Your Thoughts Aren't Accurate Representations of...your other thoughts.

[TacticalAssassin1]

I don't see the dilemma here. It's a memory... What is there to not understand?
EDIT: Mabye there is another way you could reword it?

Let me try hitting you with the argument compacted into a logical syllogism, see if that helps.

1: In order for a thought to be said to be "about" something, it must resemble or contain the essence of that which is it is about.
2: The essential nature of the color red is that it is in the active perception of it by the human observer. It is in the act of actually SEEING it
3: When one thinks about red, it does not cause them to in any way see the color, which is red's essential nature.

Therefore: what we say is a "thought about red" is in reality about red

Right. So I agree with your first point, but I disagree with your second and third. The memory of colors is just your brain duplicating patterns, of red, green and blue. When you see something 'red', it's just your eyes capturing different light frequencies and your brain interpreting that as a 'color'. Thus, when you remember 'red', it's your brain recalling what your eyes saw, what frequency the light that hit your eyes was.
Is that making sense?

It does, but I don't think its true. When I think of a color, try as I might, I cannot "see" the color. I can "visualize" it in a different sense, but I don't think my brain experiences the same patterns as when actually perceiving the color. We are conditioned to think that the color is synonymous with the thought of the color, but I don't believe it actually is. So when you think of the thought "red" that usually accompanies the stimulus of red, ever part of your instinct is pushing you to believe that you really are in some sense perceiving red, but in actuality, you aren't.

Now, does that make sense?

Yes, that makes sense, I understand what you're trying to say, and in a sense (no pun intended) I agree.
However there remains the issue of defining what a 'thought' is. Now this is just me being a smarty pants so feel free to assume I agree with you and move on. Anyway, when you see red, technically that is a 'thought' of red, yes? So you can 'think' about red, and so for your argument, you would say that you can only accurately 'think' about red when involved with direct stimulus with red itself. As for recalling the color red, it's late and all this thinking has made my brain tired, so I too cannot at this point in time recall red. I'll try again in the morning.

 

[Scabadus]

For all we know its a thought of purple.

No... A thought of purple would be a thought of purple? That statement confuses me...

It was a referance to the old philosophical question of 'what if the colour that I call red, you call purple?' It's a thought that what you perceive as red, somebody else could percieve as purple, but because they've been told that purple colour is called red, they know it as red. It's a fun thought to think about.

As for the actual point of the thread... I sort of could see red? Not physically, with my eyes, but I could almost... light it up in my mind. Tried it with blue, green and yellow too, same result. It wasn't quite the same as a normal memory, I don't know, maybe it seemed different because I was concentrating so hard. Or maybe I'm just wired up wrong.

 

[WolfEdge]

For all we know its a thought of purple.

No... A thought of purple would be a thought of purple? That statement confuses me...

It was a referance to the old philosophical question of 'what if the colour that I call red, you call purple?' It's a thought that what you perceive as red, somebody else could percieve as purple, but because they've been told that purple colour is called red, they know it as red. It's a fun thought to think about.

As for the actual point of the thread... I sort of could see red? Not physically, with my eyes, but I could almost... light it up in my mind. Tried it with blue, green and yellow too, same result. It wasn't quite the same as a normal memory, I don't know, maybe it seemed different because I was concentrating so hard. Or maybe I'm just wired up wrong.

But it's not something you HAVE to think about. There ARE other terms for "Red". Like, say, "Rojo", and these are all terms that refer to a general band of wavelength in the visible spectrum of light. You can call it cookies for all the good it does you, because it's still a specific electromagnetic wave of light.

As for your thoughts, the human brain goes through a process I believe is called "Memory Degradation". Essentially, your mind is constantly updating itself, and when a stimulus causes you to access a previous memory, you subconsciously "rewrite" that data with what the brain perceives as updated information. This is why you never notice or remember how much older a family member looks from ten years ago, until confronted with physical data that shows the dissimilarity. However, if you are, say, remembering an old child-hood memory, every time you bring up those thoughts they become more and more skewed and inaccurate, because current stimulus is effecting your view of the past. This applies to things like color as well.

 

[Scabadus]

As for your thoughts, the human brain goes through a process I believe is called "Memory Degradation". Essentially, your mind is constantly updating itself, and when a stimulus causes you to access a previous memory, you subconsciously "rewrite" that data with what the brain perceives as updated information.

Now that's interesting, and could well explain why thinking about a single colour seemed different to remembering something from yesterday. When remembering something, the whole scene is distorted and forgotten, like how you can't remember the exact pattern of wood on your dining room table (assume you have a wodden table) though you can remember the simple things: there's a table there, and it's wood. Maybe when thinking of one pure colour, this is so simple that there's almost no degredation? There's no visual pattern, sounds or background information to forget as you would in normal memories, there's just one colour. Maybe that purity allows your brain to recall very exactly the neurons that are fired off for that colour, which is why it seems so intense.

Or maybe I'm speaking utter rubbish, I'm no psychologist. Interesting theory though.

 

[DonMartin]

A serious philosophical dilemma has occured to me as of late. It's not the old problem that plagued the modern philosophy circa 1600-1800, that our thoughts of things only inaccurately represent the objective world from which they come, if there is an objective world at all. Rather its a dilemma even deeper and even more perplexing. I don't think that the abstract thought of a thing can even be said to represent the qualitative subjective experience its said to reflect.

Indulge me in a very simple thought experiment. I want you to close your eyes and just think of the color red. Meditate on it, imagine it fully.

Now here's my question. How does this thought of the color red in any way reflect the experience you have when you look on actual red? The essential nature of the color red is the visual experience you have when looking upon something red. As you meditate on your memory of red, does it replicate the experience in the same way the seeing of the color red? Are you able to see the color red when you meditate on it?

I can see only the cool black of my eyelids. In no way am I experiencing the essential nature of the color red. Therefore, lacking this essential nature, my thought of red is not even equivilent with my experience of red. So, how do I know its even a thought about red in the first place?

Edit: Here's a logical syllogism of the argument.

1: In order for a thought to be said to be "about" something, it must resemble or contain the essence of that which is it is about.
2: The essential nature of the color red is that it is in the active perception of it by the human observer. It is in the act of actually SEEING it
3: When one thinks about red, it does not cause them to in any way see the color, which is red's essential nature.

Therefore: what we say is a "thought about red" is in reality about red

First of all: I am red-green colour blind. So I'll just go along with my interpretation of the colour red.
...smug colour-seeing stupid people..... Just kidding. On with my actual response.


Very interesting. My first impulse was that you were just saying you were a skepticist, but there seems to be more to it than just that.

Also, I dont think this is a very new dilemma.. I mean, Berkeley and Kant could have answered this question easily with their theories and beliefs and proved you "wrong".

Would you mind giving us the definition of an "essence"? It seems to me (Which by no means makes it so) that you in this case consider the experience of seeing red as "the essence of red". Imagine then the essence of physical pain: You may imagine being beaten, or getting a scar, or burning your hand, or maybe you see a picture of yourself getting hurt in some gruesome fashion in your head. Now, is this not a thought about pain? If not, then what is? Can there be no thought about pain? Thoughts about experiencing pain? Are there only experiences of pain in themselves?

Now, the colour red... I can not visualize it with my eyes, but I can access my picture memory in a less direct visual part of my brain, since I can store the IDEA of red there. I know what red looks like, that is, and that's how I recognize red when I see it. Are you saying that we can not think of red, but think of the idea of red? We need to make a distinction, if there is one, between the idea and the essence of red.

We also need the definition of a "thought", and more specifically, a thought "about" something.


...Also, these two statements don't seem to fit together completely: (Though that might just be the way you wrote it, and that you actually mean something different.)

"...The essential nature of the color red is the visual experience you have when looking upon something red..."

and

"In order for a thought to be said to be "about" something, it must resemble or contain the essence of that which is it is about."

Now, why did the essence have to be the experience in the upper quote? I mean, if the essence is defined by that it resembles or contains that which it is about? Could it not be the idea? Also, is SEEING red neccessarily the "red experience"? Are there passive and active experiences?




Looking back on this post, I am being incredibly incoherent. But then again, Im writing this just minutes after reading your OP... I should spend some time thinking about it before I put my thoughts into words.

Also, I would like to discuss things like this with you over a cup of coffee. Anyone willing to join the round table of amateur philosophers?

 

[PurplePlatypus]

The question isn't whether the thought of red and the actual experience of red are one in the same. Obviously they are not. The question is that, given that the nature of the red is in it being perceived, and that the thought or memory of red does not cause us to perceive it, then why do we call it a thought of red? It does not contain the neccesary essence.

For all we know its a thought of purple.

You might as well ask why the word ?cat? spoken or written doesn?t mean . It?s just the symbol our mind has come up with to represent that colour. It means red and not purple simply because it?s a symbol of red to us.

 

[TacticalAssassin1]

For all we know its a thought of purple.

No... A thought of purple would be a thought of purple? That statement confuses me...

It was a referance to the old philosophical question of 'what if the colour that I call red, you call purple?' It's a thought that what you perceive as red, somebody else could percieve as purple, but because they've been told that purple colour is called red, they know it as red. It's a fun thought to think about.

As for the actual point of the thread... I sort of could see red? Not physically, with my eyes, but I could almost... light it up in my mind. Tried it with blue, green and yellow too, same result. It wasn't quite the same as a normal memory, I don't know, maybe it seemed different because I was concentrating so hard. Or maybe I'm just wired up wrong.

Right. Yeah I heard of that, and I agree with that too. Anyway it's been nice discussing this with you, but I'll be off for now.

 

[aLivingPheonix]

My head... hurting... too much thinking...

Seriously, this is worse than thinking about time travel.

Anywho, I don't really know whether my thought is red, as it could be white. Or pink... Imagining things is... Complicated. You see it, but at the same time you don't. It's like seeing it, but not really...

 

[Kikyoo]

The real test here is when your asleep and dreaming, that's when your mind is really free to wander. I've had dreams that had people in them just like I think of them! gasp shock and horror! Reactions are a lot more pure when you are dreaming. But as for visualizing real things that aren't there, your trying to see too hard with your eyes and not enough with your head. The point isn't to think about red so hard that you can suddenly see it, in fact what do you gain by seeing red anyways... Your mind is more expansive than that. If you focus too much on one thing your going to screw up your own head.

I find many times I have trouble getting my ideas across, words are always just vague representations of real things. But I guess my point is having just a vague idea of what someone is talking about is good enough. There is nothing wrong with not always seeing eye to eye, even with yourself. My brother changes opinions like he changes shirts. So the way he perceives things is always changing, just like every other human on the planet. We're not set in stone, so you can't force a set in stone image in your head. But you know what, your brain is really good for thinking about things that only exist because we, humans, made them. Like words. Thinking about the word "That" does it make it any less real, or unreal? Well it's just a word. A word we use. It has no meaning unto it's self, other than the act of pointing out the existence of something else.

I know this seems really complicated, but it's really simple. You are trying too hard to do something, and getting hung up on it because you can't. It's like you are trying to fly with a set of home made wings, and getting frustrated because you can't. Just relax and instead of dwelling on one thing, try to broaden your horizons.

 

[The_Yeti]

I have conclusive evidence of what the OP is trying to say.

Look at a bright light while your eyes are open, then close your eyes while still aiming your eye lashes at the light. You will see red.

Do I win thread now?

Yes, Yes you do, that extremely standard and unimaginative answer is entirely correct, for it is those without imagination that coldly tear apart theoretics with cold logical tongs violently empowered by dry ice. Thinking unimaginatively gets you called an "old soul" but methinks being an "old soul" is proof of wise mind, rather then going the phony-philosophical stand-point on trying to elaborately over-examine a thought and in doing so add which did not exist to begin with to force a greater, unneeded, non-existent sentimental background to what was a dull and plainly explainable happening at which is easily explained by light through the eye-lids.

Or just as likely and obvious answer, when blue and green both dissipate early due to error of mental ocular misinterpretation symptomatic of many many things, most relatively unharmful.

 

[Cry Wolf]

3: When one thinks about red, it does not cause them to in any way see the color, which is red's essential nature.

Here's where it gets interesting. When I recall red without the stimulus of red, I still see the color red along with the recollection of the experience of seeing the color red - the cause of which depends on from which perspective you view the mind (for what it's worth, I'm a stern materialist, believing that the mind and brain are one and that my thoughts are merely electrical impulses). It is in this I can visualize objects in other colors, like when I'm trying to decide whether X looks better in blue or red.

The important discussion in my mind, is whether or not my experience of red is the same as your experience of red. In this case, I speculate my experience of red is different to others, yet I can never prove this fact.

 

[Chefodeath]

First of all: I am red-green colour blind. So I'll just go along with my interpretation of the colour red.
...smug colour-seeing stupid people..... Just kidding. On with my actual response.


Very interesting. My first impulse was that you were just saying you were a skepticist, but there seems to be more to it than just that.

Also, I dont think this is a very new dilemma.. I mean, Berkeley and Kant could have answered this question easily with their theories and beliefs and proved you "wrong".

Would you mind giving us the definition of an "essence"? It seems to me (Which by no means makes it so) that you in this case consider the experience of seeing red as "the essence of red". Imagine then the essence of physical pain: You may imagine being beaten, or getting a scar, or burning your hand, or maybe you see a picture of yourself getting hurt in some gruesome fashion in your head. Now, is this not a thought about pain? If not, then what is? Can there be no thought about pain? Thoughts about experiencing pain? Are there only experiences of pain in themselves?

Now, the colour red... I can not visualize it with my eyes, but I can access my picture memory in a less direct visual part of my brain, since I can store the IDEA of red there. I know what red looks like, that is, and that's how I recognize red when I see it. Are you saying that we can not think of red, but think of the idea of red? We need to make a distinction, if there is one, between the idea and the essence of red.

We also need the definition of a "thought", and more specifically, a thought "about" something.


...Also, these two statements don't seem to fit together completely: (Though that might just be the way you wrote it, and that you actually mean something different.)

"...The essential nature of the color red is the visual experience you have when looking upon something red..."

and

"In order for a thought to be said to be "about" something, it must resemble or contain the essence of that which is it is about."

Now, why did the essence have to be the experience in the upper quote? I mean, if the essence is defined by that it resembles or contains that which it is about? Could it not be the idea? Also, is SEEING red neccessarily the "red experience"? Are there passive and active experiences?




Looking back on this post, I am being incredibly incoherent. But then again, Im writing this just minutes after reading your OP... I should spend some time thinking about it before I put my thoughts into words.

Also, I would like to discuss things like this with you over a cup of coffee. Anyone willing to join the round table of amateur philosophers?

Always good to answer good questions.

1: When I say essence, I mean that which cannot be taken from a thing without fundamentally changing what that thing is. I would have used Aristotle's substance, but I thought it would lead to confusion as colors are classically seen as accidentals and non-substantive in the Aristotelian canon. It should also be noted that I'm not talking about any actual objective physical phenomena of light or somesuch, but just the subjective qualitative phenomena of red.

In your getting beaten up example, you ask that this has to be pain. I'd say its not, which is entirely my point. My brain has all these complex ideas attached to my vision of pain, it tells me that I would not enjoy it at all, it tells me what parts of my body would be sore, but it DOES NOT replicate my feeling actual pain, which is the essence of pain, the feeling of it. A good thing it doesn't or I would be screaing in agony every time my mind wandered to a painful experience. Regardless, the essence of pain is absent from the thought, so it cannot properly said to be "about pain"

2: I am saying that the abstract thought of red does not contain the essence of red yes. I believe I have a marker in my head that says "when presented with the stimuli of red, then this, this, and this." But I do not think, as is common thought, that we are able to access red at will. Therefore, I don't think that placemarker can really be called a "thought of red"

3: I don't see what you're trying to say with the last. If you could please rephrase.

 

[DonMartin]

Always good to answer good questions.

1: When I say essence, I mean that which cannot be taken from a thing without fundamentally changing what that thing is. I would have used Aristotle's substance, but I thought it would lead to confusion as colors are classically seen as accidentals and non-substantive in the Aristotelian canon. It should also be noted that I'm not talking about any actual objective physical phenomena of light or somesuch, but just the subjective qualitative phenomena of red.

In your getting beaten up example, you ask that this has to be pain. I'd say its not, which is entirely my point. My brain has all these complex ideas attached to my vision of pain, it tells me that I would not enjoy it at all, it tells me what parts of my body would be sore, but it DOES NOT replicate my feeling actual pain, which is the essence of pain, the feeling of it. A good thing it doesn't or I would be screaing in agony every time my mind wandered to a painful experience. Regardless, the essence of pain is absent from the thought, so it cannot properly said to be "about pain"

2: I am saying that the abstract thought of red does not contain the essence of red yes. I believe I have a marker in my head that says "when presented with the stimuli of red, then this, this, and this." But I do not think, as is common thought, that we are able to access red at will. Therefore, I don't think that placemarker can really be called a "thought of red"

3: I don't see what you're trying to say with the last. If you could please rephrase.

Thank you for taking your time to respond! It's a very interesting idea indeed, worthy of proper discussion.

First of all, my example of the "essence of pain" was just to see if I had grasped your idea, I was trying to put your theory into another context to see if I fully understood it. I think I got a better understanding of what you were saying thanks to your response. Actually, most of my post was about clarifying, as Im sure you can/could tell. They werent rethorical questions, (well, not all of them) but actual questions.

Now, I still find some things that make me hesitate to agree with you.. Mainly questions of definition, which always, in the words of the ancients, is a *****.

First of all, if I may continue with the Pain Problem, I see your reasoning and it isnt illogical at all, quite the opposite. But still, I would disagree with you on the definition of essence as an experience:

You seem to (or so it seems to me) have a view on existence that is largely based on empiricism, or maybe rather your interaction with things and what that produces. So, would you mind clarifying your view on this? I mean, in the sense of "The noise of the lone tree"-example? (If a tree falls in the forest and no one is there to hear it etc.) Because it seems to me that your philosophy on this particular aspect of existence is based on interaction: If I can see it, it exists. If I can touch it, it is there, if I experience it, I know the essence, etc.

The reason I drew this conclusion (although possibly only temporary, depending on what you think and if you disagree or not) was because you defined the essence of an object, as we said, as the EXPERIENCE of that object. It is not pain, but you FEELING pain. It is not red, but you SEEING red. Am I making myself understood at all? Your thought of visualizing red is not, atleast what I think, thinking about red. It is simply visualizing red, thinking of SEEING red. However, you can still think of red, and KNOW what red looks like, right? Of course, red is harder to define than pain, so in this particular question it is rather the "knowledge of red" that is the definition, if you understand what Im saying. This is still just another word for definition, though.

But still, I think we need to make a distinction between the two of these: I think the essence of pain would rather be the definition: Something that hurts, that causes unpleasant thoughts, physical "non-wellbeing", and so on. The IDEA, the DEFINITION of pain, so to speak. This, we can think of, because it is made up of language. This is important, because we can not feel pain without a definition of pain. We wouldn't be able to call it pain, would we?

This definition refers to pain as a phenomenom in itself. Naturally, the need to define it came from something, which was the experience of pain. But as soon as we define pain, the idea of pain can exist without the experience of pain. I suppose you could say we derive our definitions from experience, but the these do not define the experience.

Now, the EXPERIENCE of pain, that's where I agree with you. We can not think of this, but rather think of the definition of pain, or a particular moment of pain, or the feeling pain brings us, but we can not re-enact the experience of pain.


I have another question, which is sort of what I meant with "#3". (The one you asked me to rephrase - and for good reasons too!) Im basically asking you to clarify you view with this example: If the essence of pain is the experience, and the experience is the active interaction with the object, (feeling pain) and we can not think of the experience; what makes us fear pain? I'll try to make myself clearer:

Imagine seeing a hot stove. Someone asks you to put your hand on the stove. You don't do it, right? Why? Probably because you can imagine the pain that the hot stove would bring to you: you know it will be unpleasant. You say "This will bring me the experience of pain", which, from what Ive understood, you mean is the essence of pain. But experiencing pain seems strange to consider an essence, since it's made up of two words. So, let's split it in half, and look at the latter: What are you experiencing? Pain, right? But to explain what youre experiencing, you must be able to define pain. And to define pain, you must think of pain and what it means. That is, however unclearly it is explained here, what I think seems more reasonable at the moment.


---


...The moment, by the way, is 1:24 AM. If there are problems with my post, I'll blame them on me being tired (as much as you'll allow).

 

[Zom-B]

However, while a requirement for "red" might be active perception by a human, it's still a representation created by your brain. Your eyes "see" the colour red, but then that information is sent to you brain via your optic nerve, where it is processed and resolved by your brain in to a recognizable information set, in this case "red".

I can recall that information set within my brain and get an accurate representation of "red" without even perceiving it outside of my own consciousness.

This kind of tricky thinking goes right into the whole school of thought of Solipsism. Is there a real world, or is everything you know created by your brain. There's a fundamental barrier between what we generally think of as the universe, and that is your precept system. How do you know what I see is the same thing you are seeing. Is "red" the same for us? How can you prove that everything is not a mind construct of your own? How can you prove to me you are "real"? All my experiences pass through my senses and are then processed by my brain. I can't know anything outside my brain and I have no definitive way to determine if what I'm seeing/touching/hearing is an actual space/time event or simply a thought I've created.

It's fun stuff to think about, but it's easy to start going around in circles.

 

[Zom-B]

However, while a requirement for "red" might be active perception by a human, it's still a representation created by your brain. Your eyes "see" the colour red, but then that information is sent to you brain via your optic nerve, where it is processed and resolved by your brain in to a recognizable information set, in this case "red".

I can recall that information set within my brain and get an accurate representation of "red" without even perceiving it outside of my own consciousness.

This kind of tricky thinking goes right into the whole school of thought of Solipsism. Is there a real world, or is everything you know created by your brain. There's a fundamental barrier between what we generally think of as the universe, and that is your precept system. How do you know what I see is the same thing you are seeing. Is "red" the same for us? How can you prove that everything is not a mind construct of your own? How can you prove to me you are "real"? All my experiences pass through my senses and are then processed by my brain. I can't know anything outside my brain and I have no definitive way to determine if what I'm seeing/touching/hearing is an actual space/time event or simply a thought I've created.

It's fun stuff to think about, but it's easy to start going around in circles.

Of course you aren't "experiencing" red, because it's a memory. It's very different from the way your brain process red in the form of light through your eyes.

What is the definition of "experiencing red". If I close my eyes and remember what red looks like to me, how is that not experiencing it? Or can you prove it's not?