Friday, November 13, 2009
Macbeth's Dagger and Other Illusions
Hylas objects to Philonous' idealism by claiming that on his view there is no way to distinguish between veridical appearances and illusions. In other words, idealism implies that the danger than Macbeth sees before his eyes but cannot clutch is just as real as the dagger he uses to kill Duncan. Is this a valid objection? How successful is Philonous' response?
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Hylas raises a very valid objection to Philonous' argument for idealism. Going back to the Matrix, if we know that everything is an illusion created by the Matrix, then what is to distinguish between what our imagination creates in our mind and what the matrix creates in our mind. As the things in our imagination are, by Philonous' logic, just as plausible as "real" things.
ReplyDeleteAs for Philonous' response, I think he takes the easy road out of Hylas' objection. Philonous responds by saying that whatever method Hylas uses to distinguish between them in his idea of the world, also applies to Philonous' ideal world.
This response is only slightly successful as Hylas responds by raising the situation where we can't tell whether or not we are dreaming. To quote Morphius, "Have you ever had a dream, Neo, that you were so sure was real? What if you were unable to wake from that dream? How would you know the difference between the dream world and the real world?" Philonous is then forced into a position where he must admit that there is no way to distinguish between "real" things and the corporeal. And in this way, Philonous' response is not successful, as now everything could, in fact, be a production of our imagination.
Hylas’ objection is legitimate in that idealism leaves little room to distinguish between reality and illusion. To Philonous, however, I believe that the status of an object as real or illusory does not matter so much as the fact that the object exists either way. Although Macbeth cannot grasp the dagger before him, which is an illusion, he still sees it, so it must somehow exist as an idea in his mind.
ReplyDeleteI think that Philonous’ response is also important because he essentially says that reality and illusion are irrelevant because it is an issue of how things are perceived. As he says, “[Man’s] mistake lies not in what he perceives immediately and at present… but in the wrong judgment he makes concerning the ideas he apprehends to be connected with those immediately perceived” (71). According to this view, in the case of Macbeth’s dagger, The dagger’s existence is not so relevant as the fact that Macbeth perceives it to physically exist outside of his mind, which is an error.
If you accept the idea that everything is in the mind ti be true, then I think you could word Macbeth's experience like this: it is an idea perceived by the mind which is being perceived by the mind. If everything resides within the mind, an illusion would be the equivalent of a dream to one who accepts the world they perceive to be the real world. Since we have determined that the illusion of the dagger that Macbeth perceives is similar to one that someone could perceive in a dream,would they state that it is real. I doubt it. I also think the question is a bit ambiguous in it's definition of the real world and what is really real. If one accepts that everything is in the mind and a true physical world doesn't exist or that we cannot perceive it, then I say the dagger is just as real as one he could clutch in his hand. However, if one rejects this world,then the dagger is not real. As I don't think we will ever know the true answer to a question like this, answers will forever vary from person to person.
ReplyDeleteIn terms of our perception, the dagger is clearly there as would any "real" dagger would be. In this sense, our perceptions are identical. The problem, as I believe John already stated, lies within the conclusions that we draw from our perceptions. Because we infer existence from the illusion, we reason incorrectly. To me, this answer feels unsatisfactory because how are we supposed to know when to infer larger ideas and when not to? If Macbeth reaches out and touches it, finding the dagger is no longer there, his perception has changed and now he can infer that the dagger isn't real. But if he doesn't do that, then there is no definitive way to determine illusion from reality.
ReplyDeleteI believe Hylas' objection to be valid because if our sight of the object is the only piece of information given to us by our senses, then we cannot know whether something is illusory or not without the aid of more information. If we take idealism to be true, then this illusion is just as real as a true dagger, which nonsensical to me.