There seem mainly two groups arguing in this thread. One is those who have not read any RGC but are quite sure his ideas are nonsense. And others who have read more-or-less but have not, more-or-less, understood what he is about with his absolute presuppositions. — tim wood

This is pretty presumptuous of you. You already stated that you were "not an authority" on RGC.

This is what happens when someone pushes the boundaries in proposing a concept, trying to assign to the concept, a function which is impossible. — Metaphysician Undercover

This is exactly the error that Collingwood says results in the suicide of positivistic metaphysics, trying to justify the presuppositions of natural science. It is unlikely that he is making the error that you suggest as his whole intention is not to make that error.

Absolute presuppositions have no truth value. — T Clark

No, but they relate to a set of propositions which do or can have truth values.

I don't see how this works in practice.
I don't see how one could see through a person's strategizing and cunning. — baker

I am assuming that, empirically and socially, the actions of a person that are directed by a genuine belief must be measurably different from those of a person promulgating a false belief. Presumably things like long-term consistency, cogency of presentation, tendency to evoke comprehension in others. I am assuming that "the truth will out" in some sense, or more precisely, "the false will out," and reveal its own falsity. It is an hypothesis.

If you are dissimulating, you are intentionally mis-communicating. If you are practicing authenticity, then the possibility of understanding is greatest. That would have significance for coordinated group planning and action, for example.

Personally, I assume there are manifestations of genuine belief that distinguish it from fake belief. That's what the bit you quoted suggests. Authenticity, credibility, efficacy, communicability, comprehensibility.

Thanks. I feel it generated quite a bit of substantive discussion, and raised some interest in Collingwood. Discussion is good. I'd like to look more into philosophies about shared background assumptions where that is the main topic, not a point of contention.

I'd agree that ordinary language expresses its meaning sufficiently, as apparently does R.G. Collingwood.

Not according to ordinary usage, and what better determines the meaning of terms? — Janus

The business of language is to express or explain; if language cannot explain itself, nothing else can explain it.
R.G. Collingwood, Essay on Philosophical Method

Ok. from where I sit, something presupposed is 'presumed to be the case'. Does this not exactly describe a belief?

Function, function, function. As means of transportation, you can have it that cars and bicycles are the same. But they're different. Can you discern the differences? Which would you prefer to take to the store? — tim wood

I don't understand the analogy at all. Believing is the most you can do. You react to something as if it were true. That is exactly what a presupposition is. You do not presuppose in the mode of dis-belief, or even non-belief.

Hey.....no fair confusing me, dammit!!! I had to go back through all my comments to see if I indicated absolute presuppositions were not presupposed, and I couldn’t find where I gave that indication. I’m arguing contrary to your claim that presuppositions are beliefs, which I emphatically reject on purely metaphysical grounds. So, no, there is no reason to think absolute presuppositions are not presupposed. In fact, it is no other way possible for them to be logically viable, then to be presupposed. — Mww

Ok. Well, as I said, it amounts to a clarification of what constitutes belief.

Beliefs are more fundamental than knowledge in the sense that you can have belief without knowledge, but not knowledge without belief. Not only that, but you can have true beliefs without knowledge. So is there something more fundamental than believing? I don't think so. Any thetic (positional) consciousness must be coming from some kind of position, which can be described as its "functional beliefs" (because otherwise, what else is it? If it is anything, it is the nexus of all of its most likely reactions.

In what sense is a "presupposition" not a kind of belief?

Yes, but these are relative presuppositions, — Mww

There is no reason to believe that absolute presuppositions are not presupposed.

And I qualified the sense in which they were 'functional hypotheses'.

Even if that's true, having a choice in how to react to that seems like it might in itself be meaningful.

And so more and more I find myself attracted to the idea of a 10 yearish exit plan. I don't have any kids, so no strings there. I do have a wife, but she's beautiful and almost 10 years younger than me so she will find another partner. I am also completely honest with her about how I feel in terms of aging. I am thinking why not maximize the next 10 years and do what I REALLY want to do, instead of merely surviving. I have some savings due to a property I sold, and so could rent and work part-time at a low stress job (something related to cars which I love) and just live life to the fullest. Live the kind of free life I would likely live if I won the lottery. I would live in a cool light filled loft, drive an exotic car and just wake up and do whatever the fuck I want that day. — dazed

The interesting thing would be, to do this, and find at the end of the ten years that you had attained a higher wisdom, which would enable you to carry on in even greater contentment living day-to-day, the means of being no longer being of any concern to you....

Agreed, and sustained in Prop. 5, “absolute presuppositions are not propositions”, and if not a proposition, cannot be considered in propositional form, which weighing and choosing would seem to require. — Mww

If they are presuppositions, then they are "pre-supposed". I would be interested to learn what kind of psychological mechanism "pre-supposing" is that does not involve choice. Unless you consider it a more primitive kind of choosing. They are "fundamental hypotheses" about the nature of reality, not expressible in propositional form directly but consonant with some set of relative propositions, which are taken for granted and acted upon as if they were real, in consequence of which is engendered all actual behaviours, including scientific theorization.

One could almost call this a natural "direction" of one's thought, I think that Bergson uses this metaphor.

If belief is the consequence of some cognition relative to a thing in conjunction with a judgement made upon it with respect to the subjective validity of the cognition, it follows that presupposition does not lend itself to any of those cognitive faculties relating thought to an object, — Mww

Why should we construe belief so narrowly? Beliefs apply to things like cultural norms and habitual practices and for the vast majority of people take the form of presuppositions. This overly-formalized academic construal specifically misses the sense in which these core beliefs determine the course of thinking, both scientific and everyday.

Absolute presuppositions are not considered, weighed, and chosen, although some scientific theories do evolve them more consciously — tim wood

How can a scientific theory be conscious? You are talking about thinking people, and the thought of thinking people is based upon beliefs. As I have now repeatedly said, I think what is being quibbled over here is the nature of belief. I think Collingwood has called attention to a very important feature of belief, that it is structured around Absolute Propositions which are fundamental (metaphysical) perspectives on reality that we assume (with more or less awareness, depending on whether we are metaphysicians).

When scientists are forced to do their own metaphysics because ordinary thinking has outpaced current metaphysics, Collingwood calls them "amateur metaphysicians".

...different sets of absolute presuppositions correspond not only with differences in the structure of what is generally called scientific thought but with differences in the entire fabric of civilization.
(RGC, EM, ch 7, part 2) — Pantagruel

As I said previously, they are fundamental to a perspective on a state of affairs, and our shared AP's constitute the milieu of our civilization.

Professional metaphysicians (...who claim for their own work the name of metaphysics because they regard it as a study of absolute presuppositions) may fail to do the kind of work which is required of them by the advance of ordinary or non-metaphysical thought because their metaphysical analysis has become out of date, i.e. presupposes that ordinary thought still stands in a situation in which it once stood, but in which it stands no longer.(Ch 8)

So "ordinary thought" is the manifestation of absolute presuppositions, and it is this which forms the object of study for the metaphysician, and the practical manifestation of Absolute Presuppositions (by the scientist and everybody else). Again, this is the sense in which I am aligning Absolute Presupposition with the concept of belief.

I'd say that our beliefs determine our thought more than our thought determines our beliefs. This is why these core beliefs (APs) are modifiable by way of metaphysical endeavour, rather than subjected to the whims of ordinary thought. They are constitutive beliefs.

I'd go as far as to suggest that the conscious self is that whose being is its beliefs. I think therefore I am as existential-synthesis. I am because (and what) I believe.

To me, the most important insight of Collingwood's essay is that absolute presuppositions are not facts. They are not true or false. They are useful or not useful in the particular situation in which we find ourselves. — T Clark

Right. They are much more basic than facts. They constitute the viewpoints from which facts are perceived:

...different sets of absolute presuppositions correspond not only with differences in the structure of what is generally called scientific thought but with differences in the entire fabric of civilization.
(RGC, EM, ch 7, part 2)

I think that faith relates to the effort required to produce belief. — Metaphysician Undercover

Insofar as this might be interpreted as a fundamental commitment I'd agree. We don't just "get to believe" - there is more to it than that.

Collingwood's position is that the entire notion of ontology as a theory of pure being is erroneous and a mistake.

The underlying logic of this metaphysics is that the mind knows the forms immediately through intellecual intuition. — Wayfarer

Collingwood takes Metaphysics to its Aristotelian origin, which literally simply meant "everything in his works which came after the writings on physics". His conception of metaphysics is from the "ground up" and doesn't pertain to this particular Aristotelian tenet. This is a red herring in the context of this thread. Read Chapter 1 of the Essay on Metaphysics.

Let's lay the dispute about what is and isn't said by Collingwood to rest right here.

"the metaphysician discovers what absolute presuppositions have been made in a certain piece of scientific work by using the records of that work as evidence"

Absolute presuppositions are

1. held by individuals
2. have logical, epistemic and practical consequences with respect to specific inferences or actions

To me, this not only clearly belief, I would go so far as to say it exemplifies belief. It describes core or foundational beliefs, which are so fundamental that, by their very nature, they resist excavation. If you don't like my definition of belief, that's another matter. My post is predicated on this position. It represents an "absolute presupposition" of my conceptual framework. :)

I think this shows the difference of what tim wood, Collingwood, and I mean when we say absolute presupposition from what you do. It's not a fact. It's not true, but it's not false either. It has no truth value. If you want to call that a belief, ok, but it's misleading. — T Clark

It's not. Collingwood is quite clear. It's a functional entity. Read the example from the Stanford Encyclopedia (which is from Essays in Metaphysics). Read the section of applicability to different schemas of physics. Whatever "absolute presuppositions" are, they are certainly real components of our psyche. If you don't like the word "beliefs" because of some connotations that you insist on applying to that term, I understand. They are "fundamental orientations" to which we are epistemically and practically committed.

My approach is outside the scope of his inquiry, but not contradictory. I would hope, both complementary and complimentary.

It is in the excerpt from the Standford Encyclopedia I posted, illustrating how absolute presuppositions link to 'performative belief.'

f you cannot nor will not get it into your head that beliefs and presuppositions are not the same thing at all, then you don't get it. — tim wood

The SE interprets Absolute Presuppositions explicitly as being essentially operational beliefs from a very unambiguous example in the Essay on Metaphysics.

The beliefs may not be explicit, but the actions are. People may not know what they believe, but they do act. And when they act, they are "realizing" their fundamental beliefs, whatever those are...

Perhaps you are getting hung up on the terminology? I try to go with the "overall sense" within the context of the work.

And just for good measure, here is from the Stanford Encyclopedia

Collingwood’s denial that absolute presuppositions have truth values informs a commitment to a kind of explanatory pluralism according to which the choice between different kinds of explanation does not depend on whether they capture pure being but on whether they are fit for purpose. He illustrates this explanatory pluralism by imagining a scenario in which a car stops while driving up a steep hill. As the driver stands by the side of the road a passerby, who happens to be a theoretical physicist offers his help. The car, he explains, has stopped because

the top of a hill is farther removed from the earth’s centre than its bottom and … consequently more power is needed to take the car uphill than to take her along the level. (EM 1998: 302)

A second passerby (who happens to be an Automobile Association man) proffers a different explanation: he holds up a loose cable and says “Look here, Sir, you are running on three cylinders” (EM 1998: 303). The first explanation invokes the sense of causation that belongs to the theoretical sciences of nature, sense III. The second explanation invokes the sense of causation that belongs to the practical sciences of nature, sense II. The choice between these explanations, for Collingwood is determined by the nature of the question asked. As he puts it:

If I had been a person who could flatten out hills by stamping on them the passerby would have been right to call my attention to the hill as the cause of the stoppage; not because the hill was a hill but because I was able to flatten it out. (EM 1998: 303)


In other words, the absolute presupposition is distinguished specifically with respect to its possible enaction, which is exactly what my whole OP revolves around.

The letters are black, the page is white, yes, that's black letter.

the idea that "absolute presuppositions are basically beliefs that function in a certain way," is as close to being dead wrong while still breathing as you can get — tim wood

This is dead wrong. Per the critical piece I cited. It is a reasonable line of inquiry within the parameters of Collingwood's writings, which do not extend that far, but certainly don't contradict the position.

There's nothing wrong with being wrong, only in not learning from it.....

My point is, it is a reasonable line of inquiry, and that's all I ever claimed it to be Tim. There is always that which is implicit within the explicit. Background assumptions are vast. I very clearly did demarcate where my reasoning extended out from Collingwood's, so you can appreciate where I would be a little sensitive to the imputation of mischaracterization.

Your "i.e., believed" then is yours and not RGC's. Yours a reading-into as opposed to a reading-out-of, and as such a misrepresentation - and a major misreading - of his thinking. Confusing - conflating - belief and presupposition in RGC's thinking simply a mistake. — tim wood

You speak with such authority.

Here is an excerpt from the Journal "Graduate Studies at Texas Tech University," from "An Emendation of RGC's Doctrine of Absolute Presuppositions" which is completely consistent with my presentation.


My central thesis is that Collingwood's absolute presuppositions are basically beliefs that function in a certain way, and that what he calls metaphysics is actually the study of belief systems....Subsequently I shall offer numerous comments concerning the status of principia within a belief system, but at the moment, it is necessary to say something about the nature of belief in general. A belief is basically a habitual way of acting, not the actions themselves; belief is a habit such that, given a particular situation, one will act in a certain way. Collingwood used phrases suggestive of this doctrine in enough instances to lead one to suspect that he might have been
willing to concur with it had it come explicitly to his attention. For example, in discussing a change from one Absolute Presupposition to another, he stated that "it is the most radical change a man can undergo, and entails the abandonment of all his most firmly established habits and standards for thought and action. "

https://ttu-ir.tdl.org/bitstream/handle/2346/72442/ttu_icasal_000191.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y

So, sorry Tim, but you are not quite the authority that you present or believe yourself to be.

Ah, no. R.G. Collingwood's (RGC) ideas on metaphysics are simple and powerful. It is a shame to misunderstand them and get them wrong. — tim wood

Yes, you've recapitulated RGC's arguments. None of which contradicts my interpretation. He says quite clearly, the logical efficacy of a supposition does not derive from its truth, but only on its being supposed, i.e. believed. And absolute presuppositions are fundamental, that is, they are pre-supposed.

So, this is black letter from the "Essay on Metaphysics" and its what I meant and said. I certainly extended it further, built upon Collingwood's framework. That was also made clear.

I do own all three of those books you kindly recommend.

What you refer to here is the act of believing, which is distinct from, and ought not be called "belief". — Metaphysician Undercover

I disagree. That's the essence of the whole post. It is in criticism of the whole process of "hypothetical beliefs," which is what you are espousing. Beliefs are much more robust than their empirical "filler". Specifically, with respect to "absolute presuppositions" which are the topic.

That thing is a memory — Metaphysician Undercover

This is speculation. A belief is instantiated in the act of believing To the point, since we are measuring actual believing as a kind of commitment which further manifests the belief in some kind of action.

Everyone (except a few) believe in climate change.
Someone believes in the quality of this belief and then wants to make a difference. — javi2541997

It makes sense. People who really believe can be committed in a way that people who do not really believe cannot.

So from personal experience, it seems that three stages exist: carelessness about knowledge, dabbling accumulation of fact such that a general picture of reality takes shape semiconsciously, and active synthesis for the sake of optimizing one's grasp of truth. The procession from one stage to the next is like a phase change in matter, — Enrique

I like this characterization, especially the analogy of the "phase change"....

I use it as a basis for looking at potential for research and for a reference for thinking through ideas. — Jack Cummins

Yes, it is more of a tool for finding a source than an actual source, at least in any non-trivial sense.

So, probably, the epitome could be: being a believer in beliefs than can bring the power of act inside the world/society I live in. — javi2541997

Exactly. There is a correspondence between the quality of belief and the quality of the presentation (enactment) of the belief. That would be the fundamental (or to use Collingwood's term, absolute) presupposition.

To believe is to have an attitude of confidence toward your memory. Then a belief is the memory subjected to that attitude of confidence. — Metaphysician Undercover

Right, the belief is the "attitude of confidence" that is what we are discussing. It is not the memory, and it doesn't have to be "about" memory. Belief is always a living, current, fundamental commitment.

All those words which you are applying in reference to your belief, "I am writing this now", require a memory of meaning. — Metaphysician Undercover

This would be a vicious circularity. You can't believe something unless you already believed something. Clearly we do begin to believe, which is not an 'historical fact'.

Probably to reach the best goal everyone aspire = happiness — javi2541997

Yes, people don't 'believe' they want to be happy, they just do.