PR 666: Experiential Empiricism: Empiricism Without Realism

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Abstract

      This paper introduces Experiential Empiricism (EE), a

foundational reframing of empiricism that treats experiential regularities as epistemic primitives without assuming an external mind-independent reality. Rather than following the traditional two-step process of observation followed by inference to external causes, EE demonstrates that observations themselves provide sufficient grounds for all legitimate empirical knowledge. The formal predictive apparatus of science remains unchanged, but persistent philosophical bottlenecks such as the hard problem of consciousness, quantum measurement paradoxes, and the systematic exclusion of subjective data are conceptually dissolved. EE functions as both a methodological refinement and a solution to empiricism's foundational problems, offering a framework that is simultaneously more empirical and less assumptive than standard materialist approaches.