Dude I think even flat-earthers know it's a bit lumpy. What's your point - that no one can ever say anything that completely captures the nature of things? Sure, but so what? That doesn't prevent us from talking about things or from being correct or mistaken. Of course the Earth has a shape, and we can be more or less precise in our descriptions or we can be completely wrong, and there is a difference, which does not depend on who agrees or disagree, but on the shape of the Earth.

No, dude. You see, I don't see. You need to point it out with some quotes, because from what I see, you are misunderstanding.

I don't know why you think anyone has been arguing that we don't have these concepts. But we have the concept of unicorns too. Where did that come from?

All of the above and more is necessarily the case without exception. — Marchesk

Odd use of 'necessarily' there, to mean, 'as far as we know', or 'according to our best theory', or 'unless the rules change over the event horizon', or 'unless there are wormholes or some shit we haven't come across yet'.

I think the power of science is that it's not perfect. It's the only discipline we have that acknowledges its own fallibility. — Brian Cox

A passion isn't a concept. We have a concept of causality. — Marchesk

Nobody thinks a passion is a concept. We have a passion for pattern, a passion to predict, we are creatures of habit. Cause is a handy concept that appears to justify, and appears to rationalise, but does not - unless you want to disappear down Kant's rabbit hole. Hume says we are creatures of passion primarily not rationality; don't expect him to derive shit, he's busy pointing out how underivable it is.

There is a passion to find a pattern, a passion to predict.

But since Hume was an empiricist, isn't he ceding ground to rationalism here by saying we have a sentiment toward causality? He's admitted there's something fundamental in our thought processes which we use to make sense of the world that doesn't come from sensory experience. — Marchesk

No, because it is not rational, but sentimental. 'Reason is and ought to be the servant of passion. '

That 'ought' is loose talk on Hume's part, which I interpret charitably to mean that one might have a passion to make reason the king and passion the servant. And if that passion is strong, it will prevail, but one can only regard reason as the king of passion by wilfully ignoring the passion that put the puppet reason on the throne.

In spherical geometry, assuming we're talking about an intrinsic as opposed to an extrinsic curvature of space, there would be no point at the centre of the sphere would there? I mean, if space itself is in the shape of a sphere, then there is no other space to contain that point in the centre of it, is there? Or am I wrong? — Agustino

We can argue about it. In a sense you are right, because the centre would be postulated to exist in 'another (higher) dimension', outside the geometric space. But I think the point is already made, that what is conceivable or inconceivable varies according to how daring one's thinking is.

it is universal and absolutely necessary, you cannot conceive it being otherwise. — Agustino

I think we have already conceived it being otherwise.

It is a priori. Why? Because it is universal and absolutely necessary, you cannot conceive it being otherwise.

Where am I wrong? — Agustino

Right there. I can perfectly well conceive of separate domains of any number of dimensions, euclidian and non-euclidian, such that one cannot draw any line between a point in one and a point in another. For example, in spherical geometry, there is a point (the centre) to which no line can be drawn, because the geometry is of the surface of the sphere or hypersphere.

it seems to me that Hume just shows a complete lack of awareness of synthetic a priori judgements that Kant discusses at length. — Agustino

Yes, as far as I'm aware Hume never had wind of Kant at all. You can get a Kant from a Hume, but not vice versa. But as far as I can see "synthetic a priori judgements" are just a long-winded way of saying "sentiments".

The problem is that we do both all the time. — Marchesk

Why is it a problem? Hume confesses that he does it himself, and by no means demands that one does not. He points out the limits of logical deduction. You can't get a will-be from a was, any more than you can get an ought from an is. The gaps are bridged by habit and sentiment. It's only a problem for the philosopher who has a false image of himself as purely rational.

Well if you have had contact with the Open dialogue method, I'd be very interested in your experiences of it. I don't have any particular questions, except to notice this:

I've been told I've had psychotic episodes. — believenothing

Which is exactly what I've been getting at in the thread, that it is something one is told, has to be told, as one has to be told everything about oneself - to some extent. The narrative self is a community affair.

I think what Heidegger is describing is also more basic than the below Bakhtin quote since before we can adapt our actions to those of others (consciously I assume), we already are, as dasman, an other to ourselves. — bloodninja

I'm not the expert on Heidegger, and I may have misunderstood, but he seems to be trying to describe a consciousness apart from human relations, and that to me is like trying to describe a pair of legs walking apart from the rest of the body. My thinking is that the self is the introjected other, and without the other, there would be no distinction of self and world at all.

That is the most important part of what I wrote. — T Clark

It also seems the most tortured. If enough people agree that the earth is flat, then they are all mistaken.

In so far as 'objective' means anything at all useful, it means irrespective of what anyone or everyone thinks about it.

Words take their meaning by distinguishing - by carving the world into this and that. So this attempt to universalise ...

Every statement made by a person is a subjective opinion. — T Clark

... has the effect of making the terms meaningless.

But we know that loving or hating marmite is subjective, whereas that it is made from the waste product of the brewing industry is objective. That there are blurred boundaries, hard cases, need not oblige philosophers to claim that 'all is one', which is a vacuous and secure position.

It's just your opinion that this is just my opinion, but this only even means anything if some things are not just opinions.

No, it's boring if they don't.

Does that mean you disagree? — Agustino

No, it's an explanation of why I do it. Discussions have to end, and most people like to have the last word. So rather than continue with endless nonsense, I stop. Except when I am very bored, and feel like indulging your desperate attention-seeking. Like now.

No comment.

if you want to become the next mod, you must express your hatred of Agustino publicly and vehemently >:O — Agustino

They're just trying to replace the loss of yours truly. Inevitably this needs at least two of your normal assholes.

When people are on a crusade to do things like destroy "the patriarchy", it won't do the job for them at all to say "Let's mind our manners". — WISDOMfromPO-MO

Indeed. 'Crusade' is perhaps a tad hyperbolic, but it seems inevitable in a topic like this that there will be some unpleasantness. Nobody has been burned at the stake so far, but there is no painless way to say to someone, 'I think you are behaving badly, and you need to change'. I accept that I have made myself unpleasant, and also that I have at times over-reacted and expressed myself unnecessarily harshly. Nobody's perfect, and one really needs to be perfect when criticising others. Still, there are some charges that I will offer a defence to, if I may.

The irony is that they don't see how censoring speech is itself a form of oppression. — WISDOMfromPO-MO

This is a commonplace nonsense. To claim that the prevention of oppression is oppression is simply to refuse to allow any meaning to the term. It does not require a bully to prevent bullying.

It is all self-interested politics and extremist ideology, it seems safe to say. — WISDOMfromPO-MO

'Extremist' is rather unclear; I would think that anything a long way from one's own position seems extreme, but in that sense it is not any criticism. But since I am a man arguing on behalf of women philosophers, I reject the charge of self-interest. It is not safe to say that.

Part of that diversity includes people who like to indulge in banter, dirty jokes, etc. Condemning them as misogynists, male chauvinists, an old boy network, female enablers of misogyny, etc. is no more inclusive than their words and actions that make the workplace uncomfortable for people not like them. — WISDOMfromPO-MO

Well you are using a language that has not been much used: "male chauvinists, an old boy network, female enablers of misogyny". It's a long thread, and I might have missed them, but I don't recollect using or seeing these terms.

Should feminists in the workplace be allowed to say things in front of everybody like, "Men are all misogynists afraid of losing their privilege"? That is not anymore inclusive than non-African-Americans using the n word.

No. But no one has suggested that they should be, and no one has said anything of the sort on this thread either.

But not only do we have people in this thread who are not speaking on behalf of respect and inclusiveness for all, we have them saying that some people's thoughts and words "belong in the toilet". We have them saying that anybody who tells certain jokes is a contributor to genocide and other evils.

I'll plead guilty to the first, but not guilty to the second. I pointed out that humour can be and has been used, and generally has the effect of, normalising and legitimising dehumanising attitudes. That does not equate to accusing anyone who tells an off-colour joke, or shows the effect of such normalising of genocide. Nevertheless, genocide can be the extreme result of such dehumanising, and this is a fact that should give one good reason to be careful. Genocide is not committed by monsters, but by ordinary and even intelligent people - people like me, and people like anyone else.

Somebody telling a joke could be a card-carrying misogynist, racist, homophobe, etc. Or he/she could be caving in
to pressure to fit in against his/her better judgement. Or he/she may not know better; he/she may honestly believe that the joke is harmless and would be surprised to learn that anybody was hurt or offended by it. Only he/she knows. It is not the job of the government or other organizations that serve the public to judge people. — WISDOMfromPO-MO

But that is the job of the government. I remember a time when it was quite normal for folks to drink six pints of beer and then drive home, and there was no law against it. It was made illegal, and a long campaign was waged by the government to make it socially unacceptable - against a deal of opposition along the lines of "not the government's business, a restriction of freedom, nanny state, how do they know what I'm like after six pints," etc. Folks honestly believed it was harmless. And they felt insulted, oppressed and angry when told that it was not.

Can a good joke not be at least somewhat harmful to someone? — Bitter Crank

Like the man said, it's all about context. If the context is The Last Leg, a show hosted by disabled comics, disability jokes and gross insults between them are fine by me, but I wouldn't feel at all fine making some of those same jokes at the disabled hotel where I used to work.

Yes cruelty is part of much humour, and the critical contexts it seems to me relate to power and responsibility on the one hand, and ubiquity and avoidability on the other. I generally prefer jokes directed at power and status to those directed by power and status at vulnerability; or jokes directed at oneself rather than at others.

So gay jokes by gays to gays are potentially empowering, but gay jokes at my boarding school back in the day when homosexuality was a crime were disempowering. Likewise, jokes about tits amongst women are one thing, and the same jokes in a male- dominated workplace are another.

So where are we? The best philosophy forum on the net, I'd say, and one that is, like most of philosophy, dominated by white men. So what kind of humour is appropriate here? Well you know my opinion.

Well you are certainly acting injured, but it brings me no satisfaction, at all. Funnily enough, I had thought that at least the second half of my post you are so exercised about was quite conciliatory. Ah well.

You've had a straight answer. Don't be so paranoid. Having espoused zero tolerance, I wished to clarify that my zero tolerance was a social matter more so than a formal legalistic one. I can confirm that I was not imputing that to anyone else on the thread as is completely obvious, because it would be idiotic, given that I am the hardliner round here.

Who is it that you think has made this suggestion, and where do you think that they've suggested it? — Sapientia

It's right there in the same post in the wiki quote I am discussing.

If people fear that their co-workers or fellow students may be fired, terminated, or expelled, they may not come forward at all when they see behavior deemed unacceptable — wiki

"It's a fine line ... — WISDOMfromPO-MO

It is apples and oranges, not varying degrees of the same thing. — WISDOMfromPO-MO

Is it a fine line, or is it apples and oranges?

Saying that logic does not matter is not a good idea, especially if you want rational people to hear what you are trying to say. — WISDOMfromPO-MO

Perhaps you can point to where I said that? But am I talking to rational people? If I was, I would expect them to respond to the historical examples, from Nazi propaganda and from my own youth, of humour being used to normalise oppression. You know, some logic or counter example to show that it does not do that in this case?

I brought up a point made by a woman who was arguing against something that she saw as harmful to women. We can only conclude that you think that it is "justifying oppressive, demeaning, and totally unnecessary behaviour" for someone to think critically, rationally and objectively about something and then share her concern about how it harms women. — WISDOMfromPO-MO

Well you might conclude that I do not consider it critical, rational, objective thinking. If you did that, you might want to try and convince me, by expanding the argument, that it was those things. Given that this is a philosophy forum, it would be a fairly reasonable conclusion.

You claim logic and rationality, but instead of presenting evidence and argument, you criticise my attitude and rhetoric. And note, please, that while it is a good idea to pay attention to what women are saying about this, their positions vary, and just as there are strong pressures against making complaints about serious oppression, so there are about minor issues, and even against recognising them.

There is an argument that it is a mistake to put together what are sometimes called 'micro-aggressions', including the sort of thing we are discussing, and the more serious abuses of power, not because they are apples and oranges, but because they are motes and beams. There is some sense to this tactically, but there is also an argument the other way, which I tend to favour, of zero tolerance.

Various institutions have undertaken zero-tolerance policies, for example, in the military, in the workplace, and in schools, in an effort to eliminate various kinds of illegal behavior, such as harassment. Proponents hope that such policies will underscore the commitment of administrators to prevent such behavior. Others raise a concern about this use of zero-tolerance policies, a concern which derives from analysis of errors of omission versus errors of commission. Here is the reasoning: Failure to proscribe unacceptable behavior may lead to errors of omission—too little will be done. But zero tolerance may be seen as a kind of ruthless management, which may lead to a perception of "too much being done". If people fear that their co-workers or fellow students may be fired, terminated, or expelled, they may not come forward at all when they see behavior deemed unacceptable. — wiki

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero_tolerance

When I say I favour zero tolerance, though, I mean I favour it in terms of discussing and responding. I wouldn't want to see anyone lose their job over a joke, but I don't either want to leave unanswered, the suggestion that jokes are harmless; they are not.

I am inclined to think that faith has little or no epistemic value. — Ahmed

Yes, but it might have value otherwise.

If I say I believe in truth, justice and love, It is not that I believe that these things prevail as a matter of fact, but rather that I am committed to promote them as far as my weak will prevails over my fear or whatever. So faith is not necessarily a knowledge claim at all, but a profession of allegiance, a commitment, or an avocation, even an ardent desire. Keep the faith! Be a faithful friend! These are not to do with knowing.

I think that the point Kipnis was making is that there's a big difference between a woman's boss telling her "Perform oral sex on me! I could terminate your employment, you know!" and a group of guys sharing a dirty joke at the water cooler. — WISDOMfromPO-MO

Yes, I agree that is her point, and I agree that some shit is smellier than other shit. There are grades of it.
But it all belongs in the toilet, and none of it by the water cooler. You can call that a straw man if you like, and it will indeed be a pattern, as long as people seek to justify oppressive, demeaning, and totally unnecessary behaviour.

Ohe of the standard techniques spread about by Big Energy is to cast doubt in just this way: oh yes, climate is changing, but we really don't know how much and because of what. It's standard FUD, fear uncertainty and doubt. And then all those micro-doubts get strewn around cyberspace and repeated by various people, like micro-plastics entering the food chain; legislation is diluted, green energy schemes stalled, and Big Energy wins the delay it wants.

Meanwhile.....
— Wayfarer

So it's not true that we are unable to make confident and precise predictions about the long term ramifications of climate change because Big Energy must always be wrong? — VagabondSpectre

If one throws a brick at a sheet of ordinary glass, one is unable to make precise predictions about how it will shatter. One can be pretty confident that it will shatter one way or another though. The suggestion that it's ok to destabilise the climate because we don't know what will happen, is as sensible as the suggestion that it's ok to chuck a brick at the window because we don't know along what lines it will fracture. Big Energy makes that argument, and Big Energy is always wrong to make it.

not being able to separate out being offended from being endangered. — WISDOMfromPO-MO

When I was a lad in days of yore, there were a thousand schoolboy jokes about the foolishness of the Irishman, always called Paddy,who always worked on a building site. And another thousand about a well endowed black man whose name I forget.

This was the time when there were places advertised for rent with signs, "no Irish, no blacks, no dogs".

To be the butt of derogatory jokes is to be subject to ritual humiliation, and is part of the process and justification of 'endangerment'. Jokes are fake news, that rely on, and so reinforce, the acceptance of the unspoken stereotype. Jokes have always been at the heart of prejudice, bullying, and systematic oppression, as a glance at German Nazi propaganda will illustrate. and accusations of hypersensitivity and lack of sense of humour are just as commonplace accusations in defence of oppression.

@jamalrob (N)

There is no place in science for 'Believe me, I know because I'm a teacher/authority.' Prove it, demonstrate it, or be banished to Psychceramia.
— unenlightened

Feyerabend would disagree, suggesting that sometimes science might well progress because of such authoritarian stances. — Banno

Well in the sense that the authoritarian stance is so ubiquitous that even you seem to think it is a natural attribute of science, it is inevitably implicated in progress. Nevertheless, it simply is the case, historically, that the thrust of science from its birth was against the authority of church dogma, and sceptical of received wisdom.

But like most revolutions, the scientific revolution has opposed tyranny only in the end to replace it.

More white outsiders telling the indigenous what they needed.

So maybe not such a good solution. — Banno

Not Freire, then. I don't know much about that, but given what currently passes for care, almost anything different or indeed nothing at all, would be a good solution.

Davidson's triangulation - me, you and the truth. What you say might be the case in humanities, where what is the case is so much more dependent on social construction. Is it true of the hard sciences? — Banno

More so of the sciences than the humanities. There is no place in science for 'Believe me, I know because I'm a teacher/authority.' Prove it, demonstrate it, or be banished to Psychceramia. Unfortunately, the usual oppressive authoritarian regime generally prevails in most institutions despite the naturally principled democracy of science. Truth has authority over you and me.

Less of that 'we enlightened' if you please. :D

The enlightenment is a disease I refuse to catch; as a direction of travel, it is a fine and noble thing, but as a destination reached by the great and the good, to which they are dragging the rest of us, it stinks like an extermination camp, as your links illustrate..

I think 'the dialogue''s severance from truth has a self reinforcing character. Imagine trying to communicate political-managerial decisions to a populace who will buy anything because they think you're full of shit. — fdrake

But, but ... Here's some radical claim: there can be no dialogue severed from truth, because there would be no connection between one speaker and the other. But dialogue is not what happens in academia, politics, in advertising, in the mass media, including the internet for the most part. And that is the root of the problem.

Rather than Orwell, Freire is the man with an analysis and a solution. It is because academia has fallen in love with the sound of its own voice, and no longer dialogues but pontificates, that its own voice has fragmented and folks only listen to whatever confirms their own pontification. There is, by and large, no dialogue in education, no mutuality, no learning together and from each other cooperatively, but rather a competitive shouting match, in which truth and learning and communication are no longer priorities.

...this dialogue cannot be re­duced to the act of one persons "depositing" ideas in another, nor can it become a simple exchange of ideas to be "consumed" by the discussants. Nor yet is it a hostile, polemical argument between those who are committed neither to the naming of the world, nor to the search for truth, but rather to the imposition of their own truth. Because dialogue is an encounter among women and men who name the world, it must not be a situation where some name on behalf of others. It is an act of creation; it must not serve as a crafty instrument for the domination of one person by another. The domination implicit in dialogue is that of the world by the dia­logues; it is conquest of the world for the liberation of humankind.
Dialogue cannot exist, however, in the absence of a profound love for the world and for people. The naming of the world, which is an act of creation and re-creation, is not possible if it is not infused with love. Love is at the same time the foundation of dialogue and dialogue itself. It is thus necessarily the task of responsible Subjects and cannot exist in a relation of domination.

It always puzzles me why people are quite contented with the dictum that you can't get an ought from an is, but discontented with the dictum that you can't get a will-be from a has-been.

But while I puzzle, here's a longish talk about Wittgenstein and Turing that might amuse.

https://vimeo.com/241850881?ref=fb-share&1

I'm unenlightened (hence the name), namer of names, pointer of fingers, self-appointed forum therapist, and resident anarchist gimp.

...you must play empires in order to create changes in the larger society. — Agustino

That's what I'm getting at. The change I want to make is to create a way of interacting that is not building empires You say I must play empires to stop playing empires, and I don't believe you.

If your goal is to nurse, ideally you won't be satisfied just with your own efforts, but would want to start a larger movement, again that requires capital, etc. — Agustino

No. I don't want to start a movement, not everyone does, I don't need capital etc. I don't want to play monopoly, or empires, I want to play happy families.

Anyone can become wealthy and influential if that's what they want, provided that they have access to basic education and good health. — Agustino

I might want to add a few more provisos, but suppose someone doesn't want to become wealthy and influential, suppose they want to teach, or nurse, or something. I don't think that means that they want to be poor and despised.

Within the word we find two dimensions, reflection and action, in such radical interaction that if one is sac­rificed—even in part—the other immediately suffers. There is no true word that is not at the same time a praxis. Thus, to speak a true word is to transform the world.

An unauthentic word, one which is unable to transform reality, results when dichotomy is imposed upon its constitutive elements. When a word is deprived of its dimension of action, reflection auto­matically suffers as well; and the word is changed into idle chatter, into verbalism, into an alienated and alienating "blah." It becomes an empty word, one which cannot denounce the world, for denuncia­tion is impossible without a commitment to transform, and there is no transformation without action. — Paulo Freire

Pedagogy of the Oppressed.

You say "arguably" but so far you've only asserted. Give us something more to chew on. — Baden

Ok, an outline...

Ag's individualism is empowering to each individual, whereas the sociological view is disempowering. (non absolutely).

However, the sociological view is empowering to the managerial sector who are in the position to adjust the structures of society. Those with such power will be structurally directed to conserve their own power, and thus the lawyer, the advertiser, the social work supervisor, the planning officer, the editor, will all be manipulating us in the direction of passivity, compliance, subservience to 'the forces of social necessity'. Success over a generation or two results in rage against the machine - the machinations, that is, of sociologists.

Large part of that rage is about the de-moralising of power exactly in terms of the managerial claim to be 'only doing my job'. If the lines of least resistance are in place, any idiot or asshole can be president. How's that working out for you?

Or to put it another way, we are indeed playing monopoly in a society that mandates greed, and with 50% of wealth in the hands of 1% of the players, we are near the end of the game. The game has been consciously arranged that way by people using the sociological view whereby their own actions are excused, and even laudable; they are realists as opposed to idealists - the latter being responsible for all the conflicts.

From a critical perspective, the goal is always to improve things at a social level. At least that's the way I describe it as the minute Marxism or anything with even a shade of it is mentioned there are certain elements that will cover their ears and run away screaming. — Baden

If it were a startlingly new perspective, one might uncritically applaud the goal, but the amoral sociological perspective is the spectacles 'we' have been using for a hundred years now, and arguably is the source of just the manipulative, pacifying consumerism, the monopoly of power relations, the dehumanisation, that is being critiqued.