That said, regard the above comment as a footnote or digression, as it belongs to a separate conversation to the discussion in this thread. The Hard Problem argument has a way of derailing threads! (My bad!)
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I read it again, and it appears to me that you define “real” as: not imaginary. Reality= existents + non-imaginary non-existents
Did I interpret you correctly?
I’m interpreting existent in line with what I said in the text: ‘ex-ist’, to stand apart. It means to be ‘this thing and not that thing’.
‘Real’ is ‘that which is truly so’, or ‘not imaginary’.
So I start with number, saying that numbers are real, in that they’re the same for anyone who can count. But they are not existent as objects. The numeral or signifier is an existent object but that which is signified can only be grasped by a mental act (‘the mind’s eye’).
The implication is that (for example) the domain of mathematics far exceeds the domain that can be empirically observed.
(Someone might object 'but doesn’t 7 “stand apart” from other numbers and so meet the same criteria for existence? But ex–istere (“to stand out” or “to stand forth”) refers strictly to an ontological entity in space and time—an item standing apart from or being differentiated from the background of physical potentiality and from other objects. To say that the number 7 “stands apart” from the number 8, is to use “stand apart” as a metaphor for conceptual distinction or contrast, so as to elide the actual distinction at issue.)
Platonism in the Philosophy of Mathematics (SEP)
Mathematical platonism has considerable philosophical significance. If the view is true, it will put great pressure on the physicalist idea that reality is exhausted by the physical. For platonism entails that reality extends far beyond the physical world and includes objects that aren’t part of the causal and spatiotemporal order studied by the physical sciences.[1] Mathematical platonism, if true, will also put great pressure on many naturalistic theories of knowledge. For there is little doubt that we possess mathematical knowledge. The truth of mathematical platonism would therefore establish that we have knowledge of abstract (and thus causally inefficacious) objects. This would be an important discovery, which many naturalistic theories of knowledge would struggle to accommodate.
In fact, today we can’t even be sure of the existence of a table or an apple. We only know how we perceive the world around us, but we don’t know what it actually is. The terms reality, objectivity, and existence must indeed be reconsidered to assign each a clear meaning consistent with modern knowledge.
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Your real/exists distinction seems neutral to ontology. I see nothing inconsistent with platonism, materialism, or even with a theistic ontology like Thomism. Do I misunderstand?
Here we circle back to what I said earlier, about life as a Christian without believing Jesus existed. I think it came out the wrong way in that post. What was said was one can be a Christian sans belief in Jesus.
Indeed there’s a perspectival issue at play here. Immediately one is reminded of human conscisousness. Logic, math, philosophy are things of the mind.
Phenomenology is, from my reading of it, more perceptual than cerebral. That doesn’t vitiate its importance to the topic though.
Naturalism isn’t the be all and end all of the mysteries of life, living, being. It’s the streetlight effect if you ask me.
Where did you lose the key?
Over there.
Then why are you looking for it here?
Because there’s more light here
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An intelligent robot could come from outer space and determine that there are two fruits (as opposed to any other quantity of fruits) dropped from an apple tree on the ground.
It’s epistemic rather than ontological, but I would have thought it difficult to square with materialism because of the suggestion that numbers are real but not material. So how would a materialist theory deal with that? (It is plainly closer to both Thomism and Platonism, but then Aquinas’ Christianity incorporates a lot of Greek phillosophy - something which Luther would later strenuously object to, by the way, for being insufficiently fideist.)
Right. It’s curious that it has these connotations of religion, because it isn’t obviously religious, Maybe it’s more that, because it is a challenge to naturalism, then the implications seem religious. Or maybe metaphysics generally seems adjacent to religion. After all positivists would routinely treat both as more or less equivalents as far as philosophy is concerned.
I was wondering about that too. Not all that glitters is gold. 
I’m a materialist and according to some surveys most philosophers are physicalists. It’s a long journey from Descartes to Chlamers. Scientists have unknowingly prevented the loop from closing, but unless they can deliver they’ll have to be content with “pffft” and other choice expressions; the loop has closed.
I bet it’s for want of a credible alternative….
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I agree. Numbers are real in the sense that we know and use them, but they don’t exist like apples and cups exist.
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I agree and I think this gets into the issue of are possibilities real. And I think hidden (not deeply in this) is ‘from our/my perspective’. Given out limited knowledge of the future say, we make estimates of what might happen. These get the name possibilities and ‘real dangers’ is, I think, a subset of that. From out limited perspective about what might happen in the future it’s real. It’s a real possibility to us. ‘to us’ being very important. We give this possibility reality in our minds.
But is it real, ‘out there’? That remains to be seen.
Then is the future real and exists? If not, then a real danger - which is a prediction about the future - could hardly exist.
If it’s a block universe than perhaps it exists or is real and will exist.
I think what’s ‘real’ is that aspect of the environment which is affecting our nervous system, beyond our choice.
It is the foremost environment to conscious beings- the part we’re encircled by/contained within.
Our containment in the environment is ‘reality’.
Under materialism, numbers are real abstractions of universals. They actually exist as real properties of groups of physical objects, but the property itself is not a spatially located object.
The principle of “show don’t tell” is simple enough for me. If something is real then one ought to be able to show us that it is, perhaps by pointing to it. But if one can only ever imagine it then it cannot be described with the adjective “real”, and can never be worthy of that description. This is because thousands of years of historical evidence has proven that one cannot simply imagine or speak something into existence, no matter what noun-phrase is used, and unless these essays can provide some sort of empirical evidence they can only ever amount to the multiplication of zeros.
Can you see, show or display your own mind? Can you point to it? If it is not visible, and not pointable, does it mean your mind is not real?
That’s right. Mind is similar. It’s just a word and a relic of the human imagination.
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It seems to suggest that mind is not something that exists, but ability for seeing, feeling, reflecting, imagining, thinking and sensing just like what being conscious is.
Could it be a word to denote total mental functions taking place within the brain? Hence I am conscious would be the same meaning as I have a mind?
Could it also suggest that expressions like mind or conscioussnes exists or conscious or mind is real would be wrong logically and semantically?
Suppose we, as humans, see 2 fruits that have dropped from an apple tree.
It is highly unlikely that an intelligent robot from outer space would perceive 2 things, as it is unlikely that it would have the concept of a fruit.
It may have the concept of similarity, in which case it would perceive 1 thing.
It may have the concept of up and down, in which case it would perceive 4 things.
It may have the concept of up, down, left and right, in which case it would perceive 8 things.
This intelligent robot from outer space would only perceive two things if it had the same concept of a fruit as we do, which is highly improbable.