Conceptualizing...

Philo: Welcome back ‘stu’. Ready to learn how to use your mind?

Estudia: You bet. I’m got all these percepts from reality. So now what?

Philo: Well, your sensory material is only a baby step. You can’t do anything with it as percepts. You have to build on those percepts and form concepts.

Estudia: What’s the difference?

Philo: A baby first becomes aware of things. They automatically perceive objects in reality and understand in some implicit way that the world consists of entities. Animals are the same at birth but they both go on to learn to distinguish one object from another.

Estudia: Sure, my dog knows lots of trees and people and even other dogs at times. He must have a memory and perceive these things in his surroundings.

Philo: Yes, but you can generalize and your dog can’t. You can know things about all men not just particular ones. You can discover natural laws that describe how things interact in reality. You can form hypothesizes and test them out. You can picture things as they might have been in the past and as they might be in the future. Your conceptual faculty is a wonderful, powerful addition to your consciousness. No other species can even come close to having the power that you do with your mind.

Estudia: What is my conceptual faculty? I mean, I guess, what is a concept first of all, and how are they formed?

Philo: Patience my friend. I’m getting to that but we have to go slowly to discover the truth. You are so much above you dog or any other animal in the use of your consciousness. Take actions for example. You have to choose your values and think about your actions. How you act must be based on how you think, or fail to think. You have to think based on abstract principles to guide you. What goals to pursue and how to pursue them. You, as opposed to your dog, adapt nature for your own use. The animal can not, it must adapt to nature.

Estudia: So then, it is my conceptualizing ability that makes me human?

Philo: Well yes and no. You and your dog can differ in the manner in which you think, and act and survive because these things are determined by the attributes of your conceptual faculty. Your conceptual faculty is unique and different from any other species in that it gives you the ability to form concepts and we must know what they are to continue.

Estudia: Okay, so what is a concept?

Philo: We talked about existence before. We said that reality was composed of things and these things are called existents. As we develop from infancy we development the implicit concept of existent in three stages. First we simply become aware of them. We notice the objects around us and this represents implicitly the concept of entity.

Estudia: Then we begin to distinguish one thing from another, right?

Philo: Yes, this is still on the perceptual level, and involves mental actions like a baby noticing that something is like what it saw some other time before and it begins to recognize it. This is the implicit concept of identity. Animals can do this too. They can perceive things and learn to recognize them.

Estudia: So animals do form concepts!

Philo: No they don’t, not even implicit ones and I’ll tell you why. It is because of the third and uniquely human ability to grasp the similarities and/or differences that exist between entities. Animals do learn to recognize specific entities out of those that they perceive, but they can’t get beyond that stage. You have learned to regard objects as related to each other by how they resemble each other and so you can consider the objects as a separate mental group. You grasp the concept of “unit” implicitly.

Estudia: And, a unit is exactly what?

Philo: Ayn Rand taught us that “A unit is an existent regarded as a separate member of a group of two or more similar members.” She said that, “This is the key, the entrance to the conceptual level of man’s consciousness. The ability to regard entities as units is man’s distinctive method of cognition, which other living species are unable to follow.”

Estudia: Ah, yes, I can see that. Animals just see things and reacts to them in the order that they appear. But we organize the things we perceive according to how they resemble each other. Everything is jumbled together in reality, but we can mentally group similar things and consider them as groups of units, like all trees, rocks, people, dogs, et cetera. But we get confused some times and wonder about particular units and which group to put them in as well, like we wonder whether a particular object is say a tree or a big weed, or is that three legged thing a table or a stool or what.

Philo: Yes, but you are using words already now to discuss your concepts. Actually, in reality, units do not exist as such. There are only things, or existents, that make up reality. These things each have their own identities. Our consciousness allows us to identify and classify these things according to attributes we observe in reality. Things can be sorted in all sorts of ways. According to size, shape, color, density, and chemical or physical properties. The things are what exist, but consciousness views things in certain relationships to each other and considers that as a unit. You can do a lot more than any other animal with that ability. You specialize your thinking and can gain knowledge about all the objects in a particular unit by learning about just a few of the objects. You are capable of induction which is a way to know general principles from detailed facts. All trees have leaves, or are made of wood, or get their energy from sunlight and so on.

Estudia: So you are saying that we have this ability to grasp the idea of “unit” and that allows us to reach the conceptual level of knowledge?

Philo: Yes and without that implicit idea, the concept of unit, we could not count or measure in any way. Without the unit, we could not enter the conceptual or the mathematical fields.

Estudia: Really?

Philo: Really, but why don’t you mull over the unit idea and next time we’ll discuss more about this process of concept formation.

Estudia: Okay, but is it important or is this just academic?

Philo: No, it’s very important to the development of epistemology and hence to our philosophy. You want to eventual know what is true and what is right action in all kinds of areas and you need to know that your knowledge is valid. Believe me; you can’t learn anything about reality without first understanding your method of thinking in concepts.

Estudia: Okay, then I’ll stick with it. Au revoir.

Thinking about axioms...

Estudia: Phi, I’ve got a question. Can you prove to me that my consciousness is free to choose and that it doesn’t just work automatically?

Philo: Let me ask you something. Do you find yourself having to decide to think or not to think all the time? Are you listening carefully to what I’m saying, or are you just half listening and thinking about something else you want or need to do?

Estudia: I’m listening! Yes, I have to decide constantly about what I’m going to focus on and how hard and how long. But that doesn’t prove anything, does it?

Philo: No, but this is one of those things you can’t “prove” as such.

Estudia: Not another axiom!?

Philo: Well, if your consciousness was automatic and your thoughts were determined by something or someone, then you wouldn’t have a choice about what you are thinking. You’d just have to accept whatever you had to accept.

Estudia: Sure, I would be thinking about whatever I’ve been “told” to think about. I wouldn’t have any choice in the matter; so maybe we are being “forced” to think about this.

Philo: Then I’d be mistaken to ask you to think about thinking. We don’t need any epistemology because we couldn’t or wouldn’t have to justify our thoughts or actions for that matter. Yes, the principle of volition is an axiom. Volition is at the base of the concept of validation and that includes “proof”. The only way we can even consider validating our ideas is to accept that our thinking is free, that our consciousness is volitional. To ask me to prove to you that your thinking is free, or that you have free will, requires that we presuppose the reality of free will.

Estudia: So you’re telling me that it must be self-evident.

Philo: Well isn’t it for you? Just introspect and observe your own consciousness. Volition is a primary starting point of all your thinking about anything including thinking. In order to even consider directing your thoughts, you must be free and you must know it in someway. All our knowledge requires some form of validation, and validation rest on the fact of volition. You can’t deny it, and you can’t escape it because you have to use it in some way even in trying to deny it.

Estudia: Yes, but wouldn’t someone who holds that they have no choice and that their thinking is a result of some subconscious process, or social pressures, or whatever; wouldn’t someone like that be correct too?

Philo: Someone like that would be a determinist. A determinist claims that we are determined by something outside, or maybe inside, ourselves. Everything is determined so he must claim that his own position of determinism is determined also. So, how can a determinist know the truth? Does he never make any mistakes and always act properly and think rationally and logically about everything?

Estudia: I don’t think so. Nobodies perfect in that sense.

Philo: Right, but the determinist would be saying that when he makes a mistake, he had to do it, no matter how he feels about it, no matter if he thinks he knows better. He couldn’t do otherwise. Such a person couldn’t rely on his own opinions. How could he judge anything? He couldn’t claim he knows anything about anything, including his position on determinism.

Estudia: Hahaha... that’s funny. You’re right. Someone who is infallible and knows the truth doesn’t need to think. Hey, my dog is like that and he is conscious.

Philo: Yes, but you are a human so you must think to know the truth about reality.

Estudia: Not if I touch a hot stove. I know the truth about reality real quick without thinking.

Philo: True, but remember we allowed for the perceptual stage of awareness. Yes, the senses are automatic and beyond your control. They are a part of the identity of your consciousness. We are talking about volition now. Volition is not a separate independent philosophic idea. It is part of the axiom of consciousness and is derived from it.

Estudia: A corollary then?

Philo: Precisely. Your dog is conscious but doesn’t have a faculty of volition. We are all fallible, conceptual human beings possessing a consciousness that includes the faculty of volition.

Estudia: That’s interesting. So a determinist would be saying that he is in control of his mind and can decide to focus or not on reality. He is free to be objective and not just controlled by outside forces, and so he is free to conclude that he is not free. That’s bizarre!

Philo: Bizarre like any rejection of an axiom. Determinism refutes itself as you see. You have to accept that existence exists or that you have consciousness in order to deny it. Similarly you have to accept that you have volition in order to deny it, and that answers your question.

Estudia: Right, you can’t and you don’t need to “prove” to me that my consciousness is free to choose and that it doesn’t just work automatically.

Philo: Your will is free and is located in your conceptual faculty. Ayn Rand taught us that the faculty of reason is the faculty of volition, and you and I have validated it. Your senses are valid and your mind is free.

Estudia: Terrific. Now just tell me how I should use my mind?

Philo: Patience, grasshopper, patience, my dear. Until next time ... just let me say good bye for now.