[MD] Probability

[Case]

[Platt]
I thought you said we can't be certain of anything, that is, there is 
no "bottom line" given that truth is always provisional. I am wrong?

[Case]
I am pretty sure that we can't be "certain" of anything. It would take a lot
to convince me otherwise, and that the bottom line.

[Platt]
Why do you consider the reality of consciousness to be a "problem?"

[Case]
I am not sure what you mean by consciousness. But I do not recall saying
anything about it.

> [Case]
> Not at all. That is what I said: knowledge gleaned for our senses is all
> the knowledge of reality we have.

[Platt]
So what's the problem?

[Case]
I may not know what you are asking but sense data is secondary to physical
reality. Some here maintain that physical reality does not exist at all
apart from our internal representations of it. I agree that all we can ever
know anything about is our internal representation but I still think there
is something out there being represented.

[Platt]
There's also knowledge from reason, intuition and authority. Or so says 
the Philosophy 101 course I took. 

[Case]
See now you are catching on. First you would have to define what knowledge
is. For example I would not agree that reason is a source of knowledge. I
would say it is a faculty we have for organizing knowledge. Same thing for
intuition which is basically a short cut for reason. Also I would not put
much stock in intuitions that are not backed up by reason. I think this
follows along the lines of Pirsig's discussion on Kant were there is a
reality out there and we as organisms bring certain biological tools to the
task of sensing and making meaning of it. In the end our internal
representation is the mixture of the two but we are only able to know the
representation not what is represented.

As for authority to me at least it is nothing more than sense data. That is
a big wheel tells you something which you apprehend through the senses and
buy into because you know what is good for you.