I cannot believe words transport meaning from A to B because I have not been able to witness this occur. — NOS4A2

You repeatedly witness what you deny you witness. When you profess not to believe that words transport meaning you mean something by that and hope to convey that meaning. When you are told you are wrong you get the message and respond with words. But not randomly with just any words. You cannot make arguments you hope will convince others if any mark or sound is just as effective or ineffective as any other.

You attempt to persuade others that:

not a single person can be affected by a word — NOS4A2

and by saying so you hope to do the very thing you deny can be done.

My problem is that if the word-forms conveyed meaning ... — NOS4A2

They don't. Words do.

... we’d know what they meant by reading them. — NOS4A2

We do not read word-forms. We read words, and not always all the words, and we can still understand what is said.

This has been demonstrated by the ability to reading words even when the form is jumbled: For example and typoglycemia

People convey the meaning — NOS4A2

Those who know a language can convey meaning through the words they use, but that meaning cannot be conveyed to someone who does not know the language.

... the symbols are completely innocent, and need not be feared nor revered. They need not be defaced or censored or glorified. — NOS4A2

The symbols may be innocent but the words are not. Words are not simply a combination of letters or sounds. They are a way of saying things. Some things that some people say should be feared. One reason is not simply because others may revere and glorify them, but because they believe them and may act on them. They can be inspired by words and lied to and deceived by words.

It just seems so odd that an argument that seems quite clearly to establish a conclusion should actually be intended to keep ideas in play. — Ludwig V

The problem is that Zeno's writings do not exist except for fragments. There are various conflicting claims about what is was doing. I agree with your conclusion:

But we'll never really know what Zeno intended. — Ludwig V

I do not know how much the plaintiffs will get after all the appeals and bankruptcy strategies, but it will still cost Rudy.

If the justification for punitive damages is to stop the injury from being repeated, the dollar amount was not enough. — Paine

Will it stop him? I don't think so. Following Trump, who learned this at the knee of Roy Cohn he will continue to double down. He might even believe his own lies.

.

I thought Socrates/Plato invented dialectic. What's the evidence that any pre-Socratics knew about dialectics? — Ludwig V

I cannot give you a definitive answer on this. The following from the SEP entry on Zeno gives some indication why such an answer is not available:

The portrait of Zeno and his tactics that emerges from Plato’s references makes it seem natural that Aristotle, in one of his lost dialogues, entitled Sophist, spoke of Zeno as the inventor of dialectic (D.L. 8.57; cf. 9.25; S.E. M. 7.7). Precisely what Aristotle meant by this remains a matter of speculation, given that Aristotle also attributes the invention of dialectic to Socrates (Arist. Metaph. M.4, 1078b25–30) and to Plato (Metaph. A.6, 987b31–3); he says he himself invented the theory of it (SE 34, 183b34–184b8). There is also the question of whether Aristotle viewed Zeno’s arguments as more eristic than properly dialectical. The difference, according to Aristotle, is that dialectical arguments proceed from endoxa or “views held by everyone or by most people or by the wise, that is, by all, most, or the especially famous and respected of the wise,” whereas eristic arguments proceed from what only seem to be, or what seems to follow from, endoxa (Top. 1.1, 100a29–30, b22–5). Aristotle clearly believes that some of Zeno’s assumptions have only a specious plausibility (see Top. 8.8, 160b7–9, SE 24, 279b17–21, Ph. 1.2, 233a21–31, Metaph. B.4.1001b13–16), so that they would by Aristotle’s own criteria be examples of eristic rather than properly dialectical arguments. For Aristotle, then, Zeno was a controversialist and paradox-monger, whose arguments were nevertheless both sophisticated enough to qualify him as the inventor of dialectic and were important for forcing clarification of concepts fundamental to natural science. Aristotle’s view of Zeno thus seems largely in accordance with Plato’s portrayal of him as a master of the art of contradiction.

If the Eleatic philosophers held the opinion that all is one then Zeno's argument could justifiably be regarded as endoxa rather than eristic. I added bolding to the quote above to help explain this distinction.

If you do a search you will find several articles that credit Zeno. But all this may be tangential to Ryle.

But if he was misled, — Ludwig V

If I am right in claiming that their methodological approach is dialectical then he was not misled. He was treating the claim that all is one as a hypothesis to be examined and if it was supported by reason. Pointing to experience in order to reject the claim begs the question of the unity of thinking and being. If they are the same then perhaps what should be rejected is what experience seems to show. Dialectical movement does not resolve things, it keeps them in play.

But perhaps, as Plato seems to suggest, he lacked the subtlety of Parmenides. Perhaps he did not treat this dialectically but either as a truth to be defended or as where reason leads us necessarily. In which case it seems plausible that he was misled by a priori reasoning. By what Kant would call the pure reason of metaphysics.

We have the benefit of an established distinction between theory and practice, which didn't exist in Zeno's time. — Ludwig V

You seriously underestimate Zeno and others, especially his teacher, Parmenides. Zeno knew full well that when he walked he was able to go from one place to another. The larger problem is the relationship between thinking and being. Rather than attempt to resolve the interpretive problems I will frame the problem in the form of a question and in light of this turn to Zeno's a priori puzzle.

Is thinking the way to being or an impediment? (See Parmenides poem and the way of truth - alethia)
The Eleatic philosophers were said to hold that all things are one. Parmenides does not simply accept this, he inquires dialectically, treating it as a hypothesis. If all things are one then what follows?

If all things are one then it follows that there can be no motion. Can we reasonably argue that there is no motion? Zeno provides the arguments. We might say that he was misled by treating this a priori, but if all is one and thereby thinking and being are one, then this should make no difference.

We are in need of our monkey trainers. — Fooloso4

I came back to edit this. It should be we monkeys ..

Aquinas is a representative of the philosophia perennis. — Wayfarer

That is one way of looking at it, but not the way I look at it. As I see it, unlike Aquinas, Aristotle offers far more questions that answers.

something fundamental to the human condition — Wayfarer

I suspect we have very different ideas about what that might be. Rather than obscure it, I think it shows it.

'the union of knower and known'. — Wayfarer

Yes, the unity of two as one. But there is no unity without there being two and not just one.

It is interpreted very differently in different cultures — Wayfarer

Indeed. This is what Aristotle calls Plato's "indeterminate dyad, which includes the dyad 'same and other'.

Each side stands both together with and apart from the other. There is not one without the other.
Ultimately, there is neither ‘this or that’ but ‘this and that’.
The Whole is not reducible to One. The whole is indeterminate.

As quoted above Zhuangzi says:

But exhausting the spirit trying to illuminate the unity of things without knowing that they are all the same is called “three in the morning.” What do I mean by “three in the morning”? When the monkey trainer was passing out nuts he said, “You get three in the morning and four at night.” The monkeys were all angry. “All right,” he said, “you get four in the morning and three at night.” The monkeys were all pleased. With no loss in name or substance, he made use of their joy and anger because he went along with them. So the sage harmonizes people with right and wrong and rests them on Heaven’s wheel. This is called walking two roads.

If we’re already one, can I say it? But since I’ve just said we’re one, can I not say it? The unity and my saying it make two. The two and their unity make three. — Fooloso4

In scholastic philosophy, the union of knower and known is seen as the process of assimilation which is foundational for the Thomist view of truth, where knowledge is seen as the conformity between the intellect (the knower) and the reality (the known). — Wayfarer

He gets this from Aristotle.

But the key point is the falling away of the sense of separateness or otherness which characterises the egological attitude. — Wayfarer

Well, that is one way of interpreting it. As you said, it is interpreted very differently in different cultures. In this way one becomes many.

Named, it is the mother of the myriad creatures.

(Daodejing, Book One, Chapter One)

I [take] Zhuangzi's advice, which I should add, is not as simple and straight forward as it may appear to be. We [monkeys] are in need of our monkey trainers.

The brackets [ ] are edits.

Here is a clear reminder that autocrats do not act alone. They need their minions. From Axios:

Stefanik Urges Ethics Investigation into Judge Linked to Trump Jan. 6 Cases:
Stefanik urges ethics investigation into judge linked to Trump, Jan. 6 cases

Stefanik requested an ethics investigation into U.S. District Court Judge Beryl Howell for a speech she gave in November, in which she said the country was at risk of falling into authoritarianism.

"Judge Howell's partisan speech is obviously highly inappropriate election interference by a federal judge that undermines the public's trust in our courts," Stefanik wrote.

Apparently the limits of free speech stop at the doorstep of Dear Leader.

But rest assured, Trump promises he will only be a dictator on day one. That is enough time to root out the vermin across government agencies and replace them with his henchmen like Stefanik, who cannot wait to begin the purge. The investigations he has threatened have already begun.

Sleep well. Sweet dreams. All praise Caesar Trump.

Rather than a duality, what is implied here is a reciprocal dependence. — Joshs

A dependence of one thing on another. I suppose it comes down to what counts as a duality, but as I count it one and one I don't get one.

The second part is missing the bracket that closes the quote and thus your claim is misattributed to me.

What we call logical, rational reasoning ... — Fooloso4

There is not one well defined practice that we are united in calling logical, rational reasoning.

... one which prevents us from seeing all the relevant connections between the aspects of the world that the dualistic thinking of formal logical reasoning conceals from us. — Fooloso4

I do not think that this is an accurate description of what actually happens in our "ordinary activities" in and thinking about the world. In addition it is often the case that science reveals rather than conceals connections between things.

The CNN report reads like a dark comedy. The bungling ineptitude with which the documents were handled. The restraints put on Trump's reckless disregard. The redactions made before it was to be released together with what is claimed it would show but could not be shown because it unaccountably went missing.

Pirsig argues that Western metaphysics too often focuses on the duality of mind and matter — Wayfarer

a process of "Quality" inquiry, which involves a deep examination of and insight into the relationships between things and the recognition of patterns and value inherent in those relationships. — Wayfarer

Isn't there a duality here of mind and things that matter? Doesn't a deep examination into relationships involve an examiner and what is examined? Doesn't that examination require mind? What is the inherent value of the relationship between humans and blood sucking disease carrying ticks?

Instead, the practice of mindfulness and being fully present in each moment can elevate even the most routine tasks to a level of artistry and spiritual significance. — Wayfarer

Do you find artistry and spiritual significance in clearing a clogged toilet?

Isn't there inherent value in a quality inquiry that discriminates between positive and negative value? A farmer's ordinary activity of spreading pesticides and petroleum based fertilizers certainly is significant, but by doing so while being present in the moment may sidesteps or short-circuit the ability to see the harm being done. One must be mindful that the ordinary activity of burning fossil fuels, say, to keep that beautifully maintained motorcycle running should not be raised to the level of artistry and spiritual significance.

Value is experiential, but in no way empirical — javra

I am not sure what your claim that value is experiential means. We might not value the negative effects of certain medical treatments but those treatments might have value. We might not value to experience of exercise but value its benefits. Those benefits are evidential.

what value is ... "what is value" — javra

Are you making a distinction between what value is and what is value?

What empirically falsifiable hypothesis can be produced to determine if “value” is a fallacious reification of a process? — javra

If I understand the question, consider snake oil remedies. The experience of drinking the original Coca Cola or Dr Pepper may have made you feel better for a while but the claims of their medical value was fallacious and determined empirically through medical science.

Whether value is a process cannot be determined by the empirical sciences, this in principle, because - be it in fact process or not - it is not something that can be directly perceived via the physiological senses, — javra

The value of what? I don't think the question of value can be addressed without considering what it is that is valued and what it is valued for.

Your claim is that:

science cannot address even in principle [what value is] — javra

Can the question of what value is be addressed without regard to what it is that people value? Whatever answer we might give to the question "what is value?" wouldn't it be rejected if it is something that no one values? Is there a tipping point? Would it be an adequate answer if one person values it or only a few people? Does it matter who it is that values it?

What it is that people value is an empirical investigation. People often provide what others might regard as acceptable answers. How we might distinguish between what people say they value and what they actually value is something that experiments can help determine.

science is quite limited in what it can address. — javra

Isn't this true of every field of endeavor?

There are some who are critical of the notion of a political or social science, but many in academic political science departments, wanting to mark and defend their territory, regard what they are doing as science.

With regard to value, a social or political scientist might study what it is that people value, putting aside or rejecting the question of what value is essentially. Does philosophy or any other discipline do any better?

From Republican Tom Cole, chairman of the Rules Committee:

Since September, the House has been engaged in an impeachment inquiry, examining whether sufficient grounds exist for the House to exercise constitutional power to impeach the president of the United States ...

In other words, an impeachment investigation into whether there are grounds for an impeachment investigation. An investigation into whether they can find something they have not been able to find, something to charge him with.

Hunter Biden has exposed the cloak and dagger tactics of their Hunter hunt by not complying with the House Oversight Committee's requirement for closed door testimony. Why their refusal to open the door and let in some light?

True words seem paradoxical. — FrancisRay

The paradox of words is that there would be no Daodejing without words. The text begins with a warning about words, but the warning cannot be given without words.

Chapter 32 of the Daodejing says:

When unhewn wood is carved up, then there are names.
Now that there are names, know enough to stop!

The Dao or Way is without name, but it must be named in order to say anything about it. But the name is not what is named. There is in this sense no "true words".

Thus it is easy to know the answers, albeit difficult to understand them. . — FrancisRay

To the contrary. It is easy answer "non-dualism" but the unity so named is not to be found in such questions and answers. With words the unity spoken of cannot be preserved. With words there is dualism.

Chapter 16 says:

Attain extreme tenuousness

By way of explanation a couple of quotes from Zhuangzi:

But exhausting the spirit trying to illuminate the unity of things without knowing that they are all the same is called “three in the morning.” What do I mean by “three in the morning”? When the monkey trainer was passing out nuts he said, “You get three in the morning and four at night.”
The monkeys were all angry. “All right,” he said, “you get four in the morning and three at night.” The monkeys were all pleased. With no loss in name or substance, he made use of their joy and anger because he went along with them. So the sage harmonizes people with right and wrong and
rests them on Heaven’s wheel. This is called walking two roads.

If we’re already one, can I say it? But since I’ve just said we’re one, can I not say it? The unity and my saying it make two. The two and their unity make three.

But actually, you can't just go on about differences without acknowledging similarities. — Ludwig V

Right. In order to show that things that look the same are different one needs to acknowledge similarities since they would not look the same if there were not similarities.

If the facts are that a President has immunity from federal prosecution for crimes he's been impeached for, but acquitted then it would be interesting to hear what other facts would make a difference.

They might approve if it helps Trump but they might not want to help a liberal president.

I was more interested in the differences between the three than the similarities. — Ludwig V

Malcolm tells the following story:

In response to a comment about Hegel by Drury, Wittgenstein said: 'Hegel seems to me to be always wanting to say that things which look different are really the same.Whereas my interest is in showing that things which look the same are really different.' He had thought about using a sentence from King Lear, 'I'll teach you differences', as a motto for his book.

The question of the relationship between ontology and epistemology deserves greater consideration. Questions of ontology are often treated as if they are separate from and independent of epistemology, but both the questions and answers given say much more about how we conceive things to be than about how they are.

Is a dualist ontology more than a misattributed dualist epistemology?

Well, it might be that his decisions will be those his wife concurs with. It might also be that consideration of whether she will concur is a determining factor. But, she too might see how this might come back to bite her in the ass.

On the other hand, and contrary to what I said above, the court might decide to rule in favor of Trump and deal with what comes when the person in office is someone whose politics they disapprove of when they come to that bridge.

1) Whether a President has absolute immunity from federal prosecution in all circumstances — Relativist

Of course not!

As to how the court will rule, although political bias might favor protecting Trump, I think they are smart enough to see that such a ruling could bite them in the ass. Because of their bias they would not want to give the same protection to those who they are biased against.

2) Whether a President has immunity from federal prosecution for crimes he's been impeached for, but acquitted. — Relativist

No. Acquittal does not mean that the person impeached is not guilty of the crimes for which they were impeached.

philosophical foundation of mysticism — FrancisRay

In my opinion, when someone makes an appeal to a particular doctrine they should provide an explanation of what it is being said and how they understand it. Looking back I see @180 Proof makes this point.

You say "Perennial Philosophy" explains but you do not give (or summarize) the explanation. — 180 Proof

'Nondualism' and 'perennial philosophy' do not have a single agreed upon meaning. The same can be said of 'mysticism' and 'metaphysics'.

180's approach to philosophy is dialectical. A mode of inquiry. It is antithetical to doctrines. It asks questions but a doctrinaire approach is based on the assumption that answers to these questions have been given. There may be some common ground here in undecidable. Socratic (but not Hegelian) dialectic is an examination of opinions, but I am not sure what FrancisRay's means with the claim that:

It predicts that all metaphysical questions are undecidable and gives answers for all such questions. — FrancisRay

Is the answer that there is no answer? If so then 180 and FrancisRay are in agreement. If not then perhaps FrancisRay can tell us what these answers are.

I have wasted enough time responding to, by your own admission, your thoughtless words. The cure cannot lie in more words. The only cure would be for you to begin to THINK. Clearly and honestly, as a matter of integrity. Drop the rhetorical defense of Trump and with it the defense of all the nonsense this leads you to say.

But perhaps I give you too much credit by implying that you are capable of doing this.

The discussion of categories is complicated. — Ludwig V

This is why common examples such as "the number two is blue" are problematic. It has the advantage of illustrating a clear difference between categories, but with the exception of someone with synesthesia no one conjoins them. One might easily get the impression that philosophers waste their time with things that no one in their right mind would have the least concern with.

(By the way, if I've understood the metaphor correctly, categories don't carve anything up. That privilege is reserved to concepts in certain categories. — Ludwig V

I think they both do, but will focus on the second lecture.

The quote is Ryle, not I; so it's not I who does not say. — Banno

But he does say. And what he says is not to be found it what you quoted.

One charitably presumes that here, in the first chapter, he is setting a direction, on which he continues in the remainder of the book. — Banno

This is why attention should be paid to what is said in the beginning wherthe direction being set.

It seems from this that you think making a category error as carving stuff up wrong. — Banno

Yes, that is the question:

The question arose for me .... — Fooloso4

But further, your critique looks misplaced. — Banno

When you misquote by leaving out the beginning of what I said it may look this way, but you carve it up wrong.

I hope it's clear from the SEP article that it's more about taking a term from one category and misapplying it in another. — Banno

It should be clear from my quotes from Ryle himself that this point has been made.

It seems to me somewhat crude to take the one example to undermine Ryle's point when there are others at hand that serve him better. We might better understand his work if we are a bit more charitable. — Banno

As I said in a response to Ludwig:

My comments and questions are intended as a mode of inquiry. — Fooloso4

[Added. Quoting Ryle]

"I have said that when intellectual positions are at cross-purposes in the manner which I have sketchily described and illustrated, the solution of their quarrel cannot come from any further internal corroboration of either position." — Banno

And why is that? You do not say. He does. As I understand it, it is because the solution is to be found by navigating the "public road" rather than the "private road" (@Ludwig V I should have picked up on that) of physics or biology. And so he concludes:

These inter-theory questions are not questions internal to those theories. They are not biological or physical questions. They are philosophical questions.

As the saying goes, paths are made by walking. His claim that:

The kind of thinking which advances biology is not the kind of thinking which settles the claims and counter-claims between biology and physics.

(13)

This is questionable. Questioning something when and where it appears is not premature. When you claim that doing so "undermines Ryle's point", you sound like the Christian faithful who dare not question the Bible. The fact of the matter is, questioning is an effect and well regarded mode of seeking understanding. It does not undermine the text unless it is one's intent to do so. I do not.

If it is your first time reading Ryle, then let's read Ryle. — Banno

A surprising comment coming from someone who responds to my questions taken directly from the text by citing the SEP instead of the text.

The danger is that we trot out the pat rejoinders rather than pay attention to the text at hand. — Banno

Indeed! Glad to see you have gotten around to paying a bit of attention to the text.

The key is that Descartes thought in terms of different "substances" which is how people thought about this issue. — Ludwig V

The term 'substance' is problematic, but as you indicate it was not a problem unique to Descartes. Does Ryle others who use the term of making a category mistake? From what I cited above it does not seem that the category mistake was the use of the term.

Remember, for many people Dualism is the basis for survival after death — Ludwig V

Yes, but this predates Descartes. He makes use of accepted duality of soul and body in order to say something substantially (pun intended) different.

Well, Ryle argues that there are not a fixed number or type of categories, so he's pretty much on your page. (See pp. 8 (last line of page) to 11.) — Ludwig V

That the logical types or categories are not fixed in number is not the same thing as their being fixed, at least to the extent that biology and physics are different logical types.

I quoted from these pages above. Page 12 too.

I believe and hope that you won't regret filling in this gap - whether you agree with him or not. — Ludwig V

No regrets.

He means that only specialists use the "private" concepts — Ludwig V

Got it.

But the subject matter of biology differs in important ways from the subject matter of physics, and applying only the methods of physics would ignore what makes living systems different from non-living systems. The methods of physics do not allow that distinction to appear. — Ludwig V

This is why I asked earlier:

Consider, for example, is the question regarding the determining factors between what is living and what is not a biological or a philosophical question? Is the question itself problematic because we lack the conceptual clarity this distinction presupposes? Is it exasperated by the assumption that there are conceptual and categorical boundaries to disciplinary domains? Does the question of life itself contain a category mistake in boundary cases? — Fooloso4

I would not rule out the possibility that physics might contribute to this at some point.

I never said words do not matter. — NOS4A2

Just about everything you say demonstrates your disregard for words.

I was arguing words have no power — NOS4A2

If words have no power then they have no power and do not matter. The problem is, you open your mouth and stick your foot in it. In your attempt to extricate it you stumble.

I never said meaning is arbitrary. — NOS4A2

If words are arbitrary then they have no meaning.

I didn’t say that since the form and sound is arbitrary, the meaning must be. — NOS4A2

You claimed:

Words are independent of thought. — NOS4A2

and

It is not possible to deduce the underlying meaning from its word form. — NOS4A2

It makes no sense to treat words as if they are independent of thought and an equivocation to pretend that what is at issue with words is the form they take.

Simply to be worthy of what? What is "it"? — Athena

Living without a god. Living without something higher. Plato does this with the idea of the good.

The Greek gods were nothing like the God of Abraham so what does it mean to become gods? — Athena

That is something Nietzsche asks us to consider. His inversion of Dionysus gives us some idea of what is at issue:

I, the last disciple and initiate of the God Dionysus: and perhaps I might at last begin to give you, my friends, as far as I am allowed, a little taste of this philosophy? In a hushed voice, as is but seemly: for it has to do with much that is secret, new, strange, wonderful, and uncanny. The very fact that Dionysus is a philosopher, and that therefore Gods also philosophize, seems to me a novelty which is not unensnaring, and might perhaps arouse suspicion precisely among philosophers.

— Beyond Good and Evil, 295

Both the God of Abraham and the Greek gods were willful gods. They were not lovers of wisdom in the sense of desiring and pursuing knowledge and wisdom. Through the influence of the Greek philosophers God becomes omniscient. Man is taught not to question. But a god who questions does not forbid man to question.

The moral is, that we need the gods. — Athena

But if we have killed God then what? What will replace them? Where can we find direction and guidance?

I think a person's brain must be pickled in Christianity to appreciate what Nietzche is saying. — Athena

I think it must be just the opposite. A person must overcome the burden Christianity has imposed on us. We must question rather than obey the tablets of "thou shall nots". See the chapter "The Three Metamorphoses of the Spirit" in Zarathustra.

I don't mean the person needs to be a Christian, but despite not being a Christian s/he can relate to Nietsche because s/he has no other frame of thought. — Athena

Yes, this frame of reference is important. To be like a god man must be a creator.

@NOS4A2

I forgot to mention Plato's Cratylus. The question of linguistic arbitrariness is not something new and not something I was not aware of.

Your round-about way of defending censorship pushed you into maintaining a position you have been unable to defend. — NOS4A2

Your attempt to separate words from their meaning and consequence is the result of your irresponsible defense of Trump's irresponsible claims. Your inept defense of his right to free speech is based on your treating words as if they do not matter. Any rational discussion of free speech and censorship needs to address this.

You clearly didn’t know what the concept was until I mentioned it. — NOS4A2

If you just look elsewhere you will see I have discussed this with regard to Wittgenstein in various threads. For example here from 5 years ago.

Note that the issue of linguistic arbitrariness goes much deeper than the form and sound of words.

I asked you to start a thread on your linguistic theories but you declined.

Later, after giving you the word “arbitrariness” to google, you confirm what I was arguing all along. — NOS4A2

I don't know if this is a reflection of your failure to understand or an attempt to dissemble. I am not confirming what you have been arguing, I am pointing out your fundamental misunderstanding. The arbitrariness of the form and sound of words does not mean that the meaning of words is arbitrary. It does not mean that words do not have power or do not matter.

Why do you keep saying “our democracy”? Why not just say “democracy”? — NOS4A2

First, because it is our democracy that Trump endangers.

Second, there are various forms of democracy. You have no trouble with:

your version of democracy — NOS4A2

but question the notion of our democracy. The reason you have a problem with this is because you reject the idea of a common good, of anything that is ours rather than mine or yours. There is ample evidence of this earlier in this thread. For you there is only the competition between individual rights.

Trump makes demagogical use of this. His only interest is in what benefits him. Perhaps he sees no problem with this because he assumes we are all like this, but perhaps because he just does not care, and to think otherwise is a weakness. But what does the demagogue say:

In the end, they're not coming after me. They're coming after you — and I'm just standing in their way.

This is my first time reading Ryle. I took it as an opportunity to fill in some gaps. To read some things I had intentionally neglected. My comments and questions are intended as a mode of inquiry.

In "Dilemmas", he identifies them as puzzles about "public" concepts — Ludwig V

Perhaps this will become clear as I continue reading, but from the first lecture I do not see where he makes a distinction between public and private or how it comes into play.

Biology does indeed welcome physics, chemistry and similar disciplines. But it also welcomes inputs from psychology, sociology and other sciences. — Ludwig V

To the extent this is true doesn't it go against Ryle's move to keep them separate?

... biophysics studies living organisms as physical systems ... — Ludwig V

It studies living organisms as biological systems, but makes use of the principles and methods of physics.

... molecular biology studies them as chemical systems — Ludwig V

Molecular biology studies biological organisms at the molecular level, but this does not mean that it studies them as chemical rather than biological systems.

There is, however, the question of whether biology can be reduced to chemistry and chemistry to physics. I won't address but, but will ask whether this is a biological or chemical or physical or philosophical question? Ryle, as quoted above, seems to regard it as a philosophical question. I don't think it can be divided categorically in this way. To do so would be a category mistake.

I must be missing your point; nothing in that is about "cross-disciplinary studies such as biophysics". — Banno

Right. That's the point. Ryle separates the disciplines of biology, physics, and philosophy. As quoted above:

The kind of thinking which advances biology is not the kind of thinking which settles the claims and counter-claims between biology and physics. These inter-theory questions are not questions internal to those theories. They are not biological or physical questions. They are philosophical questions.

The assumption is that there are different kinds of thinking. In the terms of The Concepts of Mind, they are not of the "same logical type". It would be a category mistake then to address the claims and counter-claims of biology and physics as if they are of the same logical type. The development of cross-disciplinary studies such as biophysics, however shows that his assumption is mistaken. There are not fixed logical types of thinking.

What I am suggesting is that Descartes' mistake was not categorical in the sense of failure to recognize differences between fixed categories, but rather his mistake resulted from the application of the framework of the categories of his time. Ryle's own category mistake is in this way the same as Descartes, thinking in terms of the framework of the categories of his time.

Then perhaps he is on about something else. — Banno

Is he? And what is that? Simply citing an article that goes beyond Ryle without identifying which of the issues in this debate are pertinent does not tell us what this something else he is on about is.

More helpful is what Ryle himself says in the section "The Origin of the Category- Mistake" from The Concept of Mind

As a man of scientific genius he [Descartes] could not but endorse the claims of mechanics, yet as a religious and moral man he could not accept, as Hobbes accepted, the discouraging rider to those claims, namely that human nature differs only in degree of complexity from clockwork. The mental could not be just a variety of the mechanical.

... since mechanical laws explain movements in space as the effects of other movements in space, other laws must explain some of the non-spatial workings of minds as the effects of other non-spatial workings of minds. The difference between the human behaviours which we describe as intelligent and those which we describe as unintelligent must be a difference in their causation ...

The differences between the physical and the mental were thus represented as differences inside the common framework of the categories of ‘thing’, ‘stuff’, ‘attribute’, ‘state’, ‘process’, ‘change’, ‘cause’ and ‘effect’. Minds are things, but different sorts of things from bodies; mental processes are causes and effects, but different sorts of causes and effects from bodily movements.

(9)

Further on he says:

I am not, for example, denying that there occur mental processes. Doing long division is a mental process and so is making a joke. But I am saying that the phrase ‘there occur mental processes’ does not mean the same sort of thing as ‘there occur physical processes’, and, therefore, that it makes no sense to conjoin or disjoin the two.

If my argument is successful, there will follow some interesting consequences. First, the hallowed contrast between Mind and Matter will be dissipated, but dissipated not by either of the equally hallowed absorptions of Mind by Matter or of Matter by Mind, but in quite a different way.
For the seeming contrast of the two will be shown to be as illegitimate as would be the contrast of ‘she came home in a flood of tears’ and ‘she came home in a sedan-chair’. The belief that there is a polar opposition between Mind and Matter is the belief that they are terms of the same logical type.

(11-12)

I think you've got him upside down. He sets up his target:- — Ludwig V

Perhaps I do, but when I ask:

...whether Ryle is making his own version of category mistake — Fooloso4

what I have in mind is the treatment of the categories of different disciplines, that, for example, as cited, there are according to him different "kinds" of thinking such as those he names, biology, physics, and philosophy. He says that the claims and counter-claims between them are not questions internal to those theories. But cross-disciplinary studies such as biophysics seems to contradict this. The boundaries are not natural or immutable. Understanding biology at some point requires an understanding of physics. Consider, for example, is the question regarding the determining factors between what is living and what is not a biological or a philosophical question? Is the question itself problematic because we lack the conceptual clarity this distinction presupposes? Is it exasperated by the assumption that there are conceptual and categorical boundaries to disciplinary domains? Does the question of life itself contain a category mistake in boundary cases?