so let's assume time doesn't exist without a "conceptual framework". so what? how is that relevant to our universe? to our experience? to our life?
I think you are missing my point a little bit. For one, accepting absolute factual relativism is, as I pointed out, accepting an objective framework. That was the entire point of my OP!
Secondly, if you're taking the line of Kant -- that we can't know the "noumena" (for all non-philosophers, noumena means essentially how something is in itself, independent of how we view it, in terms of our perception as well as our conceptual framework). Now, you could take the line you take -- that everything is viewed through some sort of lens and as such the noumena is a fiction -- all there is is just different perspectives on what something is. Now I tend to disagree with this point, on ground that we can, in fact, know something about the noumena -- that is, we know that when we gaze at this object with our perceptual and conceptual framework, the output is what is known to us in ordinary life (what I mean by ordinary life is how we think of objects independently of philosophical reflection).
Also, as I admit, I think a lot of debates in philosophy are merely the result of a different conception of how things are. Though I do think that some debates are genuine. For instance, there are mereological debates centered around what composes objects -- either all objects compose (i.e. there is an object that is you+Eiffel tower, that is a genuine object), that objects only compose if they have some sort of unity, or that objects never compose (i.e. there are not real macroscopic objects, only subatomic particles).
I think however that there are some genuine ontological truths to be discovered. For instance, I think there is a genuine dispute over whether or not the world is more like a 4D space-time block like the one physics presents, or that presentism is true (the notion that only things in the present moment exist). Now, I do think there are scientific concerns at play here (ex. I think that time travel is likely possible if we hold a 4D picture of reality, but impossible if we hold a presentist position). But I also think there are more personal ones as well. I mean most people wouldn't likely be affected by the distinction, but the difference between the two make me think differently about my place in the world. I feel differently about being just one small piece of a "mel-worm" that extends back in time. There is "still" a mel who is 5 years old, in reality, playing and doing shit -- the shit that I feel like I "did." She exists. That part of me still exists. This is where personal reflection becomes complicated, and I won't get into it here. But this feels different to me than just thinking that I did this, but now it is gone. There is no 5-year-old mel, I only remember being her.
This is where even technical, seemingly esoteric "mental-masturbation" philosophy can be a very personal and spiritual thing, if you let it. Even debates which I do not think are genuine ontological disputes (for instance, monism -- the idea that everything in the universe is just a part of one large object) can change your outlook on life. What are the personal implications of holding the conception (even if it is just that), of being one small part of one object (or a process?) that is the entire universe?
I know some might answer this question by claiming "nothing would change on my outlook -- from my perspective, I still shit and fuck and go about my daily life, who cares?" One could say the same thing about any perspective on the universe that isn't immediate to our experience. It all depends how much you want to take these things to heart and mind.
People have gone mad, committed suicide after reading Kant. So I would hardly write this all off as "mental masturbation."
Topic: The paradox of relativism