Picture a sword

Discuss any topics related to metaphysics (the philosophical study of the principles of reality) or epistemology (the philosophical study of knowledge) in this forum.
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Bebelle
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Picture a sword

Post by Bebelle »

Have you ever thought how crazy it is to imagine things? Picture a sword, you saw the sword, but it wasn't in fact you because your eyes were open, you didn't see anything but you also did, you are seeing a sword at the same that that you are looking to the screen of your computer even though the sword is not actually there. Even if you close your eyes and imagine a sword, you still is seeing black and the picture of a sword is being formed and seen in another part, not by your eyes but by something else. So what is this sword that you are seeing and is it really you that it is looking at it? How can you see something but not with your eyes?
Maxcady10001
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Re: Picture a sword

Post by Maxcady10001 »

"After consolidation, long-term memories are stored throughout the brain as groups of neurons that are primed to fire together in the same pattern that created the original experience, and each component of a memory is stored in the brain area that initiated it (e.g. groups of neurons in the visual cortex store a sight, neurons in the amygdala store the associated emotion, etc)."

I pulled that off of a site called human-memory.net. I believe it answers your question. We are able to see a sword because we've seen a sword before, and the neurons associated with the sword we've seen, fire again when recalling the image of that sword. Since we are "reliving" or imagining the experience of a sword, the same neurons that fired with the first experience fire again. We are seeing a visual memory of the sword.
Because it is my memory of a sword, yes it is me that sees the sword. If you're getting at whether or not we really exist, that is something that can never be known.

Someone please correct me if the part about the brain is incorrect or incomplete.
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Burning ghost
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Re: Picture a sword

Post by Burning ghost »

Its called "imagination", that is why we say "image". An "image" is a representation of something that relates to sensory experience.

Also, be aware that in language we use "visual" prompts for understanding. Like when I ask "Do you see what I mean?", I obviously don't mean see with your eyes!

Language, communication, understanding and sense is a very complicated thing. The neurological explanation given above is but one way to approach the problem and frame some form of meaning. If you play around and flash between physical reductionism, analogy and metaphor, you'll fleetingly grasp at something in which the human condition is "embodied", for want of a better term!

The issue of temporality is a very difficult thing to get our heads around. We are seemingly "stretched out" across time and have to be in order to appreciate anything at all. Language really fails us in communicating the impression of immanent "being". These kind of things have been wrestled with by philosophers for eons! Maybe its nothing more than an illusion created by language we're wrestling with? Maybe the 'question' is a means of creating questions not a proposition that we have any real truth with which to answer (although in abstract realms with set propositional rules and symbols we can most certainly produce answers - mathematics being a powerful example of this, and one more obvious to anyone who has ever played any kind of game.)
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Re: Picture a sword

Post by Alias »

Picturing, imagining, visualizing... Okay.
I search the mental archives for sword images - epee, gladius, scimitar, saber, piandao, foil, claymore, cutlass, bokken, rapier...
naked and sheathed, hanging at an officer's hip or on a wall, stuck in a body or a stone, broken on the ground, held in a hand, resting on a shoulder... shiny or tarnished or rusty or bloody; at rest and in motion, as I've seem in life or depicted on film, in paint or line-drawing.
I fixate on the best-preserved specimen in my memory collection: a silver broadsword, about 4cm long, with a loop on the pommel for threading the chain through, as I last saw it some 40 years ago.
But I can't keep the image before my eyes: it fades in and out, morphs with the face of the person I gave it to, and slides away into associations with that time, flickers as something attracts my attention to the present.
Oh yeah, that's me all right.
Those who can induce you to believe absurdities can induce you to commit atrocities. - Voltaire
Maxcady10001
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Re: Picture a sword

Post by Maxcady10001 »

Alias
Can you please explain the meaning of your post.
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Re: Picture a sword

Post by Alias »

Maxcady10001 wrote: December 3rd, 2017, 10:01 pm Alias
Can you please explain the meaning of your post.
It's a response to the OP questions:
So what is this sword that you are seeing and is it really you that it is looking at it?
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Re: Picture a sword

Post by Alias »

There is no such thing as a generic sword. Every instance of a sword is singular and particular. Every visual image in memory is of a specific example that we abstract through information to the collective term. But we have no image on file of the general concept; we can only see or visualize the particular specimens we have actually seen. And even those, we cannot see on demand or with any reliability.
Those who can induce you to believe absurdities can induce you to commit atrocities. - Voltaire
Maxcady10001
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Re: Picture a sword

Post by Maxcady10001 »

Thank you
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Burning ghost
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Re: Picture a sword

Post by Burning ghost »

Also, it should be worth considering that what Alias says can be pulled apart a little ... meaning, to say that we can only "visualize" or "see" things we've actually "seen" is not in the strictest sense completely correct. We don't need eyes to "see", so we need to consider our understanding about the world to be one much like a "mapping out". Sensibly we must have stimulation (be it produced within or without our bodily horizons.)

Basically I just mean that in order to "picture anything", we must have a foundation upon which to lay our sensible experiences. That said it seems we must necessarily distinguish there to be some threshold after which we're capable of "seeing". This is likely entangled in the mishmash of inbuilt sensory appreciation upon which input is stored in memory and from which arises a general layout of our being about (in/around) a world.
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Re: Picture a sword

Post by Maxcady10001 »

Thank ypu for the further clarification. I have a lot of work to do before I can take part in arguments regarding neuroscience.
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Burning ghost
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Re: Picture a sword

Post by Burning ghost »

If you've got more than a passing interest I recommend buying Principles of Neural Science. I have the Fourth Edition, but from the reviews I've read the Fifth Edition is an improvement (if you can get the Fourth Edition much cheaper then you'd still be giving yourself a damn good grounding!)
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Re: Picture a sword

Post by Alias »

Burning ghost wrote: December 4th, 2017, 12:35 am Basically I just mean that in order to "picture anything", we must have a foundation upon which to lay our sensible experiences.
Exactly. The picturing the OP asks for is only "seeing" - which isn't all that difficult if you have actually, literally seen at least one example of the named object. If you don't know what the word "sword" means - say you don't speak English well enough - you can't conjure up an image of it, no matter how many you may have seen. If do know what it means and have seen some swords, you can call up an image, even if you are blind now. But if you were born blind and have never seen a sword, you can't picture one, even if you know what the word means. I wonder how a blind person imagines objects they understand but have never seen. "Picture" would certainly be the wrong term for that imaging exercise.

Actual, non-quote seeing can only be done with functional eyes. "Seeing" or picturing can only be done with the memory of something that has been actually seen. Imagining can be accomplished with the memory imprint of other senses. I wonder where imaging fits.
Maxcady10001
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Re: Picture a sword

Post by Maxcady10001 »

I believe I've found the third edition online free in pdf form.
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Burning ghost
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Re: Picture a sword

Post by Burning ghost »

Descartes Error by Damasio is another nice overview and a quick read (ties into my general view of "emotion" being the important point of consciousness.)

I imagine the 3rd Edition will have enough to chew on. Would probably be more manageable to print out the pages you need too rather than lugging a breezeblock of a book around! I rarely leave the house with mine and make damn sure I need a workout when I do! haha!

Enjoy
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SimpleGuy
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Re: Picture a sword

Post by SimpleGuy »

Perception can be deceiving and at the same time inspiring , think of the famous ames-room. It should be clear, that perhaps the imagination of the sword itself can be more for youre personal conscience than the simple perception could be . The imagination is some kind of mantra constantly repeated it shall give to you more insight. Just think about the sand paintings of buddhism as a form of meditation, which is a simple picture , but the more often you look at it, the more of your inner aspects are revealed and with it the meaning of terms used in your mind changes. Could you imagine that looking at the piled zen stone-heaps could be some kind of the same aspect. For psychologists, this is some kind of projection of your mind into your it, that reveals your conscience and a self stimulus, that can equal hypnosis.
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