Re: Elliot Temple's post 14122 of 11/6/16

One-line summary: Opinionated eyes?

Elliot Temple writes:


> Raw observation is both impossible (because e.g. our eyes are opinionated--they let us see green but not infrared)

Is this serious? As stated, it is wild primacy of consciousness.

Concepts are formed from perception. If it is impossible for a three-month old to have "raw observation," then, he would be unable to form concepts. Helen Keller couldn't form concepts (even though she had 18 months of sight and hearing until she lost those faculties, due to disease). She was able to form concepts only after she learned to use her sense of touch and the hand language she learned from Annie Sullivan.

We don't perceive everything, but we perceive enough.

And this whole routine about the myriad possibilities that supposedly overwhelm us is highly artificial. It's an importation of an adult perspective into the world of the child. (I'm reminded of Quine's gavagai "problem," if you are familiar with that.) Even for adults, it's converting a practical problem of what's the most productive feature to consider into a philosophical problem, which doesn't exist: Tables have a zillion characteristics, so how can I ever decide which to attend to in order to form "table." The child forming "table" confronts no such problem.