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Science is and must be exciting, since it relies on largely unspecifiable clues which can be sensed, mobilized and integrated only by a passionate response to their hidden meaning.

Perhaps this means something to you but I find it the kind of gobbledygook that Kant obfuscates with so well. This type of language is actually irresponsible, especially for a scientist/philosopher. To whit: largely unspecifiable clues. This is a term, a phrase, without any discernable meaning. What does “unspecifiable” mean? If they are “ unspecifiable” then how does he know they exist as “clues?” This is a blatant contradiction. Another violation of the Proving the Negative Fallacy and/or Assertion Without Proof that is so common in these discussions.

. . . which can be sensed, mobilized and integrated only by a passionate response to their hidden meaning.

This is nice poetry and all but it isn't serious philosophy. It is wrong though since information can only be “sensed, mobilized and integrated” by reason. (What does 'mobilized' in this context mean? Just words.)

This also backhandedly acknowledges the point I made (sensed, integrated) from the quote you used. But to call the process “intuition” is to Beg the Question or use the term in a manner in which it isn't traditionally meant.

"Polanyi ... most adequately expressed this idea of "lower intuition," so to speak, being critical to the evolution of scientific understanding and therefore progress into the great unKnown.

Evolution? Very funny. So now we have “lower intuition” which implies a 'higher intuition' without having proven the existence of intuition in the first place. Not very convincing.

But to point out that the material world cannot be understood in the absence of intuition is to simultaneously affirm the obvious fact that the world is not material.

Same errors is logic, over and over again. But to point out that the material world cannot be understood in the absence of intuition . . . this statement cannot be proven. It is merely an Assertion Without Proof, since it is attempting to Prove a Negative “cannot be understood”.

Then the second half: is to simultaneously affirm the obvious fact that the world is not material.

Oh really. Then why do bullets kill people? Do people just 'intuit' that they are deadly? See this is where this stuff crosses the line into nonsense (in a very literal sense of the word). How can it be “an obvious fact” if there are no “facts” since the world isn't material? Do you see the contradiction here? Let me put this another way, taking out the obfuscation in between and parsing the whole phrase for logical validity we have:

But to point out that the material world cannot be understood in the absence of intuition is to simultaneously affirm the obvious fact that the world is not material.

Which gives us: the material world . . . is not material.

In other words: A is not A. (That groaning sound you hear is Aristotle turning in his grave.)

Thus it fails the most basic truth table.

Thus your final statement: ".... reality itself is nothing but an intuition is a non sequitur since it follows from none of the above. If reality is nothing but an intuition there is no way to validate anything since nothing 'exists' except intuition, including the statement ".... reality itself is nothing but an intuition.”

Can you say “absurdity?”

M-PI: "Science is and must be exciting, since it relies on largely unspecifiable clues which can be sensed, mobilized and integrated only by a passionate response to their hidden meaning."

LogicWings: "Perhaps this means something to you but I find it the kind of gobbledygook that Kant obfuscates with so well. This type of language is actually irresponsible, especially for a scientist/philosopher. To whit: largely unspecifiable clues. This is a term, a phrase, without any discernable meaning. What does “unspecifiable” mean? If they are “ unspecifiable” then how does he know they exist as “clues?” This is a blatant contradiction. Another violation of the Proving the Negative Fallacy and/or Assertion Without Proof that is so common in these discussions.

M-PI: ". . . which can be sensed, mobilized and integrated only by a passionate response to their hidden meaning."

LogicWings: "This is nice poetry and all but it isn't serious philosophy. It is wrong though since information can only be “sensed, mobilized and integrated” by reason. (What does 'mobilized' in this context mean? Just words.) This also backhandedly acknowledges the point I made (sensed, integrated) from the quote you used. But to call the process “intuition” is to Beg the Question or use the term in a manner in which it isn't traditionally meant.

M-PI: "Polanyi ... most adequately expressed this idea of "lower intuition," so to speak, being critical to the evolution of scientific understanding and therefore progress into the great unKnown.

LogicWings: "Evolution? Very funny. So now we have “lower intuition” which implies a 'higher intuition' without having proven the existence of intuition in the first place. Not very convincing."

"Gödel was a mathematical realist, a Platonist. He believed that what makes mathematics true is that it's descriptive -- not of empirical reality, of course, but of an abstract reality. Mathematical intuition is something analogous to a kind of sense perception. In his essay 'What Is Cantor's Continuum Hypothesis?', Gödel wrote that we're not seeing things that just happen to be true, we're seeing things that must be true. The world of abstract entities is a necessary world -- that's why we can deduce our descriptions of it through pure reason."

"... things are not true because they are logical, but logical because they are true; our ability to use logic and math to describe the world is because they derive from something higher and eternal ..."

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M-PI: "But to point out that the material world cannot be understood in the absence of intuition is to simultaneously affirm the obvious fact that the world is not material.

LogicWings: "Same errors is logic, over and over again. But to point out that the material world cannot be understood in the absence of intuition . . . this statement cannot be proven. It is merely an Assertion Without Proof, since it is attempting to Prove a Negative “cannot be understood”. Then the second half: is to simultaneously affirm the obvious fact that the world is not material.

"Oh really. Then why do bullets kill people? Do people just 'intuit' that they are deadly? See this is where this stuff crosses the line into nonsense (in a very literal sense of the word). How can it be “an obvious fact” if there are no “facts” since the world isn't material? Do you see the contradiction here? Let me put this another way, taking out the obfuscation in between and parsing the whole phrase for logical validity we have: But to point out that the material world cannot be understood in the absence of intuition is to simultaneously affirm the obvious fact that the world is not material. Which gives us: the material world . . . is not material. In other words: A is not A. (That groaning sound you hear is Aristotle turning in his grave.) Thus it fails the most basic truth table. Thus your final statement: ".... reality itself is nothing but an intuition is a non sequitur since it follows from none of the above. If reality is nothing but an intuition there is no way to validate anything since nothing 'exists' except intuition, including the statement ".... reality itself is nothing but an intuition.” Can you say “absurdity?”

Since the physical world exists prior to our exploration of it, so do the higher worlds. This is easy to prove to anyone who goes there. But for those who wish they were mere animals no proof is enough to convince them otherwise.

......on Darwinist grounds, I can well understand why the flower is attractive to the bee. But why is it beautiful to man? After all, I am not attracted to a female chimp in heat with a swollen pink rump.

.....our access to the realm of beauty is a key that unlocks many cosmic mysteries.

"....How stupid would I have to be to think any of my answers to questions asked by ignorant flat-landers --(who limit their thinking to the horizontal world)-- would make any sense at all to them?

We have gained an ability to understand God's pointing and this alone can replace a multitude of instincts that would be necessary if living apart from God. Imagine a dog trying to explain the concept of pointing to a wolf. The wolf would just look dumbly and say: 'It's a hand. No matter how it moves, it is still just a hand. Can we eat it already?'" In a way, the capacity to point and to understand pointing is everything, for it is what lifts us out of our engulfment in matter and imprisonment in the senses. It is the essence of Polanyi's philosophy, what he calls the distinction between subsidiary (the finger) and focal (the moon) knowledge. The obligatory atheist is essentially fixated on the finger while barking at the moon.

...As the biologist Richard Lewontin describes it, "the properties we ascribe to our object of interest and the questions we ask about it reinforce the original metaphorical image and we miss aspects of the system that do not fit the metaphorical approximation." ..... Since that's the case, please excuse me if I'm not dumb enough to believe that those who Work on Darwin's Farm have the capacity to understand any of the answers I would give to their "questions".

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Why Darwinists Reject Evolution

"....Darwinists specifically do not believe in evolution, being that they reject its very possibility (i.e., directional change into an intrinsically higher state). Rather, they believe in change, a very different thing. In this regard, they are very much like progressives, who also believe in change, but not genuine progress, since their metaphysic abolishes any absolute standard by which real progress can be measured. ..." bttt