MrStakhanovite wrote:mfbukowski,
Do you see any inconsistency between these two statements?
(1) Reality exists independently of our representations of it.
(2) All representations of reality are made relative to some more or less arbitrarily selected set of concepts.
Representations: Language, Art, Science, Maps, etc, etc
I suppose I don't see an inconsistency per se, but my understanding of the meaning of these statements I think differs far from yours.
The explanation will be very terse and I will be glad to elaborate if you like, but I think you will "get" it as is.
For me, "reality" is precisely what we experience, as conditioned by language etc. Language is in a sense already "reality" or part of it, since we can experience virtually nothing without language.
I am "typing on a computer"- THAT is reality. But seeing the square screen and hitting the letters and knowing that they create words that in a context create meaning you will understand, and the fact that it is something called a "computer"- all that enters into the experience of "reality" and no one element of that experience can be divorced from the others without distorting what the "experience"-- or what the "reality" is.
I cannot know anything except as I experience it- how humans experience it. And all I CAN know of reality is what humans experience. There is no point postulating anything external to what we can experience because we can only know about it through experience, and you cannot divorce experience from language, concepts etc. I would say that what some call "abstracta" are included in reality- and so there is no point in postulating any separate existence for them over and above "reality".
So calling language a "representation" of reality or saying a concept is a representation of reality is to me, to create an unnecessary dichotomy between experience and "reality".
So it is hard for me to evaluate your statements.
Certainly in the case of pictures and maps, these devices represent or capture certain conceptual aspects of reality or experience, and these representations serve specific purposes as tools. One cannot smell the flowers in the garden on a map of the garden, or listen to grandma's voice from a still photo, but both serve specific functions, namely allowing one to find the garden from another location, or remembering how grandma's face looked.
So if those are consistent with what you mean by your second statement, then I would say that experience exists independently of a photograph of the experience- that seems blatantly clear. But if you took the photograph of the experience of "grandma" with the specific purpose of remembering the look of her face, I am not sure if that is "relative to some more or less arbitrarily selected set of concepts" or not in your statement.
So we live in two quite different worlds, and communication requires a bit of effort.