13

Can a person know that something like "free will" must exist even though an exact definition in words, using language, cannot be provided, and in the absence of a complete theory that explains it?

We could also ask the same question about other things, such as consciousness. Can we know that consciousness exists, even if we can't explain or define it? Or an external world: can we know that an external world must exist, even if we can't fully explain or define it? Or God: can we know that God exists, even if we can't explain or define it? Or time: can we know that time exists, even if we can't explain or define it?

Or even our own existence: can we know that we exist, even if we don't know how to (fully) explain or define ourselves (what we actually are)?

More generally, can we know that X exists, even if we can't (fully) explain or define it?

Can we only know those things that we can explain and define using language?


My question is prompted by the recent question Why is the question "Is there free will?", and not, “What is free will?"?.

Mark
  • 4,725
  • 1
  • 18
  • 50
  • 2
    "Know" feels like a strong term. What about something like "justified in believing"? Can we be justified believing in something that is not well defined? – TKoL Mar 27 '24 at 12:52
  • @TKoL Well, knowledge is usually defined as justified true belief. If we drop the "true" qualification, we get your proposal. – Mark Mar 27 '24 at 12:53
  • 2
    maybe it seems petty, but I think dropping the 'true' part is absolutely a desirable thing there - otherwise, you can't "know" anything unless it's also true, which means you have no idea if the things you think you "know" you do in fact "know". We can measure justifiable belief much better than we can measure 'true', I think - it's much easier to mutually determine if a belief is justified than if it's "true". – TKoL Mar 27 '24 at 12:56
  • 7
    We can't explain the vast majority of everyday facts/phenomena: hoven, smartphone, cars... – Mauro ALLEGRANZA Mar 27 '24 at 12:56
  • 1
    maybe add 'time' to the list :) – ac15 Mar 27 '24 at 17:35
  • 1
    @ac15 Done as requested :) – Mark Mar 27 '24 at 17:38
  • 3
    We know ball lightning exists due to multiple observation reports, it remains unexplained theoretically. "Exact definition in words" is a misguided idea for empirical phenomena. We want to talk about a real thing even if we cannot pinpoint it, not "defined" thing that may well be a figment. What we want is the entity underlying a cluster of related phenomena, and all we need is some way to point to the phenomena. This is done through what is called "working" or "phenomenological" 'definitions', "exact definitions" are open to future inquiry. – Conifold Mar 27 '24 at 18:03
  • Well, I mean Lovecraft as well as a lot of other cosmic horror has plenty of stories of things that can't really be described or defined, and yet the characters are able to communicate their existence. – DKNguyen Mar 28 '24 at 00:21
  • Can we know that Quality exists even if we can't define it? If a world without it wouldn't function normally. From: "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance", lo, these many years ago. – Scott Rowe Mar 28 '24 at 11:18
  • On this site there's only one thing you can know. Why people still talk about it, as if there'd ever be anything to add to it that isn't its own antithesis, is beyond me. - If you're still in your 20s, then you get a pass I guess.... – Mazura Mar 29 '24 at 03:13

15 Answers15

12

Gravity is a great example to illustrate that yes, we can be certain a thing exists without having the ability to adequately explain or define it. As with the case of gravity, we can observe it and therefore know it exists. It is our understanding of a thing that limits our ability to define it, and just as we used to explain phenomenon as being "magic" in our early history there are still concepts that seem magical to us today that will perhaps be better explained in the future with our advancements in technological discovery.

mkinson
  • 468
  • 1
  • 4
  • 5
    While this answer OP litteral question, I don't think ravity is comparable to conciousness or free will. For gravity, while we don't always understand the answer, we have a clear question in mind "why is stuff falling down", "why are things pulled toward each other"... For free will or conciousness, we're not even able to ask a clear question, even less so getting a clear answer. – Jemox Mar 28 '24 at 12:27
  • We do have to define gravity to say that it exists though. In this case it is defined as "the reason things fall down", or if you are an astronomer "the reason big things fall onto each other". If we were to define gravity differently, such as "the curvature of space surrounding us", most people wouldn't be able to answer whether such a thing is real, or just ramblings of a madman. – user369070 Mar 28 '24 at 22:18
  • @user369070 The best explanations might sound incomprehensible. I reduced SQL Normalization to 4 simple sentences once, but my students still had no idea what it meant. – Scott Rowe Mar 29 '24 at 01:51
  • 1
    @ScottRowe don't confuse explanations and definitions though: one may need to explain a definition to ensure that everyone uses the same one, but an explanation is not definition. Definition is the matter of argument, word is the method of reference to definition in natural language, explanation is an implementation detail - a carrier for matching words (and more!) to definitions. – user369070 Mar 29 '24 at 04:16
  • 1
    The reasoning here is sound. An equivalent example is: Fred. I know Fred exists. I recognize him when I see him. But I can't completely define him or explain him. I just know him when I see him. – candied_orange Mar 29 '24 at 18:54
  • @candied_orange then your definition of Fred is "the range of perceptions and concepts which evoke the feeling of Fred in me", classic pattern matching. Its still a definition though, even if not rigorous or without explanation. – user369070 Mar 29 '24 at 22:57
  • @user369070 I feel that is highly compatible with the example candied_orange gave, especially epistemologicaly, but subtly different ontologically. I don't think all individuals who make the statement candied_orange made would agree that your phrasing is equivalent to what you stated. It does point out how difficult the idea of "justified" is. – Cort Ammon Mar 30 '24 at 03:05
11

You need at least some definition, but it doesn't have to be exact or detailed.

You can't tell me whether "adfgiuadhfg" exists, because you don't know a definition of that word.

A child can tell you whether "water" exists, even if they don't know its chemical composition. (Some dictionaries include its chemical composition in the definition, some don't.)

A layperson 1000 years ago could tell you whether "sun" exists, even though their definition for it was just "a bright thing in the sky".


Of course, when you conclude that X does or doesn't exist, it only applies to that single defintion. Proving that there's a bright thing in the sky is different from proving that it's a flaming ball of gas.

HolyBlackCat
  • 252
  • 2
  • 7
8

For something to exist, it needs to be observable, either directly or indirectly. Physical objects and phenomena can be observed directly and measured. Abstract ideas can be observed indirectly by observing their effects on people's behaviour.

You don't need to explain anything to know that it exists.

But you must have a definition. Otherwise you would not know what is this thing you should be observing.

Pertti Ruismäki
  • 2,520
  • 4
  • 15
  • On the need for definitions: observations show that galaxies rotate at speeds that do not fit our current theories. Possible explanations have been proposed, but they tend to fall into one of two seemingly incompatible camps: either dark matter or modified gravity. Both of these camps have significant problems to be resolved. Thus, we can define the problem, and we are looking for an explanation, but we do not even know if what's missing from our current knowledge is a thing of some sort. – sdenham Mar 28 '24 at 12:06
  • @sdenham Dark matter is a really good example here. To answer the question 'does dark matter exist' we do need to define what we mean by 'dark matter'. If we define 'dark matter' to be a gravitational anomaly based on the assumption that general relativity is correct, the answer is an unequivocal 'yes, it exists'. However, if we say dark matter is WIMPS, the answer is probably 'no'. I think the reality is that 'dark matter' is the former which is why most scientists think the question to answer is 'what is dark matter?' and not 'does dark matter exist?' – JimmyJames Mar 28 '24 at 21:10
  • @JimmyJames The difficulty here is that the phrase 'a gravitational anomaly based on the assumption that general relativity is correct' defines the perceived problem, not whatever it is that accounts for this perception. Furthermore, 'dark matter' would not apply to any solution to the problem; it would only apply if that solution is matter which interacts gravitationally. The answer to the question 'what is dark matter' depends strongly on whether the anomaly results from some form of matter; if it does not, then 'dark matter' is defined as a failed hypothesis, not as something. – sdenham Mar 29 '24 at 14:14
  • @sdenham "Furthermore, 'dark matter' would not apply to any solution to the problem; it would only apply if that solution is matter which interacts gravitationally." Only if we are very literal about the words that make up the term. A 'koala bear' is not a bear but term is still how we refer to that animal. We talk about electron 'spin' even though it doesn't spin in the conventional meaning of the term. 'Strange' quarks are not any stranger than other quarks. – JimmyJames Mar 29 '24 at 15:17
  • @JimmyJames I don't think your analogies are applicable here. The terms 'dark matter' and MOND were coined because physicists found it useful to distinguish between two very different approaches to solving the problem presented by the observations. If MOND turns out to be correct, and yet it would be excessively literal to say that dark matter was not the solution, then it would equally be excessively literal to make a distinction between them today or yesterday - but this is clearly not the case. – sdenham Mar 29 '24 at 17:14
  • @sdenham My point is that words mean what they are defined to mean. Neither you nor I have the power to decide what 'dark matter' means in the long run. There are plenty of misnomers in science. – JimmyJames Mar 29 '24 at 17:58
  • @JimmyJames If you just wanted to make these general points, then dark matter was a poor choice to make an example from, as 'dark matter' and 'MOND' were specifically chosen to be antithetical, and it is not plausible that the former will be seen as being synonymous with the latter if the latter turns out to be correct (well, maybe in a somewhat distant future, when few people are aware that dark matter (as in actual matter) seemed to be a serious contender... but how does that possibility help us now? Are we supposed to give up trying to define anything because this might happen?) – sdenham Mar 29 '24 at 21:27
  • @sdenham "Are we supposed to give up trying to define anything because this might happen?" I think maybe we are 'talking' across each other while being in general agreement. I do have to point out that both Dark Matter and MOND might be incorrect/incomplete ideas but I think that's digression. Here's a good example: we talk about the sun 'rising'. I think we can agree that this term is literally incorrect but I'm not aware of any other term for it. Sometimes a technical term is coined before we understand what it really applies to and the definition is changed to match reality. – JimmyJames Mar 31 '24 at 20:28
5

If we can discuss something, and the participants in the discussion have similar understandings of that thing, then it clearly exists in some ontological sense. We don't have to be able to explain it in detail; indeed, in the case of the concepts you listed, the whole point of these discussions may be to come up with the definition. If it doesn't exist, what are we trying to explain?

In fact, this problem comes up for practically everything, not just weird abstract concepts like consciousness and free will. It's rare that we can come up with definitions of categories that precisely define all and only its members. If you have a definition of "dog", you'll likely always be able to find exceptions that are still considered to be dogs (e.g. the definition might include being four-legged, but there are many dogs with birth defects or injuries that result in loss of a leg). Yet we all intuitively know what dogs are, and we believe that we're mostly in agreement.

So this is just a matter of degree, not kind. We intuitively have shared understandings of what it feels like to be conscious and have free will. But since these are not directly observable like dogs, it's harder to translate these understandings into definitions and explanations. But there's some hope from modern technology. If you're a materialist, I think you believe these are the direct result of neural processes in the brain, and our ability to examine the brain's activity has been steadily improving in recent decades. Finding the "neural correlates of consciousness" may ultimate provide the definitions we're seeking.

Barmar
  • 1,710
  • 8
  • 13
5

Perhaps this is a frame challenge, but I think the real question posed by the question you link to: "Why is it "is there free will?" and not "what is free will?" isn't so really about whether we can explain or define free will, but whether we know what question we are trying to answer. This overlaps with the concept of 'definition' but I think 'definition' might mean slightly different things to different people and/or depends on the context.

For example, if I ask: "do flurgleths exist?", I think it's obvious that the question can't be answered unless we have some definition of 'flurgleth'. We can answer the question: do unicorns exist (no) and kraken exist (yes) because we know what those words mean.

I gave the example of lightning in the comments. Does lightning exist? Yes and we have a precise definition of what it is and a pretty good idea about what causes it. But what about in ancient times? Can you define lightning without an understanding of electricity? I think the answer is 'yes' you can define it without understanding it precisely. There are properties of lightning that can be objectively described without understanding the mechanisms behind it.

This brings us to 'free will'. Can we define it? Perhaps. Do we have an objective definition that everyone agrees to? I don't think we do.

JimmyJames
  • 822
  • 5
  • 11
3

The question has about as many answers as there are philosophers. What exists (ontology) and how we know that (epistemology) make up the bulk of metaphysics. Hobbes had a good materialist definition of knowing or at least "understanding" as the ability to make or reproduce something.

This lingers on in an empirical ontology comprised only of those sense data we can describe, ideally in reproducible equations. Prior to Einstein the existence of atoms was hotly debated and Mach never did admit they "really existed." Boltzmann, on the other hand, "knew" they existed because of a mathematical necessity in thermodynamics.

In some Wittgensteinian 2.0 sense nothing we really know can be described, explained, or "spoken of." All of of true import is lost in translation, so to speak. Yet in an epistemological sense we have no proper business "talking about" things outside of the reach of language, math, or communicative structures.

We can all say we know things that exist as the objects of our knowing and can't put into words. That's fine, it's just not science or persuasive philosophy, it's the ineffable pronouncements of preacherss, romantics, visionaries, and overacting thespians. Things that exist and are known to exist but cannot in any way be described are generally and quite literally called "meaningless."

You may know deep down your "better self" is there or you had an indescribable dream last night, I may nod tenderly but why should I care?

Nelson Alexander
  • 13,532
  • 3
  • 29
  • 53
  • You had a dream that was profoundly meaningful to you. Ok so its meaningless (more correctly incommunicable) to me. How did it stop being meaningful to you? More precisely *when* did it become meaningless to you? After I meaningfully(!) communicated to you that it was meaningless? – Rushi Mar 27 '24 at 18:47
  • Not sure I follow. If dreamer can't describe the dream, which happens, we suppose, it simply can't have "meaning" for others or "meaning" at all, according to some views. – Nelson Alexander Mar 27 '24 at 21:16
  • 2
    It has meaning for the dreamer. By what view is that meaning negotiable? Well... I guess by behaviorist or some extreme versions of logical positivism? The logical limit of that is qualia. Every qualia of yours in inexpressible to others — by definition. Every single thing that you express, communicate and share objective meaning about will have its layer, however thin, of qualia. See that red apple on the table? We can point to it, share it. But its redness, its taste is your and my qualia, even the table, its hardness, shape.... All incommunicable. Ultimately meaning itself is meaningless – Rushi Mar 28 '24 at 01:38
  • This happened more extremally when Leary made LSD experiments. The persons who were 'LSD-fied' often described later beauty so extreme they no colors-words, no shape-words just no words – Rushi Mar 28 '24 at 01:47
  • 1
    Tnx for the exchange. It prompted my (short) answer on LSD – Rushi Mar 28 '24 at 02:04
  • Nonduality says that you don't have a self and your concepts are all made up nonsense. It is the last stop on the rationality bus. "You don't have to go home, but you can't stay here." – Scott Rowe Mar 29 '24 at 01:43
3

As a thought experiment, consider the case of an average laborer from ancient Egypt who gets transported through time to the present. He suddenly finds himself in a control room watching the SpaceX crew launch a rocket into orbit. When he subsequently gets returned to his time, he would be completely unable to meaningfully describe or explain anything that he saw. He knows that the rocket really existed since he witnessed it himself. His inability to describe it is both a failure of language (no words yet exist that come close to an accurate description) and of context (even with the right words, there's a lot of scientific background knowledge that needs to exist before you can explain the rocket). Neither of these things has any relation to whether or not the the rocket actually existed.

To look at it another way, language is a distinctly human thing. Animals communicate, but don't use anything remotely complex enough to be considered language. If your supposition were true, then it would be impossible for an animal to ever actually know anything. I find that conclusion difficult to believe.

bta
  • 199
  • 2
  • Insightful thought experiment. But how would you apply this to the specific examples I list in the question? – Mark Mar 27 '24 at 22:57
  • 1
    Counterpoint: What he knows exist is an image of a tube that expells flames and flies up. He knows not of anything regarding a rocket. – user369070 Mar 28 '24 at 06:40
  • 2
    The egyptian would say there was a giant arrow with fire on its tail going up into the sky. Or more likely he saw something moving inside a window that one could not stick your hand through while surrounded by strange people in strange clothes all of them staring into these windows. But what one saw in the windows, are not on the other side of the windows. – stackoverblown Mar 28 '24 at 12:07
  • @user369070 True, you could cobble together some sort of description, but that's nowhere close to the level of explanation that the question is asking about. – bta Mar 29 '24 at 18:23
  • @Mark - Your specific examples are tough because philosophers still debate about both their existence and their explanation. The history of science is replete with examples, though. For instance, we've known since time immemorial that light exists but until the last century or so, the descriptions and explanations of it have been anywhere from partial to comically wrong. Anybody that works with electronics can confirm that "tin whiskers" definitely exist, but we don't really have an explanation for them. – bta Mar 29 '24 at 21:28
3

Many things exists, and we can't explain or know how it works. Like computers, many don't know how they are programed, how this website is programed, but we still accept that it exist. It may be a survival instinct, to just accept what we are taught, without a full explanation. "This is how you work a computer, but we won't tell you how it works". If we spent a long time pondering how everything works, we wouldn't be able to get much done. So, yes, I think we can know many things without explaining it.

Additionally, there are not just objects that we can't explain, we also have many abstract things such as love, hate, art. What is art? This is a question that leaves us thinking.

Animals don't know language, but do feel emotions that they themselves can't explain, such as a monkey mourning over her dead son.

wizzwizz4
  • 2,120
  • 11
  • 21
Lukius
  • 159
  • 8
3

Here is footage from the 1950s experiments with LSD.

The lady ends with If you cant see it I cant tell you about it... I feel sorry for you.

Its your choice and call ultimately, which view you give priority to:

  • She's been given a hallucinogenic; she's hallucinating. What more to say? — the commonsense view
  • She saw beauty so extreme it was indescribable — the lady's first person view

Added later

While the above may suggest that words are unimportant and below in comments I say that, I think this should be refined a bit. Here is a traditional account of 4 levels of communication — where at the lowest level its just verbiage and at the highest there are no words at all.

Rushi
  • 2,637
  • 2
  • 7
  • 28
  • 1
    "I can see it. Can you see it? It is beautiful..." Experience can't be reduced to a travelog. – Scott Rowe Mar 28 '24 at 11:24
  • 1
    @ScottRowe Yes! You are interested in eating the mango but instead spend your time counting the leaves of the tree Ramakrishna We have forgotten how pointless words are for anything that really matters – Rushi Mar 28 '24 at 11:28
  • 1
    Yeah, animals seem to have the edge on us here, not getting caught up in musing. – Scott Rowe Mar 28 '24 at 11:30
  • 1
    @ScottRowe First practice love on animals; they react better and more sensitively — Gurdjieff. But I think the real point he's making is they can teach us to love without words. You may have seen stuff on dolphins, horses and ofc dogs being good to "differently abled" children – Rushi Mar 28 '24 at 11:38
  • 1
    Our conversation above prompted a small Added later. Tnx @ScottRowe – Rushi Mar 28 '24 at 11:46
  • There's a third option: She experienced the emotion of beauty without actually seeing any beauty, the emotion was just directly activated without anything activating it. – Ariel Mar 28 '24 at 21:17
  • Apparently some hallucinogenic drugs, especially mushrooms, are being used successfully to treat some previously untreatable problems. So, they must be doing something. Hitting a car engine randomly with a hammer usually doesn't repair it. – Scott Rowe Mar 29 '24 at 01:26
  • Thats more universally true than you realize @Ariel. You go to movie theatre for a "action thriller" — fast cars, bang bang, voluptuous women. There's actually nothing there — no cars, no women, no hero-villain. Just flickering multicolored lights on a white large screen. And a few hundred ppl consentingly sweating and slavering together over the illusion. I could go on — say pornography. How much is it even an image of any real woman and how much just photoshop? [Nowadays AI]. In short: What does ACTUAL mean actually? – Rushi Mar 29 '24 at 02:04
  • @ScottRowe Gurdjieff (sorry — again!!) said: Drugs used as a foretaste of spiritual experience can speed up the path. Like a trailer. When used as a replacement for spiritual effort destroys the person. Looking up the LSD vid yesterday, I happened to see alcoholics can be helped deaddict in a couple of weeks with LSD what would otherwise take years of psychotherapy – Rushi Mar 29 '24 at 02:11
  • Think how many people could have been helped over the past 60 years if it wasn't made illegal even for medical purposes? There's nothing good or bad but politicians make it so. – Scott Rowe Mar 29 '24 at 02:17
  • 1
    @ScottRowe Well... I think politicians get more bad press than is fair. Two of the most strong, most dangerous drugs are alcohol and tobacco. How come they became acceptabilized? As the saying goes Follow the money — Baby! Also worshipping false gods˛America worships at the altar of liberal democracy when it's a dogmatic plutocracy – Rushi Mar 29 '24 at 03:33
3

First you need to do away with natural language: forget the words "free will", and ask whether the concept "" exists, and you should see that the definition of a concept and the concept itself are the same thing. The definition obviously doesn't have to be in terms of natural language: "a perception that evokes a certain specific feeling in you" is a valid definition. Many people confuse rigorous definitions with "whatever I feel like matches it", which is the source of your problem here. Do note that defining words is not a problem of philosophy: its a problem of usefulness in a context, maybe sometimes linguistics. As such different questions of whether free will exists will yield different answers: usually the answer is: "the question is ill formed". Sometimes the answer is yes or no.

TL;DR: No, you can't say whether something exists if you can't even define it. You can't even form a question to ask that.

user369070
  • 179
  • 3
  • Explaining a definition is not necessary though: some things can be assumed to be 'a priori', or 'a local variable' or 'for the sake of the question itself', or even 'i don't care/don't have time to care'. – user369070 Mar 28 '24 at 06:53
3

No, but...

Your first problem here is that several of your examples are not an object that exists. They're processes, not objects. Your second problem is that you're grouping things together which do not necessarily belong together.

For objects, we can inspect them with various degrees of accuracy, and determine their state with whatever level of accuracy the measurement method allows.

Processes are a bit different though. Processes are a description of the behaviour of an object and how it interacts with other objects. You have to watch how an object behaves, and then try to fit some kind of model to it which will predict the object's behaviour in future. There isn't any requirement to think up a reason for why this happens, at least initially. The first requirement is simply to find a model which fits past and future measurements. After that, you can start trying to fit explanations to that model.

What tends to happen is that we find classical models are generally good enough for most purposes. It's only when we dig into the more obscure corners that things break down. All your examples are top-level classical concepts. They all break down in various details, so we can't in any way say they're "true", because we know ways in which they aren't - but at the top level they're just good enough for day-to-day use if you don't look too closely.

"Free will" is a great example. You can hypothesize all you like about quantum states in the brain, and whether we're truly deterministic creatures. But even at the macro level, magicians can "force" choices (or what feels like choices) from participants which actually are predetermined by the magician; or advertising and social pressure can prime us to buy things we might not otherwise "want"; or social pressure (and the fear of retribution) can force us to do things we would not want to do. These methods of hacking our perceptions of free will are so well understood that there are literally books about how to do it. Free will is a "good enough" model of how people behave on their own; but the exceptions also need to be considered when modelling how groups of people behave together.

Time is another interesting one. For classical purposes, time is fixed. But as you get faster and faster, the difference becomes significant. This isn't just abstract theory - it's essential if you want your GPS satellites to get you the right position.

God is the exception here. It looks like an object - but in fact it's a place to group together all those processes we don't (or didn't) understand. God has been (and still is) used as the reason people die of diseases, or why lightning strikes buildings, or avalanches or extreme weather or earthquakes or tsunamis happen. As science has advanced, the "god of the gaps" principle has taken all these processes away from a hypothetical god, because the idea that they're caused by (a) god doesn't actually give us a useful way to predict and mitigate them. Sacrificing doves isn't a great medical intervention, and it doesn't stop lightning strikes!

Of course a god or gods can also give us the idea that there's a life after death, which these days is their primary role. Is that real, or is it merely the process of a group of people inventing a comforting fiction in a world where they don't understand all the things which can apparently kill them for no reason? There's no evidence either way. And still, this is always (a) god as the representative of the process of dying, not as an entity in its own right. We know dying happens as a process, and religion is a way you can model it in a way that results in you feeling better about it. That's not necessarily a bad outcome, so long as it doesn't go further than that.

Graham
  • 2,174
  • 11
  • 15
2

We "know" something is out there when we have models (based on mathematics) for it and these models not only explain how this phenomenon works but we can also predict its future state.

Since these models are currently incomplete ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_everything ) and created by human beings who don't have infinite knowledge and intelligence, there are some things which we observe and for which our theories just don't work. I'm not sure whether I've ever heard scientists use the term "know", e.g. in regard to dark matter or dark energy. Normally they say, "there's something out there which is not accounted for", i.e. for which our theories do not work and we need new physics theories to understand and explain these phenomena.

Speaking of "consciousness", some philosophers claim there are very peculiar things about it which science doesn't/can't explain but that doesn't mean we "know" it exists.

"Free will" is an even worse term because there's no phenomenon which needs "free will" to exist.

In the end, yes, we can claim "we know something exists" because we can observe/infer it directly or indirectly and our existing theories don't explain how this thing is possible. And once we have the theory about the thing we thought we knew existed it might as well cease to exist.

E.g. people in the relatively recent past thought lightning bolts were cast by God(s). Turns out lightning bolts are real, and exist, yet the Gods who cast them don't need to apply.

  • ""Free will" is an even worse term because there's no phenomenon which needs "free will" to exist." I'm going to add this to my toolbox about a deterministic universe. – DKNguyen Mar 28 '24 at 00:25
2

These are all very complicated question that have no clear answer. The concept of Existence is difficult. There are different streams of philosophers - some allow concepts to exist, some do not. Some call "Existence" an attribute of an object, some do not.

It is not clear what "know" means. Knowledge is a wide field, both regarding how it is defined, and what can be known.

As to your particular question: "free will" would probably be considered a concept by most people; and "exist" would probably not include such concepts for most. So "free will" does not "exist". But an actor could "have" free will, i.e., free will could be an attribute. (Or probably many other ways to combobulate these terms).

Conscience is a special case as it mixes up the observer with the observation. You're probably familiar with the quote "I think, therefore I am", and in this sense many probably would say that conscience is the only thing that we can be sure exists (at least in the singular - i.e. I can be sure that my conscience exists - I don't know about yours).

"God" is complicated because it is not necessarily a concept (if you are a believer). Someone who believes will tell you that God exists; someone who doesn't, won't.

AnoE
  • 2,698
  • 7
  • 9
1

For a real-world example, consider the duck-billed platypus which just happened to exist, though most 'experts' said that because they could not explain or define it, it must be a fake.

Suppose either of us sees an unidentified object. As an extreme example, an unidentified flying object.

We know it exists because we've at least seen it and perhaps also heard or smelt, touched or even tasted it.

How could our complete failure to explain or define it mean that it didn't exist?

0
  • Free will: It is not controversial that we humans feel free in most situations. We have the impression to be free, not only in our doing, but also in our volition, and most of all in our decisions.

    On the other hand, we do not have an explanation wich combines the phemomenon of free will with the basic principles of our natural laws of nature, which act as causal deterministic laws.

  • Consciousness: The same situation holds for conscious. We feel conscious most of the day, but we cannot explain qualia and other conscious perceptions. Nevetherless neuroscience investigates with some success the neuronal correlates of consciousness (NCC).

  • External world: The assumption of an external world is the most simple explanation for the common view and agreement of humans about the similarity of our perceptions. The objection of solipsism is possible, but it is hard to live and to act consequently on the basis of solipsism.

  • God: The interpretation of certain individual phenomena as religious phenomena, triggered by a personal God, is controversial. The discussion between theists and atheists continues since thousands of years. The echo resounds also on this philosophical platfom.

    Placing side by side all proposals for a definition of God shows, that there is no general accepted definition of God and no agreement about the existence of God.

  • Time: Humans perceive time in a subjective manner, which is not identical with the view of science. Since the Theory of Relativity, physics considers time as one dimension in a 4-dimensional continuum.

    Time cannot be separated from space. Both are intimately linked in
    the physical concept of spacetime. In separation, neither time nor
    space have absolute meaning. Instead the splitting of spacetimes
    depends on the chosen coordinate system of the observer.

    In daily life it is good practice to measure time by clocks.

All of these concepts can be further problematized in philosophically way. But wit the exception of the God-concept and the issue of free will, in order to deal with these subtle questions is not necessary for the daily life and the orientation in our living space.

In every case one has to discriminate between the phenomena, a working definition of the phenomena, and the explanation of the mechanism behind the phenomena. In most cases, one operates with these phenomena on the basis of a working definition.

Without the first two steps it makes no sense to start with the final step of an explanation: If I don’t know what I am searching, I cannot decide whether I am successful in finding.

But it is not unusual that a successful investigation improves the initial working definition.

Jo Wehler
  • 30,912
  • 3
  • 29
  • 94