Some people (i.e. Searle) associate consciousness, in particular, with a linguistic capability having an irreducibly semantic component. Or at least, they associate lack of (or failure to demonstrate) consciousness with a reduction of semantics to syntax. (As in the Chinese Room.)

This particular association (i.e. consciousness <---> genuine semantics) seems a useful one, to me. What about you? — bongo fury

Things were meaningful to us long before we became aware of it. — creativesoul

I guess that nicely expresses denial of the association I proposed? (Maybe so. Not looking for a fight here. Just clarification.) — bongo fury

(I seem to have read 'aware' as 'conscious', but no harm done.)

Yes. I'm denying the characterization of consciousness as 'genuine semantics'. — creativesoul

Cool. We know where we stand. — bongo fury

But hey, kudos to us for exploring and questioning a bit further, despite the inevitable misunderstandings. I think our concerns are very similar, and there is plenty we could soon agree on, or disagree more clearly on. And in the end...

Is meaningful language use proof of consciousness? Certainly. I'm guessing that that is what Searle's Chinese Room is all about(what exactly counts as meaningful language use). Is it required for consciousness in it's most simplistic manifestation(s)? I think not. — creativesoul

So an association after all (if only one-way not two-way).

And maybe worth bringing up after all.

Semantics involves thinking about (pre-existing)meaning. Prior to thinking about X, X must first somehow exist.
— creativesoul

Prior to the chicken, the egg?
— bongo fury

:brow:

You'll have to do better than this. — creativesoul

:sigh:

You don't see the chicken and egg, here?

Clue:

Meaning is not equivalent to semantics.
— creativesoul

You've heard of the "theory of mind theory of mind"? I give you, here, a "theory of meaning theory of meaning". — bongo fury

Hi again.

Yes. I'm denying the characterization of consciousness as 'genuine semantics'. — creativesoul

Cool. We know where we stand.

Meaning is not equivalent to semantics. — creativesoul

You've heard of the "theory of mind theory of mind"? I give you, here, a "theory of meaning theory of meaning".

Semantics involves thinking about (pre-existing)meaning. Prior to thinking about X, X must first somehow exist. — creativesoul

Prior to the chicken, the egg?

Consciousness is not existentially dependent upon such high order social skills. — creativesoul

It's a hypothesis, though.

Pre and/or non-linguistic meaningful thought/belief is not existentially dependent upon language, whereas both syntax and semantics are. — creativesoul

But pre and/or non-verbal-linguistic meaningful thought/belief is of a piece with pre and/or non-verbal-linguistic language, i.e. symbolic functioning in general, with its syntactic and semantic aspects.

I put it to you that thought, belief, and meaning are part and parcel of all conscious experience. — creativesoul

Sure.

Is language part and parcel of all cases of consciousness? I don't think so. — creativesoul

Ok. I say that language in the very broad sense of symbolic functioning is part and parcel of all awareness, attention and now also (entering stage left) experiencing, thought, belief and reasoning. To distinguish the specifically conscious awareness, conscious attention, conscious experiencing, conscious thought, conscious belief and conscious reasoning, I hypothesise the need for genuinely semantical understanding, as outlined previously.

I am willing to hear an argument for consciousness being existentially dependent upon language use, and would agree as long as that claim/argument was properly quantified. Some consciousness is... Not all. — creativesoul

Some dependent on verbal language, all dependent on a genuinely semantical competence in some kind of language in the obvious wider sense (of symbolic functioning).

Hi , thanks for your response.

It's all about meaning. — creativesoul

Me too!

This endeavor also requires thinking about thought/belief. — creativesoul

... Or does it? Maybe those issues will sort themselves out if we deal with meaning first?

Things were meaningful to us long before we became aware of it. — creativesoul

I guess that nicely expresses denial of the association I proposed? (Maybe so. Not looking for a fight here. Just clarification.)

So, I'm unsure what "genuine semantics" is supposed to be referring to. — creativesoul

One that doesn't amount, on closer inspection, to just another layer of syntax. Suppose we endow a thermostat with a sub-circuit containing a coloured light-bulb. This is genuine semantics for us, as users, but for the device itself, only more syntax.

However, unless I'm mistaken he [Searle] is a speech act theorist, or was. They work from thought/belief having propositional content, — creativesoul

Well, my fascination is primarily with plain old "assertoric" speech acts, which may or may not coincide with production of declarative sentence tokens (utterances or inscriptions) but more generally amount to (as I see it) pointing of words (or pictures) at objects. As though we drew an arrow from one to the other. Which we generally don't, so we are talking here about a social skill which is in the practice of a mutually agreed pretence, and is of the highest order of complexity.

Earlier, you mentioned what we can do that chimps and babies and robots cannot. Point to both an actual symbol and it's referent. — creativesoul

Thanks for looking, and forgive the correction: it's vital to see that I am talking about our ability (e.g. the infant St. Augustine's ability) to understand that someone is pointing (directing, as it were) a word at an object. It's been fashionable for well over half a century now to dismiss such an ability as too easy a matter, and anyway unrepresentative of language as a whole. So I'm aware that I need to argue its complexity and relevance. (BTW though, our having to deal with people's constant Heraclitan equivocations between instance and kind does kind of hint at the level of complexity.)

...taking proper account of obvious prima facie meaningful and attentive thought/belief of language-less creatures. — creativesoul

Consciousness of language-less creatures, though? I would guess not. Certainly a relatively weak consciousness in creatures showing a relatively reduced form of the kind of semantical understanding just outlined. But in our closest competitors (chimps, robots) that looks very reduced indeed.

Talking of language...

Some people (i.e. Searle) associate consciousness, in particular, with a linguistic capability having an irreducibly semantic component. Or at least, they associate lack of (or failure to demonstrate) consciousness with a reduction of semantics to syntax. (As in the Chinese Room.)

This particular association (i.e. consciousness <---> genuine semantics) seems a useful one, to me. What about you?

Concerning Quine's holism:

Instead of reductionism, Quine proposes that it is the whole field of science and not single statements that are verified. All scientific statements are interconnected.

That is utterly wrong.

No, Quine's holistic solution is "not even wrong".

A scientific statement stands by itself, because it can only be tested experimentally by itself. Experimental testing of one scientific statement says nothing about any other scientific statement. You would have to experimentally test that one too. — alcontali

This would be how a "falsificationist" is an "anti-inductivist", I dare say?

The only kind of links, by which it makes sense (on this view) to connect scientific statements into some larger web, is the deductive kind of links. If the whole thing appears to hang together tighter than the known deductive links would themselves suggest, or if we are asked what brought this (rather than any other) particular set of largely unlinked statements together, we must still resist recognising any other kind of linkage.

And if we succeed in this resistance, we will find it easy enough to deny any holistic influence among scientific statements. Because we recognise far fewer links than the holist typically does.

Is this fair? Do you identify as "anti-inductivist" in this sense, of recognising only deductive links between scientific statements?

I think (but could be wrong again of course) that you've got your choice of tick/cross on your final scenario wrong in each frame? I'm reading that final pic each time as "no people, some dinosaurs"? I.e. dotted circle meaning no people?

Aren't we all agreed we are allowed to read "no people are dinosaurs" as allowing for there being no people?

Perhaps not, if we take Aristotle's alleged stance?

But as others (including @snakes alive and @unenlightened) pointed out correctly, we don't need to, to prove option (c)?

Also, what about "no people, no dinosaurs"?

Haha, no worries.

What I believe, is that the attempt to simplify a complex thing is a mistake, because it leads to misunderstanding, in the sense of a person who believes oneself to understand the thing because it has been simplified, but really does not understand the thing because it is complex. — Metaphysician Undercover

Clearly, I'm barking up the wrong tree trying to sell my favourite theory to you as a paragon of scientific systemization and simplification. Never mind.

As a non-metaphysician I don't quite see the problem with tracing (albeit provisionally) reference to future objects and events. But perhaps you will provide me with a rude awakening in that regard?
— bongo fury

You see no problem with taking it for granted that one can point to something which is not there? I don't understand how you can believe that you can point to something which is not there, and then just assume that you are actually pointing at something. — Metaphysician Undercover

No, if it turns out that there was (in the end) nothing there, I and probably the speaker will look for an alternative interpretation. I did say "albeit provisionally".

What you are really doing is pointing at language use, and insisting that all language use is a matter of pointing, but when it is shown that this is impossible because sometimes there is nothing there being pointed at, instead of seeing that this is not a matter of pointing, — Metaphysician Undercover

I notice you keep saying "pointing at something" and ignoring my reminders that it is generally a matter (or rather a mutually agreed pretence) of "pointing a word at something". This (stated properly as a semantic relation between word and object and not usually finger-pointer and object) strikes me as perfectly intuitive, something a child will recognise as being essentially what we are playing at, with language. I sense that you sense this, and are forced into mis-stating the principle in order to deflate the intuition, or to divert us into a certain famous ready-made critique of finger-pointing, which I think is an unnecessary diversion.

Obviously, we can easily cause the child to question the intuition, and quite possibly to soon disavow it. I, though, think the intuition is a good enough basis for a thoroughgoing theory, such as the one I have alluded to, recommended, and tried (however inadequately) to apply to the OP. And I thought you might be interested. And thank you very much for your highly interesting interrogations about it!

Again, why is this a problem, that we should be ever unsure whether a token is pointed at some one or several or all of the things that every token "of the word" ever points at? This would be how we generalise and particularize.
— bongo fury

I will ask you then, how is this a pointing? Suppose there are a thousand equally probable possibilities indicated by a single use of a single word, for example, "get me a cup please", when there are a thousand cups in the room. How can you describe this use of that word as a pointing? — Metaphysician Undercover

I'm admitting it's far worse than that! Your token of "cup" could be pointing at (referring to) any or all of past, present and future cups. Obviously your interlocutor will look for suitable examples that are ready to hand. You might even produce a token (or, indeed, a finger) that points out a more particular target. But you both want to allow the pointing at any or all cups as well, as this is how (according to the theory I recommend) we create what other philosophers were (and on occasion still are) inclined to call a "concept" or "idea" or "form" of a cup, but which we can better see as a classification, through language, of objects.

I'll let you have the last word. Thanks for looking!

Thanks for your continued indulgence in this matter. I will be keen, I assure you, to know of the theoretical possibilities from your perspective as well.

Telling someone what to do is not a matter of pointing to an activity, because the particular activity which is referred to does not even exist at the time of speaking. So even if we say that speaking is pointing, there is really nothing which is actually being pointed at. — Metaphysician Undercover

Not that, typically, we discourage children from pointing out hypothetical or potential circumstances? Fictional ones, even. Not in my home, anyway.

This problem is very evident with "meaning". Meaning is related to intention, and intention is related to what is wanted, and the "thing", or state, which is wanted is nonexistent. — Metaphysician Undercover

I don't know if you come to bury "meaning" here or to praise it, but I would point out that I offer a considerable simplification: in equating use, meaning, reference, denotation, labelling, and pointing; and from largely (initially at least) setting aside such related notions as intention, desire, connotation, depiction, metaphor, expression and sensitivity. This is in the spirit of enlightened reductionism outlined above, with an expectation of dividends from the theoretical effort, not least by way of insights into the related notions.

So your thesis is lacking, because it requires that we can point at non-existent things. — Metaphysician Undercover

As I was saying before, the aspiration is entirely in the direction you urge: towards an analysis that traces reference to concrete, existent things. More so, perhaps, since the reference is assumed to be by uttered or inscribed linguistic (or pictorial) tokens, rather than mental items? And you seem to me to exaggerate the difficulty of interpreting most word-pointings as being directed towards physical items. As a non-metaphysician I don't quite see the problem with tracing (albeit provisionally) reference to future objects and events. But perhaps you will provide me with a rude awakening in that regard?

Now, the speaker was not referring to that particular thing which the hearer brought, nor is "a cup" a thing unless you're Platonic realist. And, if you're such a realist, then there is a huge gap between the "thing" referred to, the Idea of "a cup", and the thing which the person brings to you, a particular cup. — Metaphysician Undercover

You're preaching to the converted, here. I'm surprised you don't see that.

So referring to an activity is always a reference to something general, but if one points to a particular thing which has carried out this activity, is carrying out, or will carry out this activity, we attempt to particularize this reference. But such a thing, to particularize the general, is impossible because there is an incompatibility between the two. — Metaphysician Undercover

If the difference between us is that you see an impossibility where I see a normal human skill of constructive ambiguity, could that be because you haven't grasped the relevance of the inscrutability involved: there being no fact of the matter?

But as you can see, the thesis that speaking is pointing is really inadequate, because pointing at all these different possibilities would require that one is pointing in many different directions at the same time. — Metaphysician Undercover

Again, why is this a problem, that we should be ever unsure whether a token is pointed at some one or several or all of the things that every token "of the word" ever points at? This would be how we generalise and particularize.

Just to be absolutely clear, I am saying that since it is false that "No people are not dinosaurs." it must necessarily be true that at least one person is not a dinosaur. And thus that there are no people is incompatible with the given premise. — unenlightened

Yep, I get it :lol: thanks :pray:

No, I don't think so. The region was excluded, so in the negation it is opened up again, but not necessarily populated.
— bongo fury

You think wrong, — unenlightened

Hey, perhaps I should have said "No I don't think so, assuming that we're using a Venn diagram to illustrate FOPL, like Snakes' - not Aristotle".

if there are no unicorns, then there are no unicorns with a horn AND no unicorns without a horn. Thus they all have a horn AND they all have no horn. — unenlightened

... all what have a horn and no horn??

By the way, you aren't suggesting that option C does follow on the assumption there are no people?

Or, that the assumption is incompatible with the given information? [Edit: this one :wink: ]

"No people are not dinosaurs" -> ~Ex[Px ^ ~Dx] — Snakes Alive

Agreed.

This is NOT true, so:
~~Ex[Px ^ ~Dx] — Snakes Alive

No, only this: [Edit: Yes! At least this:]

~{~Ex[Px ^ ~Dx]}

Which can't [Edit: yes it can] equate to

(~~Ex)[Px ^ ~Dx] = ~~Ex[Px ^ ~Dx] = Ex[Px ^ ~Dx]

as you hope, unless [Edit: if] it is ruled out that there are no people. Because after all, if there are no people,

~Ex[Px ^ ~Dx]

is true. So the negation of that would be false, but you want it to follow as true (option C).

[Edit: yeah, well I suppose wanting option C to follow is no good reason to say the negation is true, and that the previous line is therefore false, and that therefore there are no people. But of course the initial info is telling us the previous line is false, and that therefore there are no people. I think I kept imagining that there being no people could somehow survive the negation. Probably I was just thrown by the simple multiple negatives that unenlightened warned about above. :lol: Thanks and apologies to and ].

So,

If we take this as having no existential import (and it seems to me that it doesn't), then we cannot infer anything that does have existential import. This rules out A and C. — Virgo Avalytikh

is quite right. [Edit: well, no.] Where you have to be a genius (as so often with puzzles) is not with the logic [Edit: although apparently that helps] but guessing which presuppositions are meant to be obvious. The testers here might be thinking it's obvious that there are people, maybe that we shouldn't take anything of the sort for granted. We don't know. Since they take the trouble to remind us that "Note: some does not exclude all", I'm guessing they have neglected to clarify (or even notice) their own assumption that there are people. So most people here are geniuses, but Virgo you fail for being a bit too clever.

In Venn diagram terms, a universal (all or none) statement declares a region empty, but its negation declares that region populated. — unenlightened

No, I don't think so. The region was excluded, so in the negation it is opened up again, but not necessarily populated.

[Edit: ahem]

So in Aristotelian logic, 'All people are dinosaurs' does have existential import? Or is it just ambiguous? — Virgo Avalytikh

My question too, so I went here, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syllogism#Existential_import, and found interesting history and controversy to elaborate Tim's basic answer, i.e. yes assumed in Aristotle but not in modern systems. [Edit: beside the point after all.]

That should end with “QED,” — Noah Te Stroete

Haha, but "non sequitur".

Likewise, if you restrict your understanding of "inertia" to "momentum", thereby understanding inertia as mass times velocity, you will not apprehend the inertia of a body at rest. — Metaphysician Undercover

My analogy was: if you reduce your pre-systematic notions of momentum to mass times velocity, at the obvious cost of sidelining all sorts of helpful pre-systematic notions of momentum and wider aspects of motion, you gain a powerful theory which you may even find develops and generalises to apprehend all of those other pre-systematic notions, including notions of inertia. I don't claim this is the actual historical sequence with mechanics. Just that any theory is, typically, reductive (we certainly don't insist it is complete), but we hope that it produces thereby a more complete and systematic view, long term.

Sure, it may fail, and just be reductive. And a less obviously reductive theory may achieve a more systematic view. Let's judge by results.

I think that telling someone what to do, is not a matter of pointing at anything. — Metaphysician Undercover

Unless, as apparently occurs to you right away, it is a matter of pointing at an activity, probably from a range of alternatives. But,

How is an activity, which doesn't even exist yet, a thing? — Metaphysician Undercover

I mean 'thing' in the loosest sense, at least if questioned during the discourse itself, but later on...

So, how does "I can't function...", point to anything? You might say that the subject is "I" so it points to I, but the matter is "function", so the subject matter is "my functioning" and this is not a thing which is being pointed at. Subject matter in general, is not a thing. — Metaphysician Undercover

... I will prefer a parsing that imputes pointing of a word at a relatively concrete entity. Here it is quite plausible that the girl points the phrase "can't function" at her concrete self.

Then there is what you call "metaphorical use". How do you think that metaphorical use is a matter of pointing at something? — Metaphysician Undercover

By being a word-pointing that participates in a novel sorting of some domain that is not its original or usual domain. In "can't function" the transfer is from the domain of machines to the domain of people.

I really think that most language use cannot be characterized as pointing at something. — Metaphysician Undercover

Pointing of words (or phrases, or pictures or sunsets) at things, though? Participating in the vast cultural network of pointings we call usage. Helped along by what I was calling type-token equivocation, by which I meant the cultural pressure to infer (and the frequent utility in inferring) that a thing pointed at by one token of a word will tend to get pointed at by another token, and that two things alike in getting pointed at by one word will deserve to get jointly pointed at by other words too. Induction. Generalising. Learning through example and association. That kind of view of language use.

What do you even mean by "pointing a word"? Is this metaphor? — Metaphysician Undercover

Sure. If it doesn't work for you, try another? The author of the theory I'm hawking calls it "labelling". We don't literally attach words to objects by uttering them, but by a few months old we are able to play the game of inferring the semantics that later on we learn to describe in these and other metaphorical (though often dead-metaphorical) terms: "calling it a...", "describing it as...", etc.

I know that many people (under a certain famous influence) assume such a view of language to be hopelessly impoverished. To me, it looks rich enough. If it were simply a matter of establishing and following a correlation (a word-object mapping), then yes, too easy - easier than human language, and not likely to pass any Turing tests. But what the human baby does is a lot more: it understands the correlation as a large and fragile game of pretence, not reliably tied to the facts of the situation; it has to engage in the complexest kind of collaboration and negotiation.

An interesting tidbit: If you think about it, there's only one way for nature to be uniform, and infinite ways it can vary. — Purple Pond

No such luck...

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

https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/437915

Finally! We can get down to business. See if we can trade any ideas despite our (apparently) very different views on "use".

The word "use" is used in many different ways. — Metaphysician Undercover

Agreed.

If we restrict "use" to the sense of using words, — Metaphysician Undercover

... or at least recognise use of words as an important kind of use...

then I think you need to realize that we use words for a lot of things more than just pointing at things. — Metaphysician Undercover

Here we differ.

Do you agree that the most common use of words is to tell someone what to do? — Metaphysician Undercover

Well, not really, but anyway...

And do you agree that this is not a matter of pointing at something? — Metaphysician Undercover

No, not really. I think it's a matter, at least, of us striving to agree what some words (or pictures or sunsets) are pointed at. One domain from which to choose objects pointed at might be a set (perhaps fuzzy) of slabs, another domain might be a set of places-to-lay, another might be a set of expected tasks, another might be a set of payments or punishments, and so on.

"Urggh! How restrictive... "

Not necessarily. Or, rather... If only!

Under what elaborations, or other scenarios, would you like to explore / test it?

"Can't function" is nice... A relatively entrenched, 'literal' usage sorting the domain of machines into, roughly, those in working order and those not. Then, a more novel, 'metaphorical' usage to sort the different domain of people, according to criteria some of which agree and some contrast with those for literal application. An important contrast, creating humour, would be the more stringent standard, denying the status of working order to perfectly healthy and normal humans recently roused from a sleep state. The story amuses because the child has learnt the secondary, metaphorical use before the original, probably not sensing the humorous implications of the change in domain and criteria. The metaphor itself (the change in domain and criteria) amuses by creating referential links, under the surface as it were, by which other machine-words and machine-pictures are readied to help sort the domain of persons.

And of course we sense the more general struggle of the novice to project, from limited examples, to suitable occasions for pointing a word. Which is always cute. Because we feel so much more expert. Even though we can barely cope, ourselves, with the constant dilemmas of projection, domain ambiguity and type-token equivocation, which are endemic to the game.

Why do you want to restrict the meaning of "using words" to "using words for a particular purpose", when that particular purpose is to point at things? — Metaphysician Undercover

For the same reason someone might want to restrict the meaning of "momentum" to "mass times velocity". The promise of theoretical simplicity and generality. What I thought you might be craving when you lamented:

So these people are trying to create a division between this type of meaning and that type of meaning, without any supportive principles to show that one supposed "type" is actually different from the other. In reality, the meaning which a defined word has is no different from the meaning which a piece of art has, which is no different from the meaning which a beautiful sunset has. — Metaphysician Undercover

Ha ha, I like the philosophical dog, but I don't think we are on the same page here.

I meant the alleged appropriateness (complete and utter) of some particular probabilistic framework in the inductively (and therefore uncertainly) projected state of affairs wider than the evidence. I didn't mean some test of falsificationism as a doctrine. I was clarifying for Purple that Hume is not appealing to probability to justify induction.

Pardon me if I'm being too serious here. Or yet unclear.

You mean the habit of the mind to associate two or more things that are constantly conjoined, justifies our belief that they will be constantly conjoined in the future? — Purple Pond

It justifies our provisional (falsifiable) theories, yes.

Why? — Purple Pond

Seems to work.

It's not obvious that our habits of association in the past are relevant to what will happen in the future. — Purple Pond

Eh?? You don't choose to adopt such habits of association, then, in your daily life?

Am I missing some point? — Purple Pond

You're not alone in finding the whole situation to be a scandal.

mine and Hume's personal beliefs about the efficacy of induction are not of any importance in this discussion. We're here to consider arguments not personal beliefs. — Purple Pond

Yes, arguments, not only beliefs. Including arguments about whether deductive argument from observationally verifiable premises is sufficient to support induction. Hume argues it is not.

The point is that Hume needs to provide justification for his use of induction — Purple Pond

Which is that it seems to work.

But what's left? You say habits and customs, but first I need you to explain exactly how they justify our use of induction. — Purple Pond

They seem to work.

Yes, it does. Just not a guarantee.
— bongo fury
You mean lend probable support? — Purple Pond

No, because as you say:

You would then have to assign probabilities to events. How do you do that without assuming that the past will be like the future? — Purple Pond

So I mean, rather, it lends inductive (fallible, less than certain) support to a hypothesis which may or may not be framed in probabilistic terms. But which, if it is so framed, will - as I think you are rightly pointing out - imply a universal hypothesis about the appropriateness of a particular statistical or probabilistic framework.

To cut a long story short, in my opinion, Hume makes sense by supporting falsificationism because Pavlov's dog does that too. — alcontali

Which points up that the question too rarely asked in this kind of discussion is: "which are the good habits and customs... the good inductive hypotheses thereby produced?". Falsifiable ones, yes. Let's assume that. But that leaves an embarrassment of riches to choose from. Unlike the dog, we may want to decide (and formulate) what are the best habits to follow.

What kind of justification do you have in mind that he would approve of? — Purple Pond

Habit, custom.

Hume may believe that induction is efficacious, however that doesn't excuse him from coughing up justification in order to persuade others. — Purple Pond

Why not? Do you not advocate science, on the grounds of its success?

Put it this way, how is he supposed to convince me his inductive conclusion is accurate when he puts serious doubts on the very process of induction? — Purple Pond

He doesn't put doubts on the process. Like I said, he only wants to recommend that you give up the futile search for a justification in deduction.

He approves of it in the sense that when he stops philosophizing he forgets all his skeptical doubts and goes on with his day. — Purple Pond

Which, if I remember rightly, he implies was a relatively louche existence. But if he was a scientist, it would mean getting on with his science. Following inductive habits and customs, of course.

It doesn't mean that he thinks that there is any rational reason why induction will continue to work. — Purple Pond

Yes, it does. Just not a guarantee.

I specifically mentioned his words, "custom", and "habit". To me it makes it seem like Hume is implying that our inductions are quite arbitrary. — Purple Pond

He definitely doesn't want you to think that way.

... for Hume there is no warrant for extrapolating beyond what we observe and remember. — Purple Pond

You mean extrapolating deductively? Yes, that's right. No warrant for induction in deduction from experience.

If you say that he does warrant such things, I'm dying to know what kind of warrant he approves of. — Purple Pond

Habit, custom.

I agree that induction can't be justified using deduction, — Purple Pond

And that is the only kind of justification which Hume is seeking to deny to induction. He isn't trying to discredit induction as an enterprise, he is only asking how, in general, it might get done. Rather than inventing some infallible method, he quite sensibly looks at how animals generalise beyond their experience. You can question the flow of sources backing up his biological and psychological claims about the role of habit, but you can't say he is inconsistent. Quite the opposite. He is probably reaching these claims through the exercise of precisely those habits of mind that he ends up claiming are efficacious (though fallible) for such a purpose.

What I find odd is that right after Hume talks about how induction is unjustified — Purple Pond

Nope! He approves of it.

From what I see, it's not only that Hume uses induction when he argues that induction is unjustified, — Purple Pond

Nope! He loves it.

Hume is using induction as if it were a perfectly fine method to show that, after all, it's a rather arbitrary method (habit, custom). — Purple Pond

Nope! Not arbitrary, depends on experience.

Whereas, I see it as a game of 'pretend', on which we must collaborate.
— bongo fury

Yes, I understand this, but where does the "we must collaborate" come from? — Metaphysician Undercover

So... you do understand how I might see your example (of how you use the words to point at different things) as a game of 'pretend', but it surprises you that I might see this as likely to involve collaboration?

You wouldn't expect a game of 'pretend' to involve agreement about what is to be pretended? (If it is to amount to a game between or among players, and not just a set of one-person games?)

Do you recognize a difference between loving a person and using a person? — Metaphysician Undercover

Rather, you are saying you oppose dignifying a narrower, technical sense of "use" whereby it means, more specifically, "using a word to refer to something" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Use–mention_distinction)? You want instead to emphasise and keep in play the very general sense of "using something in some way"? Resist reducing linguistic "use" to the mere pointing of words at things?

Such a disagreement between us (where you resist what I embrace) is what I said I expected to be the case, yes. Do you agree this is the disagreement? — bongo fury

Agreement (about just where it is we disagree) looming in sight? No, I don't kid myself, but anyway...

You say,

When I say something to someone, and the person understands what I have said (understanding is demonstrated by the person's actions), I do not think that it is the case that the person agrees with how I use the words to point at different things. I think it is simply the case that the person understands how I use the words to point at different things. — Metaphysician Undercover

Exactly! As though there were some fact of the matter (to be understood) of how you use the words to point at different things.

Whereas, I see it as a game of 'pretend', on which we must collaborate.

You say,

So for example, when a person speaks to me using a lot of jargon which I do not think is warranted in the situation, I might understand what that person is saying, but I wouldn't agree with that person's use of words. — Metaphysician Undercover

Whereas I reject the jargon for the reason that it is not conducive to the necessary collaboration. We won't be able to agree (enough) what things (we should pretend) the words are pointed at.

Hence the gulf between our agendas, explaining why you answer this,

Do you associate meaning with use? (Or were you just interrogating T Clark on the point?) I certainly do associate the two. Equate them, even. But probably I see it/them quite differently to you. I see it as definitely not a matter of fact, but one we can reliably find agreement on in many cases (the clear ones). Like the case of a single grain of wheat not being a heap, snow not being black etc. I deny that you can (within the language) succeed in pointing the word heap at a single grain. Whereas, from what you say, I'm guessing you will accept any such attempt at use as inevitably counting as an instance of use of the word, however anomalous? — bongo fury

... with this,

I do associate "use" with meaning, but I would not equate the two. I believe that meaning extends beyond use. We could consider the metaphysical distinction between "good" and "beauty". "Good" is associated with use, but "beauty" is something desired for no purpose, just for the sake of itself. So "a good" is desired, and called "good" for some purpose, use, and it is meaningful because it is useful for that purpose. But things of beauty are desired and are apprehended as meaningful, though not because they are useful for a purpose. That brings meaning more toward the desire, rather than the act which is intended to fulfill the desire (use). This is why I believe that "use" accounts for some aspects of meaning, but it doesn't account for the entirety of meaning. — Metaphysician Undercover

Which is fine, I'm not complaining. We have different agendas, different half-baked theories of discourse. I speak for mine when I say half-baked - yours can be done if you like.

As expected, very different views on "use", the difference resting, if I'm not mistaken, on whether we see reference as a matter of fact.

Bongo had said that we strive for agreement, — Metaphysician Undercover

... about, specifically, which words (or pictures or sunsets) are pointed (already or eventually) at which things.

I was aware that as a description of human discourse this calls for plenty of clarification, and I was trying to begin it by alluding to the "inscrutability of reference": the (alleged) fact that any actual connection between symbol and object is in our imagination or diagram. (Straw man version: no bolt of energy passes between symbol and object.) MU thought this irrelevant, so I wasn't surprised to find it difficult to know how best to engage with their subsequent critique, or whether it really engaged with mine.

But I fancy that their evident fear and loathing of equivocation might be related to my own fascination with what I see as a kind of equivocation at the heart of the social game (of agreeing what is pointed at what). As when, for example, we equivocate between implying that a particular token is (or isn't) pointed at a thing and implying rather that every single token "of the word" is (or isn't) pointed at the thing. Not to mention the equivocation dual with this, between referring to a single thing and referring to each of a whole class of ("same") things.

Not that I would think that all of this equivocating is necessarily a problem, if properly understood. Nor that I'm assuming anyone else would think it necessarily a problem, or that they don't already understand it better than I do. Hard to know what people's assumptions are in a discussion of this sort. Well, obvs.

Being smothered to death by a blanket though does not seem like a good way to go. — Fooloso4

You're drunk, aren't you?

... reposting... below

Sure, why not. — Fooloso4

No reason at all. We're all gonna die. Etc.

Let's compromise: snooty joke.

In my opinion Witty [...] was a genius who stopped his thinking at a premature insight, whereas he ought to have proceeded further in his thinking.

"A conclusion is a place where you stop when you got tired of thinking." -- traditional, origin unknown. — god must be atheist

Well! With these kinds of views, I'm surprised you dare to show your face here in church.

I think our poor little three year old has suffocated under her blanket. It seems that no one has been paying attention to her. — Fooloso4

Fair, if snooty, point. If my last post above is in any way to blame for your sense of dislocation then I should admit that I didn't explain how I might have expected MU, or anyone, to appreciate the relevance of "inscrutability" to the girl's efforts. In fact, I didn't even link back to here,

But if you think of "meaning" in this way, as something which is attributed to words, you would have to accept that we can use words without knowing the meaning of the words. How would we characterize this type of use then? The child gets some sort of message across to the parents, but we cannot call it "meaning", because the child doesn't know the meaning. What is the child doing?
— Metaphysician Undercover

She is doing what we all have to do all the time, to a greater or lesser extent. Play the game of pointing the words (or pictures or sunsets) at what they (already, or are destined eventually to) point at. About which there obviously can be (as famously noted) "no fact of the matter". But about which we are nonetheless happy to strive to agree. — bongo fury

... which might have helped - since neither of us, here, is badly neglecting the child. I generalising unashamedly, yes.

Do you, also, find there being or not being a fact of the matter of meaning to be irrelevant to the girl's concerns?

Bongo had said that we strive for agreement, — Metaphysician Undercover

... about, specifically, which words (or pictures or sunsets) are pointed (already or eventually) at which things.

I was aware that as a description of human discourse this calls for plenty of clarification, and I was trying to begin it by alluding to the "inscrutability of reference": the (alleged) fact that any actual connection between symbol and object is in our imagination or diagram. (Straw man version: no bolt of energy passes between symbol and object.) MU thought this irrelevant, so I wasn't surprised to find it difficult to know how best to engage with their subsequent critique, or whether it really engaged with mine.

But I fancy that their evident fear and loathing of equivocation might be related to my own fascination with what I see as a kind of equivocation at the heart of the social game (of agreeing what is pointed at what). As when, for example, we equivocate between implying that a particular token is (or isn't) pointed at a thing and implying rather that every single token "of the word" is (or isn't) pointed at the thing. Not to mention the equivocation dual with this, between referring to a single thing and referring to each of a whole class of ("same") things.

Not that I would think that all of this equivocating is necessarily a problem, if properly understood. Nor that I'm assuming anyone else would think it necessarily a problem, or that they don't already understand it better than I do. Hard to know what people's assumptions are in a discussion of this sort. Well, obvs.

If we say that there is a "way of using" a word, then the generalization is intrinsic to this concept, "way of using". What would validate a "way of using", if not some faulty assumption that X (a particular instance of use) is the same as Y (a particular instance of use)? — Metaphysician Undercover

Nominalist, heal thyself!

- Does unconscious processing = unconscious awareness ? (e.g. in a thermostat)
- Does unconscious processing = unconscious attention ? (e.g. in a CCTV camera)
— bongo fury

What your definition of Awareness and Attention ? And of unconscious processing too — Basko

What my examples suggest is that, by any definitions plausibly grounded in common usage, Awareness and Attention fail, by themselves, to distinguish conscious from unconscious processing, because they pervade both.

But that shouldn't discourage the defining and the modelling. We (or they) will get there in the end!

My hobby horse is, we need to improve our descriptions of consciousness by questioning the folk-psychology of inner words and pictures. AI (still a few years at least from creating consciousness) appears to have moved on from the time when it assumed a basis in image files and other internal symbols, located in and retrievable from memory stores. And so ought psychology. And philosophy.

But I agree that defining and recognising consciousness - what kinds of processing are to qualify - is key. My hunch (if you asked me? perhaps not!) is that the difference coincides very roughly with the gap between us and chimps... or human new-borns... or (so far, as yet) robots. What we can do that they largely can't. Which is play the social game of pointing actual symbols (words and pictures) at things in the world.

As expected, very different views on "use". Thanks for going over yours once more.

Anyway, I remain a fan of your previous diatribe against (other people's) unnecessary multiplication of types or categories of meaning.

My questions are simple :

- Does consciousness = Awareness ?
- Does consciousness = Attention ?
- Does consciousness = Both ? or Something else ? — Basko

... and helpful, I think. How about the following refinement?

- Does consciousness = conscious awareness ?
- Does consciousness = conscious attention ?
- Does consciousness = Both ? or Something else ?

To which we could add,

- Does unconscious processing = unconscious awareness ? (e.g. in a thermostat)
- Does unconscious processing = unconscious attention ? (e.g. in a CCTV camera)
- Does unconscious processing = Both ? or Something else ?

Answering (any or all of these) is taking a punt on picking the best way to discover and explain the difference between conscious and unconscious processing.

Thanks for the further clarification.

I'm guessing you can't mean "there is no such thing as 'using something' in a general sense because each instance of using something is unique and particular"?

Rather, you are saying you oppose dignifying a narrower, technical sense of "use" whereby it means, more specifically, "using a word to refer to something" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Use–mention_distinction)? You want instead to emphasise and keep in play the very general sense of "using something in some way"? Resist reducing linguistic "use" to the mere pointing of words at things?

Such a disagreement between us (where you resist what I embrace) is what I said I expected to be the case, yes. Do you agree this is the disagreement?

As expected, very different views on "use". Thanks for the clarification.

What other way would it be? Figurative pain? Metaphorical pleasure? Abstract taste? Well, maybe that one for some people. Non-literal feelings?

I dream of platonic reds and functional sounds. — Marchesk

Ok... I mean, SUPPOSING all that were ok... how do you answer the inevitable, literal-minded question, "where are they, then?"

Are they in a brain?

What's this --- we are happy to strive to agree? In some instances we co-operate and truly do strive to agree, happily. But in other instances, like in the philosophy forum, we happily disagree. — Metaphysician Undercover

Happily? Only, I would say, in those lucky cases where we can agree about what we are disagreeing about (in my book, agree about what each of us were pointing the words at). Only then can we say: either, ok, it's a matter of opinion, we'll agree to disagree; or else, oh dear, one version must be wrong, but we'll allow both accounts to co-exist for now. But, in that case, only for now. I'm surprised you can't see the strife as striving for agreement? No one need assume that any eventual settlement must be congenial for all parties.

Hope you and T Clark don't mind if I butt in here, because it's relevant to the above...

Do you see a difference between knowing how a word was used, and the act of using a word? If you associate meaning with use, then I would say that knowing the meaning of a word is knowing how the word was used. This accounts for the fact that the same word has different meaning in different instances of use. Meaning is specific to the instance of use, and knowing its meaning is knowing how it was used in that particular instance. — Metaphysician Undercover

Do you associate meaning with use? (Or were you just interrogating T Clark on the point?) I certainly do associate the two. Equate them, even. But probably I see it/them quite differently to you. I see it as definitely not a matter of fact, but one we can reliably find agreement on in many cases (the clear ones). Like the case of a single grain of wheat not being a heap, snow not being black etc. I deny that you can (within the language) succeed in pointing the word heap at a single grain. Whereas, from what you say, I'm guessing you will accept any such attempt at use as inevitably counting as an instance of use of the word, however anomalous?

So these people are trying to create a division between this type of meaning and that type of meaning, without any supportive principles to show that one supposed "type" is actually different from the other. In reality, the meaning which a defined word has is no different from the meaning which a piece of art has, which is no different from the meaning which a beautiful sunset has. — Metaphysician Undercover

:up: :up: :up:

But if you think of "meaning" in this way, as something which is attributed to words, you would have to accept that we can use words without knowing the meaning of the words. How would we characterize this type of use then? The child gets some sort of message across to the parents, but we cannot call it "meaning", because the child doesn't know the meaning. What is the child doing? — Metaphysician Undercover

She is doing what we all have to do all the time, to a greater or lesser extent. Play the game of pointing the words (or pictures or sunsets) at what they (already, or are destined eventually to) point at. About which there obviously can be (as famously noted) "no fact of the matter". But about which we are nonetheless happy to strive to agree.

Spartan enough and general enough?

I just have them along with pains, sounds, tastes, thoughts, etc. — Marchesk

I meant literally?

Are you a philosophical zombie? Because you argue as if you have no conscious experiences. If I ask whether you experience pain, are you going to give me some functional/physiological response? — Marchesk

Ha ha, I have wondered if I am transitioning into a consciousness-denier! I don't think so. I think I'm learning to recognise some wrong descriptions.

Is it the skepticism about mental pictures / symbols in the brain? Do you need them in your intuition of consciousness or perception? You can have pictures and other symbols in a camera or a computer, obviously. Presumably they aren't sufficient for consciousness or perception. Are they necessary?