Totally incorrect. Wanna hint?

You get 10 points for attempting an answer. Your answer was not correct, though.

Sounds about right.

You're using potential as synonymous with possible. There are other meanings.

If it's true that I'm never going to drop the ball, what is the resistance?

I meant that what an acorn becomes depends a lot on the environment in which it exists. Same with a human?

Same with a philosophy forum?

if you hold a golf ball in the air there is potential energy associated with it. Unmanifest energy is a philosophical oddity, but...

Whether the ball subsequently falls through air or mollases, the potential is the same. The medium through which the event take a place influences what we see.

The potential can be increased. Raise the ball higher, for instance.

But then as I hold the ball, I tell you I'm never going to drop it. What is the potential?

The physics definition is related to personal potential though.

Potential=kinetic × resistance

So a person born with silver spoon might rise to great heights with minimal talent.

An engineer wants his bridge to stand up to any and all reasonable challenges. He doesn't care which particular ones it actually will face.

:) 'All interesting discussions require a portion of confusion.' -- Isaac Asimov.

Yep. Although Mariner's answer was awesome. Did you see it?

The OP said that by "everything" he meant the universe. So I think he was asking about ontology. But then he disappeared. Apo scared him off.

Much appreciated!

Yes — Srap Tasmaner

(Y)

There's a kind of sex that's wild and intense. The characters on the scene are cosmic. It's fun times at the temple of the Mood God. And there's a place for that.

There's another kind of sex that's very personal. It's tender because the most vulnerable parts are unveiled: not genitals, but hearts.

May everyone have both kinds at some time or other along the byways to nowhere.

You appear to be asking a metaphysical question: do non-material things exist? A materialist will deny this. Certain types of idealist will say that all things are non-material.

I don't know if I could persuade our good friend @Mariner to give his explanation for why materialists and non-materialists aren't as different as they appear to be. But who knows?

You'd probably have to specify that that's what you mean by "everything."

Comey insinuated in one of his congressional hearings that he wanted to go back to academia (suggesting disgust with politics). Maybe he's glad to be fired.

At this point few people doubt that the Russian govt is actively attempting to manipulate events through hacking. The notion has been floated that they want people to know that so there will be awareness of a greater threat in the form of hacking power plants, airports... just general chaos.

Comey's firing is just fun for democrats to play with.

You can call him George Washington, doesn't make it so.

Maybe he's a Kiwi. They call everybody cunts.

Dude. The US can have Russia as its ally if it wants to. Its not a betrayal...except maybe of Ukraine.

There are no more cunts or dicks on the scene than usual.

Why don't you try being friendly?

I like that answer. Thanks.

The notion of innate knowledge has a long history. Chomsky's view is in line with Leibniz's: it's capacity that is innate, not specific rules or bits of knowledge.

Don't really know what Witt thought. Soames says he may have been thinking of instinctive ability or potential manifest by social conditioning... something like that.

Bitterness had come to Jerusalem since Antiochus put a statue of Zeus in the holy of holies. Rabbis would ponder how long a Gentile has to be tortured in the afterlife to mark justice.

Jesus said let it go. It's not doing any good. It's just twisting your soul.

The problem I see is that the philosophical position is apart from ordinary life. I think the idea is to step back and reflect, and then return to hustle and bustle with deeper insight.

So perhaps that's the problem with trying to make language games into a theory of meaning. It only addresses the active language user. Sometimes we're passive... doing nothing except being.

I don't think Witt was trying to make it into a full blown theory though. Do you?

Cool.

So one pays attention to context of utterance in order to identify the reference of an uttered word. I never doubted that.

I came across an interpretation of Witt that says language games are instrumental in creating the structures that allow innate linguistic ability to manifest as speech and writing.

Depends on the context. Although people seem to find dictionaries useful.

We do use words. Sometimes we use words to refer to things.

Indeed Socrates, it is just as you say.

When I'm reading something about ancient Sumeria, I lean toward meaning holism. Political stuff..I think postmodern. When I say "Don't touch the tail pipe", it seems to me that "tail pipe" has a very distinct reference. Why shouldn't I?

I think I've said that twice in this thread already.

It's a greeting. Nobody thinks it refers. Was it not your view that we can redefine reference as simply using a word?

People who deny scrutability of reference are going to be deflationary about truth. They won't worry about truthmakers.

It's common knowledge that words refer. The burden is on you to show that we're all deluded.

OK. I didn't say he discarded ostensive definition all together. But we agree that showing most definitely does not account for all of language learning.

I think it's true that "language game" as used by W signifies that language has meaning in the context of human interaction. Your upgrades to my sentence changed its meaning. You changed it into an assertion of your version of Witt's thesis. And yet doing that does not at all "dissipate" my question.

Reference is not important; or better, all there is to reference is the use of a word or phrase in a speech act. — Banno

There are situations where reference is not important. Few humans who have ever lived would say that reference always is unimportant. All there is to reference is the use of a word?

cabunctious

Nope.

The question in the OP assumes a referential theory of meaning that the Investigations rejected before language games were intorduced. — Banno

I think I can say that's a bald assertion since I wrote the OP. It's simply asking if "language game" should be thought of as a pawn in a language game.

Maybe you could help me understand your view.

Witt discarded ostensive definition as a thorough-going explanation for anything because he recognized (in line with what Chomsky would eventually say) that there's just way too much language that a person would already have to understand in order to learn anything ostensively.

If you disagree with Witt and Chomsky on this, could you say how you would address their grievances?

Talking about Wittgenstein in terms of concepts shows a deep misunderstanding. — Banno

I think you're going to have to come up with something a little more creative to do with your bishop to win this game. Everybody on this thread disagrees with you. (Except me.. I have no clue.)

The approach you're taking is one many analytics have held on to, but I confess I find it difficult to understand why they do after Wittgenstein. It seems to say that a certain sort of talk, what Robert Brandom calls (at great length and density) the giving and receiving of reasons, is what all talk is about. It's not how they talk on my local bus, for instance. A philosophy of language has to cope with the talk on my local bus if I'm going to ride with it, as it were. — mcdoodle

I don't know of any analytic philosophers who would claim that all language is propositional. When I think of things analytical types might be holding to, it's Quine and behaviorism (which excludes any consideration of propositions). Propositions are making a come-back lately. It's definitely not some bulwark of analytical philosophy. The come-back is based on recognizing what we give up when we deny propositional meaning... essentially agreement.

My thoughts about language games were based just purely on the passages of Witt that I have read. It sounded a lot like behaviorism. I realize now I was wrong about that.

Anyways... I appreciate the discussion. :)