Jump to content
Objectivism Online Forum

Concepts Applied to Percepts

Rate this topic


Recommended Posts

I found the below in Leonard Peikoff's DIM Hypothesis partial outline (forgot the link). It says that Descartes theory of concepts (or maybe just his undefined use of them) was Misintegrated, or M, as apart of the DIM hypothesis, because he quote thought"concepts to a significant extent must be applied to percepts."

What exactly does this mean? Does this mean that Peikoff is stating that it is counterproductive to try and grant percepts the power of concepts and vice versa, thereby disrupting the functions of our method of cognition, that is receiving a percept and then integrating it into a concept? Is he saying that Descartes confused concepts and percepts and believed that concepts existed in the place of percepts?

The reason I'm most concerned about this is that I see myself using a similar method. I just realized after reading this outline that I do view concepts as percepts at times, which disassociates my brain's content from reality directly because my referents become floating abstractions in essence. Not only this, but in class for example, I will be interpreting information as though it was already a concept (like for example a vocabulary term) and then stare at it in a confused stupor as opposed to just taking it as a new percept and treating it accordingly, exposing it to conceptualization afterwards. I then get into the habit of believing that every thought out of my professors' mouths are essentially concepts, even if they are definitions, and therefore shortchange my thought process in forming my own concepts.

From Peikoff's Outline of the DIM Hypothesis-

"I Aristotle: Unity through: secular world/grasped by concepts abstracted from percepts.

M2 Plato: Unity through: transcendent world/grasped by conceptsindependent of percepts; secular world is unreal, and percepts are in conflict with concepts.

M1 Descartes: Unity through: M2 above, except: secular world is real, and concepts to a significant extent must be applied to percepts.

D2 Kant: Unity impossible and undesirable; concepts (and percepts) are

detached from reality.

D1 Comte: Unity, in disconnected chunks of percepts, through: secular

world/grasped by lower-level concepts."

Thanks.

Edited by MoralParadise
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I found the below in Leonard Peikoff's DIM Hypothesis partial outline (forgot the link). It says that Descartes theory of concepts (or maybe just his undefined use of them) was Misintegrated, or M, as apart of the DIM hypothesis, because he quote thought"concepts to a significant extent must be applied to percepts."

It doesn't say "because." It says that Descartes theory involves a form of misintegration, *and* that concepts apply to percepts. You would read this better as involving a form of misintegration *even though* he thinks concepts apply to percepts. Notice the contrast with the M2, according to which "percepts are in conflict with concepts." The part about concepts actually applying to percepts is what makes M1 better than M2. But it's not a fully "integrated" theory, because concepts only apply to percepts--they don't also derive from them.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...