>"I think I misquoted, I see “navigate life better” in another one of your comments"

Okay, I see that.

>"- better than what? In what way? The point of this was that this is implicitly a value statement."

Would it be a "value statement" to say that we navigate better when we are not hallucinating things that are not there? I don't think so, seems to be more about the nature of what navigation is to me. Kind of like seeing works better if you're not cutting your eyes with a razor blade at the time.

>"Prove this."

No. You know what a horse is. There are only about seven things we can know for certain exists beyond doubt i.e. not as parts of some 'The Matrix-type illusion' but this is not a conversation about "Are we on a planet or more like brains in a jar fed sensory data?"

>"Another assumption."

(sigh) No, it is not. Imagine we went extinct then a hundred years later aliens land and pick up a Superman comic. They decipher English and begin to grasp it is about a humanoid from another planet that came to this planet and from its Sun gained powers beyond the local humanoids. Communication is the sharing of concepts. Concepts are one of the few indestructible things there are. They can be lost to us physical beings but they can never be destroyed.

>"Another assumption."

No, rape is evil, this is not something just in our minds, that is objective fact. It would remain true if we humans went extinct and then ages later some other species got the exact same sapience as us and rape existed just like now. 'Rape is evil' would remain true today even if all life in the universe had gone extinct a very long time ago.

>"It sounds like you don’t subscribe to materialism"

I don't care about labels and clubs like that.

>"I myself am a dualist on good days and an idealist on bad ones. And yet, while I believe in an objective reality, I have yet to prove that materialism is an untenable world view, just as you have failed to do, along with countless philosophical minds of the past much greater than ours."

I don't care about "philosophical minds of the past". I don't care if it was David Hume that said "You cannot get an ought from an is" or someone else, what I care about is what that means and how it fits with what else I understand about the truth.

>"This isn’t to say that I don’t truly believe in my worldview, but the minute I appeal to the distinct nature of qualia the materialist will object."

What do I care, if you can't even follow the logic of the person you are speaking with without going "You can't say that is fact because no one can prove it." and "Those are assumptions you're making, you can't possibly know them to be facts." etc.?

>"More philosophical work must be done for the matter to be “settled,” if it ever can be."

Nothing ever "must" be done. Our ancestors could have gone sterile and our species would be extinct by now.

>"Where did I say I was smarter than you,"

You didn't.

>"and how is that even relevant?"

Did you just skim my last post for things to go "Prove it." and "No one can know that yet and no one might never figure it out." about?

>"The caliber of my intellect does not grant or revoke special credence to my ideas."

I wasn't talking about your ideas, I was (obviously) talking about your post prompting me to mansplain myth and concept, and my use of horse and pegasus, and even regurgitate the very point our conversation started on; me not misusing the word myth. Observe;

You said this: "You say, or imply, that a horse is “real” and a Pegasus is a “myth.” Well, this is confusing for one because you are using the wrong sense of myth that you cited, as people rightly (according to you) believe a Pegasus to be a fiction."

This, what you were referring to, was what I cited: "A myth is a fiction believed by a large number of people (in the present or in the past) to be a non-fiction."

It's right there: or in the past. The past includes ancient Greece.

So your ideas (or them getting special credence) have zip to do with you making me go "Did this person leave their brain at home or am I being trolled with feigned ignorance?"

>"The ideas should have merit on their own,"

"Should" is a myth. And I guess "merit" would be too since it would be a form of "deserving" which is (drum roll) another myth.

>"and “stand trial” as you say."

I don't think that's the same as what I was referring to. I was referring to them standing trial to be decided as fiction or non-fiction, not if they "merit" something. But I guess you don't mean it like that, you mean in terms of plausibility and truth in which case I take it back, it is the same.

>"Likewise, me indicting your ideas is not indicting your intellect."

That on other hand is wise of you. I hope that is true of me as well.

>"The only personal thing I was criticizing was your behavior. Finally, I assure you I am not feigning anything; if I’m truly that incoherent in these remarks then I am that stupid."

I was not saying you were incoherent.