- ... it still remains a scandal to Philosophy and to Human Reason-in-General that the Existence of Things outside us [claimed by P-realist] (from which we derive the whole Material of Knowledge, even for our Inner Sense) must be accepted merely on Faith,
and that if anyone thinks good to doubt their Existence, we [philosophical realists] are unable to counter his doubts by any satisfactory proof.
Kant- CPR -Preface B
- in that it [Philosophical Realism] regards the Objects of Outer Sense as something distinct from the Senses themselves,
treating mere Appearances as Self-Subsistent Beings, existing outside us.
On such a view [Philosophical Realism] as this, however clearly we may be conscious 1 of our Representation of these Things,
[but] it is still far from certain that, if the Representation exists, there exists also the Object corresponding to it.
A371
Proof of an External World
- Kant says it is a scandal not to be able to give a proof of the existence of external objects … He says that, " if it occurs to anyone to question their existence, we ought to be able to confront him with a satisfactory proof. …" CPR Preface B
I have, then, given … conclusive proof of the existence of external objects. [It] was a proof that two human hands existed at the time when I gave the proof … It is also obvious that I could give many others … now. So that, if these are the sort of proof that is wanted, nothing is easier than to prove the existence of external objects.
In the Preface of 'On Certainty'
- What we publish here belongs to the last year and a half of Wittgenstein's life.
In the middle of 1949 he visited the United States at the invitation of Norman Malcolm, staying at Malcolm's house in Ithaca.
Malcolm acted as a goad to his interest in Moore's 'defence of common sense', that is to say his claim to know a number of propositions for sure, such as
"Here is one hand, and here is another", and
"The earth existed for a long time before my birth", and
"I have never been far from the earth's surface".
The first of these comes in Moore's 'Proof of the External World'.
The two others are in his 'Defence of Common Sense'; Wittgenstein had long been interested in these and had said to Moore that this was his best article. Moore had agreed.
But in 'On Certainty' W critiqued Moore's argument at length that it is flawed.
There are pro-Moore supporters who insisted the great W had misinterpreted Moore and blah blah ..
Btw, I merely mentioned W as a side-note, but rely heavily on Kant's argument that the P-realists' claim of a mind-independent reality, noumenal or thing is impossible to be real. It is delusional to insist there are absolutely real mind-independent things.
What is most real are human-based FSK-ed things arising from experience that is conditioned upon 13.7 billion years of forces since the Big Bang.
So, it is a scandal and insult to Philosophy that P-realists insist there are mind-independent things based merely on speculations, assumptions and faith without proof.
Otherwise, show me the proofs?
If none, P-realists cannot deny there are human-based objective moral facts, i.e. morality is objective in that sense.