Not re aboutness, and if you do, you have no comprehension of aboutness. — Terrapin Station

Again, there is a distinction between words about some idea and words about some state-of-affairs.

Statements of what Star Wars is about is about ideas, not about some state-of-affairs.

If you were to tell a person about Star Wars, should they believe that Wookies actually exist and Star Wars is about real Wookies, or is it an idea about Wookies?

When you talk about state of affairs, are you referring to the ideas in your head, or the state of affairs? If you say that you are referring to your ideas, then do your ideas refer to some state of affairs? If so, then aren't you indirectly taking about states of affairs as opposed to beliefs that they refer to? Isn't the fact that you can make that distinction indicative of something? If you aren't making that distinction then are you an anti-realist? Aren't you using a shortcut in language and context to imply that you are taking about states of affairs instead of your beliefs? If I were to admit that I was talking about my beliefs as opposed to some state of affairs would you be more or less inclined to believe what I said?

It seems to me that is realism is the case then we make statements about states of affairs external to our minds. If realism isn't the case then there is no distinction between ideas and states of affairs independent of the mind.

Yes, it is. — Terrapin Station

So you don't make distinctions between the idea of igneous rocks and actual igneous rocks. Got it.

For some reason you're thinking "If it's possible to be wrong about x, then I can't be sure about x," but that's not actually how psychology works. — Terrapin Station

But we are on a philosophy forum where we are skeptical about the very nature of knowledge itself.

Of course they can be. "Igneous rock is always polka-dotted" is wrong, but it's about igneous rock. "About" is a term that tells us what we're referring to semantically in the sentence in question, or what we're thinking of in a thought that we have. (What we're referring to semantically in a sentence is what we're thinking of, really.) — Terrapin Station

But it isn't about the igneous rock if the igneous rock isn't polka-dotted. You'd be referring to the igneous rock in your head, not the one outside of it. So it's really an issue of making a category mistake.

Yes, of course I'm sure I have beliefs.

What does any of that have to do with anything I just said? — Terrapin Station

You said:

You can't statement something that isn't a belief. — Terrapin Station

I said:

But beliefs can be wrong. — Harry Hindu

Do you agree that beliefs can be wrong?

If so,

AND you can't statement something that isn't a belief (in other words, statements are beliefs that can be wrong)

then how can you be sure that you have beliefs? You could be wrong.

I didn't say that satatements can't be about states of affairs. — Terrapin Station

When beliefs/statements are wrong then they necessarily can't be about some state of affairs.
When beliefs/statements are right they necessarily are about some state of affairs.

That a statement is about some state of affairs doesn't imply that the statement isn't a belief. — Terrapin Station

But beliefs can be wrong. States-of-affairs just are. Are you not sure that you have beliefs?

I said "You can't state something that isn't a belief." — Terrapin Station

So then every statement of yours in every one of your posts isn't about some state-of-affairs - like "You can't state something that isn't a belief."? So "You can't state something that isn't a belief" really isn't some state-of-affairs. It is a belief. So that means "You can't state something that isn't a belief" isn't really true outside of your own mind.

Hmmm. So you can't make a distinction between a belief and some actual state-of-affairs? So, "Donald Trump is the President of the United States" is a belief, and not an actual state-of-affairs? Do you believe that there are states-of-affairs external to your mind? How did you arrive at the "belief" that "Donald Trump is the President of the United States"?

No, that's not the way it works in a society with norms of communication that are generally accepted and agreed upon. It's about as sensible as saying that claiming that this paper stuff I have in my hand is dollars is purely subjective, or claiming that Donald Trump is the President of the United States is purely subjective. — Baden

Yet we have comedians pushing the envelope of what is acceptable to say. We have new words with new meanings, and even old words with new meanings (take the n-word for example. It isn't offensive to some because they accept being called the name).

I guess it's based on the obvious falsity that being offended is always a choice as if if someone came up to you on the street and shouted "get out of my way, you cunt" you could somehow choose not to feel anything at all. — Baden

That person on the street doesn't know me. Their use of words speaks volumes about them and nothing about me. I won't get offended by that because I know the person saying it is the actual cunt for behaving in such a way.

Being offended is just giving power to others to define you. You'd only get offended if you believe that what they say is true in some sense.

The person might have a mistaken belief that by saying "Daydreaming that you are flying is a waste of time," they're saying something different than "I believe that daydreaming that you are flying is a waste of time," but the person would simply have a mistaken belief. What they're really doing is the same thing in both cases. — Terrapin Station

No. Go back and read my post.

Is the person mistaken that they have a belief? Whether the belief is right or wrong is a different question.

False beliefs can be a cause of some effect in the world as much as a true belief (false beliefs are just as real as true beliefs). The fact that one has beliefs is objective. Whether or not the belief is true or not is discovered by using the belief to make decisions and then observing the effects.

Wrong. The fact is that claiming something is offensive is speaking for yourself, not for others.

Colored: DATED•OFFENSIVE
a person who is wholly or partly of non-white descent."

Google. — Baden

What is offensive is subjective. Claiming that you are offended is just a passive-aggressive way of limiting free speech.

You do realize that the NAACP was formed over 100 years ago, don't you? — Arkady

Genetic fallacy.

Put your money where your mouth is. Go tell it to the NAACP.

What do you see as the difference between a value statement and something like "I was daydreaming that I was flying" that makes one subjective and the other objective? — Terrapin Station

Simple. "I was daydreaming that I was flying" is an objective statement about the state of some mind.

"Daydreaming that you are flying is a waste of time." is a subjective statement because it might not be a waste of time outside of your mind. Now, if you were to say that "I believe that daydreaming is a waste of time." That would be objective because, again, you are describing the state of some mind, not trying to make the claim about daydreaming itself being a waste of time. You are referring to your belief, which is a state of mind.

You do not believe that value statements are about the state of some mind? — Terrapin Station

No. Statements about the state of some mind wouldn't be value statements. They would be objective statements about the state of some mind. Only when you attempt to project value (as it relates to how it affects your goals) onto some state of affairs do you become subjective.

Also, why would you think that some people are saying that minds are not part of the world? — Terrapin Station

Just look at the questions you posed.

Value statements are subjective. All other statements are objective.

Moral statements are subjective. Talk about how morals evolved is objective.

Minds are part of the world, so speaking about the state of some mind is objective.

Go tell that to the NAACP.

Are you black? If not, then why are you speaking for all of them (making a generalization), as if they ALL would be offended by the term, "colored people"? How racist. — Harry Hindu

No, I'm not black, but rest assured that black people (f/k/a "colored people" or "negroes") have empowered me to speak blackly on their behalf on all matters relating to blackness, including on the proper use of descriptive terms pertaining thereto. Glad we cleared that up. — Arkady

Uhh.. The NAACP is a black organization calling themselves "Colored People". Obviously not all blacks think that it is an improper descriptive term. Those blacks who think that it should be are racist in thinking that other blacks shouldn't think for themselves.

I don't know if you are an American yourself, but "colored people" is a somewhat antiquated term to refer to certain ethnic minorities (especially blacks/African-Americans). It doesn't appear as if you meant anything pejorative by it, but it still strikes one as being a bit "off." — Arkady

Go tell that to the NAACP.

Are you black? If not, then why are you speaking for all of them (making a generalization), as if they ALL would be offended by the term, "colored people"? How racist.

In poll after poll, we know that the vast majority of Americans side with the left on virtually every public policy issue. We also know that in presidential elections, the GOP candidate seldom wins the popular vote, in recent decades. So, why should anyone be surprised when we hear of the GOP committing voter suppression where they are tossing out the ballots of colored people who are likely to vote against them? After all, since the majority of Americans are opposed to the GOP's policies, the GOP has to take a stand against democracy to maintain power. Yet, I have never heard a single mainstream news network connect these dots. Instead, when reporting on voter suppression, they focus on the suppression of likely democratic votes within a specific county or state region, as opposed to recognizing that the problem with the GOP is nation-wide. — LD Saunders

I don't see any real evidence here of GOP voter suppression, but that isn't to say that it doesn't exist. What we do have is real evidence of Democrat voter suppression. Remember the 2016 Democratic primary?

The fact is that both parties engage in underhanded and unfair tactics. You only realize this once you step back and take an objective look at the American political system. It is broken and the main problem is that we have political parties in the first place. People now treat their political party as a religion, as if their side is always righteous and the other side is a horde of demons. They divide us and have us at each other's throats when we shouldn't be pointing the finger at each other, rather we should be pointing the finger at them and the system that they have designed to keep themselves in power.

This is actually a quite difficult question. — Pierre-Normand

No, it isn't. You're making things more complicated and not even getting at anything I have said. I am talking about the self. You are talking about animals, the human race as a whole, etc. Go back and read the OP. You're performing all these unnecessary mental gymnastics just to avoid answering the question I asked you.

Is the self aware of itself prior to learning a language? Yes or no? I'm not asking how the human race has changed or is different from other animals. That is all very well documented and explained by the theory of evolution by natural selection. Every animal is different and has it's special repertoire that enables it to survive in its environment. Humans aren't special. They are just one species, not just on the Earth, but in the universe as a whole. Language could have evolved on any planet in a species with a large enough brain. You're not seeing the bigger picture here.

This idea that humans are special is antiquated. If that is what you and Apo think, then maybe your are not as self-aware as I thought.

So your own cite says the difference was like night and day. And yet you want to shrug your shoulders and say there's no big deal. Language is just a more complex form of symbol system. — apokrisis

When did I ever shrug my shoulders and say "there's no big deal"? Now you're just putting words in my mouth, creating a straw-man where there is none.

Go back and read my posts, Apo. I have consistently compared learning a language to learning other, profound things - like that there is no God after believing for most of your life that there is (Night and day), or realizing that the Earth isn't the center of the universe, or that you aren't specially-made and separate from nature. These are all profound changes in awareness of the self. They just aren't the only changes that the self can go through or be aware of, so you can't say that just one of them creates the self, or makes the self aware of itself.

The self is already aware of itself at a very basic level and learning through observation and experimentation allows one to become aware of these other relationships the self has with the rest of the world it finds itself in. We basically discover our relationships with the world. That is what we become more aware of - not so much ourselves because we are already aware of that, rather we become aware of more relationships between our self and the world. That is what learning a language does and what learning that you are an animal and not a special creation of an omnipotent being does.

So are you saying animals aren’t conscious then? You can’t have it both ways. — apokrisis

No. Didn't I say animals were conscious and that self-awareness comes in degrees that is the result of brain structure? For you, consciousness is either on or off and language is the switch.

But it is his post linguistic past which he refers to in that video segment. And I’ve already cited the telling way he describes his pre linguistic past. — apokrisis

He describes his pre-linguistic past as him being stupid. I already went over this. You can create a narrative when you realize that you have some idea that others don't (you realize that you are separate) AND you have a symbol system to relay that idea (language, hand gestures and facial expressions, etc.). Language is just a more complex form of symbol system.

I watched the whole video before posting my first comment in this thread, thanked you for the reference, and commented on it. I even transcribed a bit from the video in my first paragraph. I also acquired Susan Shaller's book A Man Without Words (2nd ed. University of California Press, 2012), which provides a much fuller account than the short documentary, and read about one third, so far. I also read the useful critical comments on Wikipedia (The talk page also is worth looking at). Apo also referenced a blog article discussing Ildefonso's case. — Pierre-Normand

Yet you can't even respond to a whole post or answer questions posed to you in posts.

It's very difficult having any sort of a meaningful discussion with you when you keep oscillating back and fort between the stances that your thesis does and doesn't contradict your interlocutor's thesis — Pierre-Normand

No. It is impossible to have a meaningful conversation when I keep refering to avideo that you and Apo refuse to watch. You are ignoring the previous post to you where I askex you a question that you refuse to answer. That is what makes it impossible to have a meaningful conversation with you.

Yeah. After he learnt language. So proves my point. — apokrisis

No, it proves that he can refer to his self in the past, before language, because his self existed prior to his learning language.

I've shown that language ain't "just a tool" as you claim. If we are looking for something that explains the mental chasm between social animal and encultured human, then language accounts for that. — apokrisis

Sure. I've never denied any of that. What I have denied is that you become self-aware, or conscious, after leraning language. That is what OP was asking.

Language is a tool.
— Harry Hindu

I can see you are emotionally attached to your dismissive position. — apokrisis

I dont see how that follows.

The rest of your post doesn't reject anything I've said. I have already talked about discoveries that have changed the way we see ourselves, and language is one of those things.

I guess you're not going to watch the video that I posted the link for that shows that contradicts your previous post, and pretty much everything else you've said, but that's your problem, not mine.

However, you've been consistently arguing that the acquisition of linguistic abilities doesn't change "what is already there" regarding the structure and nature of the self but rather merely enables the subject to communicate it or express herself with words. — Pierre-Normand

Wrong. That isn't what I said. Every time I used the string of symbols, "what is already there" in this thread, I was saying that we use language to refer to what is already there - the self. I never said that the self doesn't ever change. That would be absurd.

What I'm rejecting is the claim that language brings the self into existence, or that the self becomes aware of itself through language.

The acquisition of language changed what was already there, in a fairly radical way, and went far beyond the mere enabling of the communication of it. It changed what was there to be communicated. — Pierre-Normand

Again, if you go back and re-read my previous post, you will see that I made the argument that learning a language is just another experience we have that changes us. Every time we acquire knowledge of some sort it changes us (our selves), and if we have a complex system of communication then we can create new words to refer to those new things, just like how languages have evolved to reflect our new knowledge. Think about the change humanity went through in how it viewed itself when we realized the Earth wasn't the center of the universe and that we weren't separate from animals.

Let me ask you PN, what is the thing that was there that changed?

He can say that now .... retrospectively. Equipped with a language that is suitably tensed. — apokrisis

Language is a tool. Tools are only useful to you when you are aware of the problem the tool is used for. The problem for Iledefonso wasn't that he couldn't communicate. It's just that he couldn't use language to communicate. Language makes more complex ideas communicable.

And the surprising thing about his reply was how indescribable that language-less and unnarrated past state was to him.

But then that is not so surprising. Our own autobiographical memories only start to form about the time we really begin to master the habit of self-narrative talk and self-regulatory thought. So before the age of about three, we don't have a narrative style of memory. We weren't able to organise our experience so it was telling a running story about our "self". — apokrisis

Yet he describes himself and shows that he already had a narrative before language.

If you go back and look at the video between about 14:00 and 18:00, you'll see that had ideas about himself and even goes about describing his gardening at a hospital and his relationship with his boss. He knew what doctors were, but thought that he was too unintelligent to be one. What he lacked wasn't intelligence. What he lacked was language, but that isn't to say that he lacked an awareness of himself as a social being. Watch the video.

"It’s another frustration that Ildefonso doesn’t want to talk about it. For him, that was the dark time. Whenever I ask him, and I’ve asked him many, many times over the years, he always starts out with the visual representation of an imbecile: his mouth drops, his lower lip drops, and he looks stupid. He does something nonsensical with his hands like, “I don’t know what’s going on.” He always goes back to “I was stupid.”

If he can use facial expressions and hand gestures to communicate "I was stupid.", then obviously one can communicate this state of affairs without language. Language is just agreed-upon visual scribbles and sounds (and braille for the blind). We could use any assortment of visuals, sounds, or tactile sensations to represent some thing or state of affairs. We can create a narrative with any kind of symbol system, not just language.

It would be a mistake to represent acquiring language by babies as the result of fulfilling a recognized need. (Does a child grows up because she wants to become an adult?) And, in the first stages, the acquired language is too weak to serve as a simple mean of communication. — Number2018

A child does grow up because she wants to become an adult. You're separating the will of the body from the will of the mind. They are one and the same.

Learning one word means that you communicate that one idea to others. Language takes years to learn because there are so many things to have names for and you have to learn them all if you want to be able to communicate them all. You can learn of the existence of some thing or event by reading or hearing about it, or you could be there yourself prior and then learn the word that refers to it after the fact. Words mean nothing unless you know
1) that they are symbols (this was Idefonso's problem)
and
2) what they symbolize (this is a problem when seeing a word for the first time)

Hmm. Telling, hey? — apokrisis

What is telling is that in your entire post you never quote him saying that he discovered that he was seperate and different from others.

He says that "I" changed and "I" was stupid. Which shows that he had an "I" before language that was different. We all change when we learn something new. I could say the same thing Idefonso said when I went from theism to atheism. All he is describing is a change in himself, not that the change was that he discovered himself.

Your main argument is that Idefonso was able to fulfill essential human social functions. But what about more complicated ones? Could he successfully orient and perform in our digital society? — Number2018

Would a person from the 19 century be able to orient and perform in our digital society? This has nothing to do with self awareness. It is more to do with adapting to, or responding to, the environment you find your self in.

You can only find a language useful if you already are aware of your self as seperate from others and that others have seperate minds need to be informed of something that you know but they don't. When we realize that other people have minds too, we find language useful.

It could be that some higher form of intelligence wished for life to be part of reality, but didn't want to be bothered managing it. — Jake

"Being bothered by having to manage something" is a limitation of humans, not gods.

Gods don't make mistakes. Natural selection does. What we observe in nature is what one would expect to see if life was a "blind" (lack of intent) assortment of adaptaions of prior biological structures and behaviors. This is not what one would expect to see if omniscient intent was the cause.

What about movies or books? If a god wanted things to stay how they are, they wouldn't create time, but they did, because there's certain beauty in change. God doesn't want either dinosaurs or humans to control the planet - they want the narrative of dinosaurs going extinct, humans rising to the top and then whatever's going to happen.

Also, a god could, depending on the definitions used, exist outside time and view the universe as a space-time-block with time being the fourth spatial dimension. — BlueBanana

God could not have created time just like God could not have created itself. It is something that is eternal.

Time is just a measurement of change. If god has intent and creates, or changes its mind, then God changes and would be part of the causal process. In this sense God would be part of the same reality we are. One reality - all connected by causation.

What use is creating a narrative for an omniscient being? You seem to be describing human beings, not some omniscient being.

Because not being indecisive is not the (usual) definition of a god. Some definitions do include it but it's not a necessary part of the definition. — BlueBanana

Sure it is. An omniscient being can't be indecisive. If its not omniscient, then who call it god? It could just be aliens.

Language doesn't make us self aware. It allows us to express what is already there. It allows us to express ourselves in greater detail and with better efficiency than simply using hand signals and noises.

Your analogy doesn't work. It would be more like the painter used certain colors, then erased everything, put more colors, erased everything again, put more colors, on and on, - never creating a picture.

Why should I call an indecisive being a "god"?

Not so. The claim would be that it is sharing the same culture which results in sharing the same style of selfhood. Language in a general fashion allows culture to even exist. But simply speaking English doesn't mean there aren't then many national and regional styles of selfhood and self-regulation.

So the point is that language enables that leap - the one to a cultural level of semiotic organisation. Individuals can now learn to take the collective social view of the psychological fact of their own existence as "conscious beings". Awareness of self is awareness of self as an individual actor within a collective social setting.

But every language serves that purpose. And every culture can then write its own version of the script. A Japanese sense of self can be quite different from an American one - or at least to the degree that American culture hasn't overtaken the traditional Japanese mindset. — apokrisis

If I was the only person to exist, I would still have self-awareness because I can make the distinction between environment and my body, just like every other animal.

There is plenty of research on the development of self-regulation in children if you are interested in the characteristic stages. But you are pushing for a simplistic reading of the argument. If a self-aware style of cognition is something learnt, then there is no fixed moment when it clicks into place. It is always something that is developing.

Words and grammar just give access to this new world of possibility.

And long before infants have any mastery of speech, they are already embedded in a world where they are being treated as psychological individuals - especially if they are middle-class and Western. A social demand is being placed on them. So the learning of the way to think is already begun. — apokrisis

It seems to me, that in the last two sections here, you have admitted that it isn't language that triggers selfhood. Now you are saying it is culture. You are admitting that we have selfhood prior to learning a language. Words and grammar simply allow us to use shared symbols to refer to what is already there.

Infants discovering their arms and legs and how to control them has nothing to do with culture. It is biological.

If anything, culture diminishes our self as it makes us adopt a cultural norm and become more like those around us.

Well when it comes to dogs and cats, their tails often seem to have a mind of their own. And also get chased and attacked like a foreign object. :) — apokrisis

And they react to their image in the mirror as if it were another dog or cat. This is because their sense of vision is not as keen as their sense of smell or hearing. Could you be aware of yourself by smell alone? Could you be aware of yourself without any sensations at all except for having a language? Are computers self-aware as they know languages?

If that were so, you would be able to point to the vast differences between chimp and human brains. — apokrisis

There are vast differences between chimp and human brains, however chimps communicate in their own way. They still have a sense of self without a language. It just isn't on the level of human self-awareness because of brain structure, not because of their vocal tract.

According to this:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3398142/
Humans' ability to use language developed from precursors to distinguish vocalizations that exist in chimps' and humans' ancestors.

https://vimeo.com/72072873

I have used The Man Without Words as evidence that people are conscious without language many times on these forums and it is ignored. People just want to believe what they want and ignore all evidence to the contrary. It is nice to see that at least someone else has seen the same thing and understand what that means for the relationship between consciousness and language. — Harry Hindu

Still no reaction to this, eh? Idefonso wasn't surprised that he had a self when he learned a language. He was surprised that there are shared symbols that he can use to communicate his self's ideas, wants and needs.

Nothing about the existence of gods — BlueBanana

It IS about the existence of gods. If "god" was indecisive, then why call it a "god"?

I'm using my phone to reply, so sometimes the autocomplete doesn't work right.

I also argued that sharks could be god's reason for creation, or maybe some alien species that has been around for billions of years. If "god" has favorites, then is it really a "god"?

The good old "religion contradicts science and objectivity and is therefore false" straw man. — BlueBanana

That wasn't the point I was trying to make in the post that you just cherry picked.

You should be looking for theists to aim these arguments at. — Jake

But I'm throwing them at you because you were taking their position. Now you're faced with a difficult question and don't want to play anymore?

Agreed. And this proves exactly nothing about gods. — Jake

Sure it does. It shows that God would be indecisive or inconsistent.

That'd be one of the best conclusions in this thread, were you not stating it sarcastically. — BlueBanana

I wasn't being satcastic.