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sudden insight re problem of perception

Here is a reallllllllllllllllllllllllllly difficult ) for an Aristotelian. The Ari dude maintains that the same form that exists in nature comes through perception to exist in us. Okay, but if we examine how, say, the ear works, we see a transfer from mechanical energy to chemical--or should I say electro-chemical? So when we look at the organ(s) of sensation from a material point of view, it seems like something other than the original form comes to be in us.

This sort of problem is the meat and potatoes of representationalism. For if the sort of quality that exists inside the animal in the area where cognitions occur is something different from the sorts of qualities that exist outside the animal, then it would seem to some that only a representation can exist in the brain/mind.

My reply is to counter by posing another, even more difficult question to the advocate of representationalism: HOW is it that we're aware of sameness? (as in "the same sound", "the same soundmaker" "the same world," "the same environment," etc.) This question is more basic than questions about qualities inside and outside of the brain. If the representationalist were to deal with this problem in the "same" way that he deals with the problem of hearing, then he would likely end up denying our awareness of any sameness-- of any continuity in being---whatsoever. All sameness would be illusory, or perhaps sameness would be real but merely internal. This would just be the beginning of the problems that would beset the representationalist. For if it is merely internal, then how can one communicated with others about the same things? etc.

In order to avoid these problems, one must grant that one's perception and thoughts are of and about the same world as that perceived and thought of by others. The would-be representationalist must agree that we perceive and know the same world as others. And any ontology of cognition invoked to make room for this "sameness" will come in handy when it comes time to give an account of, say, hearing.

The two questions (about hearing and about being continuously aware of the same continuously existingt world) are interconnected. They are both about being, temporality, openness to being, etc.

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