Representative Realism in Plain English

A film created to demonstrate representative realism, as revision for AQA AS Philosophy.

Created by David Comley and Katherine Haralampous

Category:

Film & Animation

Tags:

• Representative
• Realism
• AS
• AQA
• Philosophy
• Berkeley
• Austin
• Locke
• Anti-realism
• Alton
• College

[ArcadianGenesis]

Direct realism is the worst theory in philosophy. It is a fact that we do not perceive anything that can be called "reality." Every person who has taken a course in biology or physics knows that our sense perceptions are incredibly limited. Direct realism is simply out of the question. The only question that remains is, what is the relationship between mental states and brain states? Indirect realism is a good theory.

[doobuzz]

An interesting answer, but what about the numerous criticisms of representative (i.e, indirect) realism?

[VaguelyPhilosophical]

thanks for the video! very helpful for my AS exam tomorrow :)

[CeltoSaxonKnight]

@Sewblon

An hallucination is usually private & transient. Sense data can usually be corroborated (i.e. public) without time limitation. Of course you could suppose all perception is just a public, non-time limited hallucination. Which is possibly either scepticism or idealism depending on how you want to look at it...

[Sewblon]

@willthong And how does sophisticated direct-realism differentiate hallucinations from sense-data? They are both private mental images.

[willthong]

@Sewblon Sense-data are not just all perceptions. Sense-data are specifically private mental images.

And it seems more probable than representative realism, certainly; representative realism requires two ontological planes (1. the physical world and 2. sense-data) whereas sophisticated direct realism only needs one. Thus, representative realism fails according to Occam's Razor.

[Sewblon]

@willthong How does that ensure, or even render it probable, that what the world looks like to us, has anything in common with the way it really is? Is it even supposed to do so?

[Sewblon]

About sense-date and hallucinations. Sense-data is either a catch-all term for everything that we perceive via our senses, or a chemical reaction in our brains. And hallucinations are either just another thing that we perceive with our senses, or a chemical reaction in our brains that does not have the cause we habitually think that they do.

[willthong]

@ArcadianGenesis

You're mistaken. Naive direct realism is not a theory at all, but a pre-theoretical account. Nobody actually maintains the naive direct realist position.

Naive direct realism does not equal sophisticated direct realism. Sophisticated realism rolls back the realist's assumptions. Instead of saying "everything we perceive exists as we perceive it", instead, the sophisticated direct realist claims "everything we perceive is perceived without non-physical mediation (sense-data)".

[acey172]

Am revising for my January mocks at the moment - it's tomorrow. On Knowledge of the External World and Reason and Experience. Nothing was making sense until i watched this video. Thanks Mate, Done Well. :)