Is it possible for a person to have no beliefs at all?

Oh? Where did you get YOUR vasectomy?

I had prostate cancer.

Sorry to hear that cicerone... Cancer is a horrible thing for anyone to have to have gone through.

FS

I truly do not think I have, but if I have, I apologize.

My opinions are mine...and of course I place great stock in them or they would not be my opinions.

The problem with people like you is that you refuse to acknowledge when you are un-aware if what you're saying, you don't see that is is very valuable to question your own pre-suppositions and conclusions.

Until you do this conversation will just be about your conclusions and your 'reasons' for sticking to them.

With good doctors to advise and treat me, I am now in remission. Since I was a grade 4 (Gleason score), I chose radiation treatment. I have other minor health issues with the treatment, but they're minor.

I had grade (2) around 8 years ago, it's amazing .. Grade (4) would have been very scary.... Guess you are an ultra positive one Glad things are minor, I too have no issues anymore

Hope you get back on your feet as soon as possible so that we can disagree on each other a couple of decades more around the forum ! best of luck to you !

Been "back on my feet" right after the treatment. It was no fun laying on that cold, steel, radiation treatment "machinery" table in the raw for eight weeks.

My avocation is world travel. You can visit my blogs at www.travelpod.com. Look for me as; c.i.222 I'm now working on my recent trip to the Dalmatian Coast cruise that was completed on April 12.

I like your realization that "being wrong does not equal failure". Indeed, many of our largest errors may have promoted our species' survival. I believe that ultimately (in the longest run) we are all wrong in our thinking, but sometimes we are pragmatically right (at least in the short run). But our perceptions are always right, even mirages. It's only our thoughts about them that deceive us.

U can try it and see.
Let us know how it works out.





David

Yes, thoughts and perhaps expectations? We only protest the reality of a mirage of water when we expect it to be actual water.

"protest the reality of a mirage of water"

Can you tell me exactly what you mean by this? To me this only looks like the stringing together of a few 'clever' words.

Someone who sees a mirage of a lake is likely to say "it is not real".
He is, of course, referring to the lake, not the mirage. A more correct statement than "it is not real" would be "it is not water".

What about this 'seeing' makes it, as you put it, a 'mirage'? Anything that is reference-able must have been 'seen' in some way, there-by it could be referenced.

What is the fundamental basis for which we use to distinguish the 'real' from the 'un-real'?

Would not any sort of 'knowledge' of any given thing or event constitute its 'realism'?

Are your dreams 'real' or not? Do they 'happen'?

Physicality.
Any application of the word "real" in relation to aspects of our mental experience is ambiguous at best, and at worst nonsensical.

My dreams are real experiences. So is the experience of eating an imaginary apple. This experience is not to be confused with the real experience of eating a real apple.

Do you see how ambiguous the word "real" becomes when we relate it to an imaginary apple? It devalues the distinction "real" until it becomes less meaningful.

Then some ask if free will is real. That is when the application of the word "real" approaches nonsense. "Free will" is not an object or a phenomenon. It is an idea, a way we understand certain aspects of our situation; a perspective. Does it make sense to ask if a perspective is real?
Isn't asking for the validity of the perspective a more sensible approach?

I am going to try to reply to your post to the best of my 'abilities'. However, whatever I choose to say will, most likely, be an in-accurate portrayal of that-which I truly had in mind to convey. I ask that you bear with me. What you had written will be in bold.

"Physicality.
Any application of the word "real" in relation to aspects of our mental experience is ambiguous at best, and at worst nonsensical."

For accuracy, everything must be taken down to its fundamental 'roots', otherwise there is no point in delving into philosophizing. Having said that, there really is no way for me to tell just what you really mean by 'physicality', no matter how much we choose to agree. I only know what I mean should I use the word 'physicality'. You create a double-bind by using the words 'mental-experience' and I'll show you how. Pre-supposing the 'existence' of 'mental experience' automatically gives validity to a conscious observer, it also means that this one who is conscious would never leave the 'point' of observing. Do you see how that's a double-bind? When you go into a discussion with someone using words like 'mental, experience, consciousness etc. etc.' you make a pre-supposition that you 'force' them to either agree with or to prove you wrong. You're coming into the conversation with your own 'baggage' and are not being authentically present. Don't take this to mean anything other than that you are robbing yourself of a chance at authentic communication.

"My dreams are real experiences. So is the experience of eating an imaginary apple. This experience is not to be confused with the real experience of eating a real apple."

Maybe I should ask the question I asked before, however a little differently. In the statement above you make a clear distinction between A. The experience of eating an imaginary apple. and B. The 'real' experience of eating a 'real' apple. So, again, what is your fundamental basis for distinguishing the difference between these two?

"Do you see how ambiguous the word "real" becomes when we relate it to an imaginary apple? It devalues the distinction "real" until it becomes less meaningful."

If there is such a word as 'real' and its pre-supposed meaning is accurate then it should mean no more or less regardless of whichever scenario applied to. And of course it's ambiguous, but YOU sir are the one who made it that way by using the word 'imaginary' in front of 'apple'.

"Then some ask if free will is real. That is when the application of the word "real" approaches nonsense. "Free will" is not an object or a phenomenon. It is an idea, a way we understand certain aspects of our situation; a perspective. Does it make sense to ask if a perspective is real?
Isn't asking for the validity of the perspective a more sensible approach?"

I'm not even going to touch on 'free will', people who still wonder about that do not know how to move on with their lives. Not only that but they don't realize that living goes in indefinitely.

Your asking if a perspective is 'real' is a play on words. By using 'perspective'(same as imaginary) near the beginning of the sentence and then 'real' near the end you give the semblance of a vast contrast, thus proving your conclusion that it is 'nonsensical'. You're just spinning in circles, and all I can do is show you that this is what you're doing, trust me, I wish there were some method to stop the spinning but there isn't. The only thing to do is to just drop it.

Pre-supposing the existence of 'perspective' already gives it validity to he-who-has pre-supposed. Unfortunately most people waste their 'living' trying to prove what they already know, and because 'perspective' isn't explicitly provable they have to go around defending it.

From wiki on mirage.


Our brains play games with our minds.

There is every way. Physicality isn't a difficult concept to grasp. If it has physical form or substance it has physicality.
I do not believe this to be a matter of hierarchical "command structure", and so I do not think the "fundamental roots" are easily identifiable.



Like I said. Physicality.
I was attempting to show how ambiguous "real" is when used in other contexts than distinguishing what has physical being and what does not.



Yes, I used "real" out of it's intended context. Precisely my point.



Good, since that isn't the topic. It was another attempt at demonstrating how "real" is often used in contexts where the word describes little or nothing.

"There is every way. Physicality isn't a difficult concept to grasp. If it has physical form or substance it has physicality.
I do not believe this to be a matter of hierarchical "command structure", and so I do not think the "fundamental roots" are easily identifiable."


Regardless of how 'difficult' or not you find it to be, there would still be a vast 'give-and-take' to take place on my behalf for 'us' to put forward the existence of what the word 'physicality' points to. You have 'formed' your own meaning of the word and I have 'formed' mine, you're stuck with yours as I am mine.

"Like I said. Physicality.
I was attempting to show how ambiguous "real" is when used in other contexts than distinguishing what has physical being and what does not."


You still do not have the grounds necessary for distinguishing 'physicality' as separate from which you used for your distinguishing, the question comes about again. What are your grounds for distinction? How do you distinguish what 'has physical being' from what does not?

"Yes, I used "real" out of it's intended context. Precisely my point."

Yes, and it was my 'point' that yours is circular and self-serving. You're just trying to 'get one past the goalie'.

"It was another attempt at demonstrating how "real" is often used in contexts where the word describes little or nothing."

I think of the word 'real' to be used more often by people who are trying to prove their conclusions and/or pre-supposition(s). Often through clever word-play or semantics.