodied minds', and including our gut bacteria - in human ways.

And, of course, the silly idea that reality depends in some mysterious way on human perception, knowledge and description comes from the ancient delusion of mistaking what we think and say for the way things are.

And, of course, the canard of 'mind-independence' - absolute or otherwise - is a legacy hangover from an ancient religious substance dualism recycled and repackaged by Descartes and Kant.

[Skepdick]

So, of course, there were bacteria long before humans knew about them - and DNA, and quantum events, and so on - all of the stuff that it's only rational to call 'reality'.

And, of course, we humans have to perceive, know and describe this reality - including our bodies, including our 'embodied minds', and including our gut bacteria - in human ways.

And, of course, the silly idea that reality depends in some mysterious way on human perception, knowledge and description comes from the ancient delusion of mistaking what we think and say for the way things are.

And, of course, the canard of 'mind-independence' - absolute or otherwise - is a legacy hangover from an ancient religious substance dualism recycled and repackaged by Descartes and Kant.

Surely, before you can succeed at describing this reality you ought to figure out what a description is and how it relates to the described?
Surely before you describe anything first you have to observe, perceive or experience this stuff you have to describe?
Surely you have to describe this aparatus of yours that observes, perceives and experiences stuff?

Naaah. Peter "Dumb Cunt" Holmes is just going to skip over all that stuff and get straight to describing reality.

Like the dumb naive realist he is.

And yet he can't even tell you why it's true, a factual statement that this color is red...

square-xxl.png (2.33 KiB) Viewed 454 times

[Iwannaplato]

Nope. I am not saying people back then could claim that their was DNA. They couldn't. A realist would say of course there was DNA and gut bacteria back then. A realist would even say, but a person back then had no justification for believing in gut bacteria or DNA, because they had no empirical research or empirical anything to back up such a claim.
But the DNA was functioning back then.
We know now a realist would say, that there are gut bacteria and there is DNA and there was back then. And even though people back then could not perceive it and had no FSK to even conceive of these things within, DNA and gut bacteria existed and performed the functions, in those people back then, even though they did not know about it.

Right there up above, you distinguish yourself from realists on this issue. You say there were no gut bacteria back then.

So, how did their digestion work without them?

And note: you directly say there were no gut bacteria back then. You didn't say 'They could not have known about them.' or 'Belief in them would not have been justified back then.' It has nothing to do with hindsight. I am not saying that they should have believed back then. I am focused on your ontological claim that there were no gut bacteria then. (and it doesn't matter for me whether they were mind independent or mind dependent. Since you are claiming they did not exist, this doesn't matter. Further, I am not asserting they did exist. I am responding to your claim that they did not exist back then and then wondering how this would have affected digestion)

As I had stated you are conflating foresight with hindsight grounded on philosophical realism re mind-independent ontology.
On this basis you assumed there are absolutely mind-independent gut-bacteria then 500 years ago and now in 2023.
It is the same you did with DNA & digestion or anything you will consider within history.

I am not assuming it. I told you what realists believe and then, just to be sure, I reported back to you what you had said.

Please stop telling me what I believe. You are incorrect each time.

You have said that there were not but bacteria at that time.

How did their digestion work?

An as ANTI-Philosophical_Realist I do not accept ontology [philosophical realists'] at all. Such an ontology is Metaphysical, illusory, non-nonsensical and meaningless.
Your response indicate you are forcing me to accept your illusory metaphysical ontology. [the perennial irritation].

No, I am not.

1) I am not telling you what to believe.
2) I could not possibly force you or anyone to accept any belief at all.

So, stop accusing me of this and just answer the question;
How did their digestion work if there were no gut bacteria at that time?

If you believe there were bacteria back then, then some mind must have known they existed back then. Otherwise how could something that did not exist then function back then?
If you do not believe there were gut bacteria back then, how did digestion work?

I don't need to hear about realist's beliefs or accusations that I am forcing you to believe something. I don't need to hear what you think my beliefs are. That is irrelevant to what your beliefs are. I don't need to hear what you think I am confusing.

All I am interested in is your answer to the question.

At that time in the past, before humans could know about those bacteria, according to some of your statements they could not exist, since no one had perception of them. They were not in an FSR or FSK. So, at that time they should not have existed, according to many of your statements. So, one wonders how digestion would have worked.

Yes, now we have these bacteria in an FSK. Did this current knowledge retroactively lead to the existence of the gut bacteria in the past?