Peter Holmes wrote: ↑Sat Apr 20, 2024 4:21 pm
VA. So - humans make reality in the way a carpenter makes a chair. You have got to be kidding.
What is wrong with the carpenter
made that specific real chair [a part of reality] existing within reality [all there is]?
PH wrote:Meanwhile.
1 Reality is all there is. (You agree.)
2 We humans are part of that reality, and in no way separate from it. (You agree.)
3 We humans have to perceive, know and describe that reality in human ways. (You agree.)
4 That reality can be perceived, known and described in different - for example non-human - ways. (If you disagree, please explain why. Why can reality be perceived, known and described only by humans?)
5 There is no reason to think that there is or can be no reality outside the ways we humans perceive, know and describe it. (This follows from 1 to 4.)
Metaphysical anti-realists don't have a leg to stand on.
You are very deceptive in the above.
PH:
1 Reality is all there is. (You agree.)
We have to be precise here.
1. Reality [sense 1 - FSERC] is all there is. (I agree.)
1. Reality [sense 2 - p-realism] is all there is. (I do not agree.)
To me, your argument above is a sham to start with.
Your 'two senses of reality' merely begs the question. How can reality be 'all there is', if it's nothing more than we humans perceive, know and say about it? We haven't been around for long, and we needn't have evolved at all. Would reality - 'all there is' - then be nothing?
You are conflating the two senses, that is why you see it as begs the question.
Based on your illusory view, you
assumes there is something out there absolutely independent of what you perceive, know and say about it.
This assumption create a
Reality-GAP between that-something
and your perception, knowing and saying about it, which can never be bridged eternally.
This is where the problem of doubts, skepticism, dualism are raised as with Descartes, evil demon, matrix, correspondence theory of truth, others and worst of all - an independent God [theism].
so, obviously your p-realist view has loads of problems from grounding on an assumption, thus illusory.
If there were no humans, would there have been and be no universe? Cos that's what your theory entails.
But that's silly. What you're actually saying is this: we humans can have no non-human perspective on reality. And that is an ordinary, realist claim about the human condition, with no anti-realist entailment - and no 'absolute conception of reality' entailment, which is and has always been your straw man criticism of philosophical realism.
Anti-realists aren't 'anti' (opposed to) reality - because what on earth could that mean? Instead, anti-realists are opposed to the idea that there is or can be an absolute, essential, complete or perfect conception and so description of reality - as though there could be such a thing. It's shadow-boxing - tilting at windmills.
As explained above p-realists ASSUME reality and thus create a REALITY-GAP that can never be bridged eternally.
Antirealists [Kantian] ground the emergence and realization of reality on what is empirical, observable [directly and indirectly] experienced and
possible to be experienced as reality [all there is] and it is verifiable and justifiable via a human-based FSERC -science the most credible and objective.
In this case, what is reality is
entangled with the human self individually and collectively.
As such, there is no need to ASSUME there is
something beyond all the above.
In addition, there is no need affirm what is speculated as 'there something before there were humans' is the real deal.
Antirealists [Kantian] accept whatever is speculated or inferred is part and parcel of the reality that emerged and is realized.
So, yes, if there were no humans, there would have been and be no universe!
So, what!!
Will reality -all there is - just disappear if we hold the above belief?
No! what emerged and is realized via the evolved FSERC will be there regardless of our beliefs, i.e. whether
1. - if there were no humans, there would have been and be no universe! or
2. - the universe existed and exists regardless of humans.
That you insist upon belief 2 [p-realist] and reject 2 [FSERC] is due to
desperate psychology, bugged by 'ex nihilo fit' and avoiding cognitive dissonances from an existential crisis.
Point is belief 2, i.e. p-realism is full of holes as grounded on an illusion, while 1 [FSERC] is more realistic, pragmatic, involves no assumption, no reality-Gap and facilitate humanity's progress more effectively.