[Dawnstorm]

Originally Posted by bianca

Reality is undoubtedly context-dependent. But reality is also boundless. What I said about imagination has nothing to do with the objective existence of dragons, or chairs, or trees for that matter. What I meant is simply that one can broaden one's perspective on situations and contexts, and the trigger for this is imagination. Inside a certain context, one can wander off the context's limitations, by imagining something which upon first consideration does not stand to reason, and proceed to make the application of his imagination both possible and fruitful. This takes both courage and of course, critical reflection. This is how hunches or hypotheses ,which transgress the boundaries of a specific context, come into being. The way language is pregnant (with itself,or rather with shades of meanings), is the way context-specific truths are pregnant with truths. Einstein's relativity theory is about reaching beyond specific contexts in search for new perspectives, contexts and truths.

True; it's imagination, after all, that's responsible for dragons.

(Notice, how I said, "true" above? I'm not entirely comfortable with that "true", not because I disagree, but because I feel it's pre-mature, and that's because I don't feel immersed in a context that makes it relevant. It's a social "true", mostly, because I can't think of a better way to reply to the post. [Sorry, I'm starting to lose my grip on the topic.])

Your putting "imagination" to the fore has made me curious about the relation between "metaphor" and "hypotheses". Schrödinger's Cat, for example.

As to the brain versus experiencing void, what do you think about the possibility of the brain re-inventing itself to cope with the lack of experience,or external stimuli? Since there have been experiments made on the brain in void environments, not only with prisoners but also with astronauts, who experienced going awry, hearing voices and so on. How would you explain that?

I don't know. I'd probably look at dreams, LSD, schizophrenia and "metaphysical experiences" for an analogy. (Dreams, at least, aren't uncommon, and cause vision of absent things. Schizophrenia makes you lose track of the distinction between what you're seeing/hearing and what your thinking.)

Thought experiment (the other way round): Imagine we knew all about the brain, and transferred a perfect replica of a brain-state into a computer. Would the computer experience your body? Would the computer go mad, because it experiences a body that it can't verify?

The question is this: how much of our experience is induced by having a body, besides a brain?

In conclusion, I believe we see things from different angles, but I think both angles are relevant to the topic. There can be misunderstandings, and the topic is complex. That's why I mentioned previously that I need to learn to express myself a little better.

Don't I know that feeling? Currently I'm not sure I know what I'm saying.