[ExI] Resend: "The Empirical Object" by Dr. Sunny Auyang

[Jef Allbright]

On 7/18/07, Lee Corbin <lcorbin at rawbw.com> wrote:

> My favorite line in the book is "I have never
> seen a sense impression in my life". In other
> words, we see objects; we *perceive*
> (I suppose) sense impressions. So the
> realism of "I see a car coming towards me"
> is supported, and other theories that might
> tempt one to say (when speaking precisely)
> "I see the sense impression of a car coming
> towards me" are denigrated.

Them's fancy words, but your concluding paragraph shows that you don't
quite get it.

The author's statement, "I have never seen a sense impression in my
life", is an elegant allusion to the core of the problem. Elegant,
perfect, right-on.  She highlights the philosophical problem of the
Cartesian Self, the mind's "I", the homunculous, the "hard problem of
consciousness", qualia, and such related hoohaw.

For you to say, "we perceive (I suppose) sense impressions", is to
continue to make the core mistake of assuming that sense impressions
are somehow delivered to a perceiver.  Rather, the sensory apparatus
of the observer interacts with its local "reality" and the observer
system perceives.  "Sense impressions" are meaningless (can't be
modeled) when you insist that they must then be perceived.

Tell me, Human, what is this perceiver you speak of, as if somehow
distinct within the observing system?

- Jef

P.S. I did try to ignore this one, but it was so over the top that I
went over with it.