Which is obvious nonsense, — EugeneW

[condescension] Let me explain this to you. Just saying "it's self-evident", "it's obvious", "it's a priori knowledge", "it's nonsense", or "it's undeniable" is not an argument.[/condescension]

had he had some knowledge of physics. The problem in physics is why cause precedes effect.. — EugeneW

He actually made his arguments based on and with reference to his understanding of modern physics at the time. Take a look at his argument - "On the Notion of Cause," 1912. I actually don't find that part of his argument especially convincing. I focus more on the fact that I think causation is a metaphysical entity. As with all metaphysics, it is neither true nor false, only more or less useful. Let's not go any further into it right now. The point I'm trying to make is that it is very much not obvious that things are caused. It's not obvious to me. It wasn't obvious to Russell. It wasn't obvious to R.G. Collingwood in 1943. We're not the only ones.

Suffering, then. I ask, what is it? A very good question. — Constance

Suffering is suffering. What more do we need? :wink:

Let me explain this to you. Just saying "it's self-evident", "it's obvious", "it's a priori knowledge", "it's nonsense", or "it's undeniable" is not an argument — T Clark

I dont wanna argue! Philosophy is not about argument (but it's probably you"re good at, hence your love to argue). Every effect has a cause. Only an object on a Norton Dome can be said to have no cause for its motion. Give me one example of a cause less event. Then I might give an argument why is has a cause. Everything is determined, has a prior cause. Without cause and effect no free will.

He actually made his arguments based on and with reference to his understanding of modern physics at the time. Take a look at his argument — T Clark

Then his knowledge was insufficient. It's all there is to logically conclude.

t wasn't obvious to Russell. It wasn't obvious to R.G. Collingwood in 1943. We're not the only ones. — T Clark

The obvious is the tip of your nose. Squeeze it too hard and you say "ouch'!

But the idea is not what is discussed here. — Constance

You brought up my previous post and were dismissive.:

Someone argued that causality was debatable because Bertrand Russell wrote a paper saying so. Russell was actually waying we can't make sense of causality, but he was not contradicting the basic intuition that a spontaneous cause is impossible. I wonder how this went with him. Does he understand that a spontaneous cause is apodictically impossible. — Constance

I was that someone. So I responded and it is exactly the idea that is being discussed here. And, by the way, yes Russell was exactly contradicting the basic intuition that a spontaneous cause is impossible.

What makes causality so intractable to analysis is that it is intuitive, and not empirical, and such things are not reducible. — Constance

So, is it your position that your intuition trumps reason? Common sense must be right? I know the feeling you are talking about. When someone says that x caused y, I know what they mean. I've thought about that a lot and come to the conclusion that, except in a few very simple situations, it just doesn't work.

Every effect has a cause. — EugeneW

That's a bit muddled. Do you mean that every event has a cause? If so, then no, not necessarily. If you don't want to argue, then don't contradict things I write.

It's all there is to logically conclude. — EugeneW

You haven't provided any logical argument. As I noted, "it's obvious" is no argument at all.

It's the only plausible way to approach reality. We assume what our brain creates is a true image. Wouĺd you assume we're given a fantasy? Would you prefer it? — EugeneW

But this is a critical point. It is not the only approach, not even close. What happens is science's views become derivative, and primacy goes to it the Cartesian center. You can deny there is such a thing, which is fine; but you have arrived at a foundation for discussing things philosophically: phenomenology. Physics is now derivative, and this means its explanatory basis as a science with all of its paradigmatic historical progression, is held to be reducible to affairs at a more basic order.
Not fantasy. More real than real, if you like: the intuitive horizon that is presupposed by science. Hard to talk about, really, unless you read about it.

Do you mean that every event has a cause? — T Clark

No, an event is a confusing term in relativity. It doesn't cover what it means. Events are metaphysical monsters. They don't exist. Every happening, on the other hand, is made up from a cause and effect, as they are spread in spacetime.

You haven't provided any logical argument — T Clark

The logical argument:

Russel (or C, for that matter) based their refusal of a cause on physics. They didn't have enough of this knowledge. Logical conclusion: their refusal is unwarrented.

Every happening, on the other hand, is made up from a cause and effect, as they are spread in spacetime. — EugeneW

And I say "no." And you say "it's obvious." And I say, "no, it's not obvious." You are arguing that cause is real and obvious. My only argument is that it is not obvious. We're not getting anywhere with this.

They didn't have enough of this knowledge. Logical conclusion: their refusal is unwarrented. — EugeneW

I'm done. Unless someone pulls up one of my previous posts for criticism again without attribution.

Is there a cause having the effect of T Clark leaving the room?

Perhaps not, like the instantaneous decay of a uranium atom. :chin:

Suffering is suffering. What more do we need? :wink: — Tom Storm

Some would say suffering requires redemption, not to invoke religious dogma, but as a stand alone phenomenon.

It is not the only approach, not even close. — Constance

Im sure there are a lot of approaches. I prefer the approach the theory is the reality.

What happens is science's views become derivative, and primacy goes to it the Cartesian center — Constance

I disagree. Scientific views become reality.

You can deny there is such a thing, which is fine; but you have arrived at a foundation for discussing things philosophically: phenomenology. — Constance

Phenomena lie at the foundation. Indeed. But there exists stuff behind the phenomena. Scìence can lift the curtain and make that stuff visible. It's all a perception, I agree. But a truthful one.

Physics is now derivative, and this means its explanatory basis as a science with all of its paradigmatic historical progression, is held to be reducible to affairs at a more basic order. — Constance

Physics is now a derivative? I don't agree. All natural processes have a fundamental basic blocks. Truly existent matter. True, its nature remains unknown, though we can feel it by eating it.

Not fantasy. More real than real, if you like: the intuitive horizon that is presupposed by science. Hard to talk about, really, unless you read about it. — Constance

More real than real? You mean what the nature of matter is? Then I agree. It's the content, the charge of matter that gives us consciousness. It's not that hard to talk about.

When the going gets tough...

And I say "no." And you say "it's obvious." And I say, "no, it's not obvious." You are arguing that cause is real and obvious. My only argument is that it is not obvious. We're not getting anywhere with this. — T Clark

Exactly! Its you who uses no argument! Except some reference to old dusty thinkers denying cause on insufficient knowledge base.

there a cause having the effect of T Clark leaving the room?

Perhaps not, like the instantaneous decay of a uranium ato — jgill

Yes! His leaving was not caused at all. He just instantaneously decayed spontaneously.

I was that someone. So I responded and it is exactly the idea that is being discussed here. And, by the way, yes Russell was exactly contradicting the basic intuition that a spontaneous cause is impossible. — T Clark

No, He was arguing that he could not make sense of it. The intuition is without an arguable basis. When we talk about it, and caste the intuition in terms, and these terms have associations, and these bind the argument to implications, and so on. This is how this goes. This intuition qua intuition is not assailable.

So, is it your position that your intuition trumps reason? Common sense must be right? I know the feeling you are talking about. When someone says that x caused y, I know what they mean. I've thought about that a lot and come to the conclusion that, except in a few very simple situations, it just doesn't work. — T Clark

Intuition is far from common sense. It simply stands alone. It would be like talking about qualia, but then, qualia, like being appeared to redly, really is not discussable. The moment you drop language, you stare dumbly, and when you try to discuss it, you find yourself deep in context, deep in the contingency of language, for red is not yellow or green, and color is a principle of subsumption, a classificatory term, and so on, and now one is on the road to arguing about being appeared to redly. Causality suffers the same fate. But there is in this something Other, this insistence it has, is an intuitive presence. It is "prior" to discussion. This is, again, NOT at all to say that there is some unassailable way to talk about this; not that we can definitively say what it is. This would be like explaining logic which says Wittgenstein, "shows itself" but not its generative nature.
When it is said that apodictic intuitions can be argued about, they are not arguing about the intuition; they are arguing about what is SAID about the intuition. You really should take a look at Russell's The Notion of Cause. Massively verbose.

It is not the only approach, not even close.
— Constance

Im sure there are a lot of approaches. I prefer the approach the theory is the reality.

What happens is science's views become derivative, and primacy goes to it the Cartesian center
— Constance

I disagree. Scientific views become reality.

You can deny there is such a thing, which is fine; but you have arrived at a foundation for discussing things philosophically: phenomenology.
— Constance

Phenomena lie at the foundation. Indeed. But there exists stuff behind the phenomena. Scìence can lift the curtain and make that stuff visible. It's all a perception, I agree. But a truthful one.

Physics is now derivative, and this means its explanatory basis as a science with all of its paradigmatic historical progression, is held to be reducible to affairs at a more basic order.
— Constance

Physics is now a derivative? I don't agree. All natural processes have a fundamental basic blocks. Truly existent matter. True, its nature remains unknown, though we can feel it by eating it.

Not fantasy. More real than real, if you like: the intuitive horizon that is presupposed by science. Hard to talk about, really, unless you read about it.
— Constance

More real than real? You mean what the nature of matter is? Then I agree. It's the content, the charge of matter that gives us consciousness. It's not that hard to talk about. — EugeneW

It is not as if I expect you to see this and it does take work to familiarize yourself. But if all you read is science, you will never grasp phenomenology. This is the way of it with all things. Kant through Derrida has to be read. A must if you are going to talk about the foundations of knowledge claims.

And just look at how dismissive you are of something that altogether denies you want you want. Brains cannot do what you insist must be assumed. No way in good intellectual conscience you can think like this. When you find yourself at the very basis of your thinking about something, and the whole thing falls apart, it's time to move on to something that doesn't do this.

Sayin you don't agree is not an argument. By all means, make your case.

Topic header edit (recommended): On the matter of logic and the possible world(s)

He was arguing that he could not make sense of it. — Constance

He wrote that causation is "...a relic of a bygone age, surviving, like the monarchy, only because it is erroneously supposed to do no harm."

Intuition is far from common sense. — Constance

I am a strong believer that intuition and introspection are valid, powerful, means of gaining knowledge and understanding. But, in the end, their results are still subject to the scrutiny of observation, experimentation, and reason. When you give intuition primacy over those factors, you've left philosophy and crossed the border into the bleak wasteland of voodooism, mysticism, and Republicanism.

I've had my say. You can have the last word if you'd like.

Paradoxes like Zeno's should be telling us that geometry and reality are very different..................but the world altogether is not logical; it is alogical, apart from logic, qualitatively different................language is mostly self referential....................We live in epistemology. The world before us apart from this is utterly metaphysical. — Constance

I agree with what you have written.

The question is why are geometry and reality very different

For me, the reason is that relations are foundational to our logic, yet relations have no ontological existence in the external world.

This explains why geometry and reality are very different, the world is alogical, language is self-referential, we live in epistemology and the world is utterly metaphysical.

If there was a more persuasive explanation why logic and reality are very different than because of the the nature of relations, then this would be of interest.

The next question is why we need to know why geometry and reality are very different

Perhaps it is sufficient to know what pragmatically works. I turn the ignition key on my car and the engine starts. I don't need to know why the engine starts, all I need to know is that turning the key starts the car. Why not treat the external world as an empirical experience and not search for any sense beyond this.

My justified belief that relations within logic are fundamentally different to relations within reality can never be knowledge

My belief is that logic and reality are very different because of the nature of their relations, and this I can justify. However, my justified belief that logic and reality are very different because of the nature of their relations can never be knowledge, as I can never have a true understanding of a reality that is relation-free using reasoning where relations are fundamental.

In this respect, my justified belief remains a working hypothesis, and will remain so
until presented with a more persuasive explanation as to the nature of logic and reality. My belief must always remain an invention rather than a discovery, as my belief transcends what I can ever discover.

Summary

The nature of relations is the fundamental barrier between our understanding of the external world and the external world itself.

Butting in......

Space doesn't bend; things bend IN space. — Constance

Agreed, re: gravitational lensing. There are no mathematical expressions with space qua infinite containment, as a variable, which there must be if space moves, which it must if it bends.
(“Well, gosh, Mr. Bill. Where did the space go that was above the rock before I put the bucket there?”)
—————

Causality as an intuition is taken AS causality in play, in context. — Constance

Maybe....taken as causation in play.
—————

the moment you try to talk about it, you place it in the dubious hands language and analysis. — Constance

At first, maybe just language; to talk about indicates an analysis has already been done from which follows the dubious transcription into language. Subsequently, dubious analysis would then be of the initial language.
—————

Kant wanted to deny metaphysics — Constance

This is catastrophically false, but none of your co-respondents noticed nor cared, even though every single one of them is fully immersed in it, so.....you got off scot-free. Almost.

Butting out.....

"as much as Kant wanted to deny metaphysics"....................This is catastrophically false, but none of your co-respondents noticed nor cared — Mww

Speaking as a co-respondent, the phrase used was not "Kant denied metaphysics", which may well be "catastrophically false". The phrase was "as much as Kant wanted to deny metaphysics", which has a completely different meaning and is not "catastrophically false".

I am a strong believer that intuition and introspection are valid, powerful, means of gaining knowledge and understanding. But, in the end, their results are still subject to the scrutiny of observation, experimentation, and reason. When you give intuition primacy over those factors, you've left philosophy and crossed the border into the bleak wasteland of voodooism, mysticism, and Republicanism. — T Clark

Of course, you are right, if you take intuition to be simply the immediate response your brain hands you to something you encounter. A mother's intuition, or the common sense that tells you a woman's place in the kitchen or something Donald Trump might think of. These "prereflective" beliefs are notoriously ill-conceived. But logic? Geometry? There is an element of necessity here that will not yield to any analysis. We may have the knowledge claim of what this is wrong, and I am sure this is true; I don't think for a moment that we understand what causality "really" is, same for logic: we are paradigmatically bound, you could say, in this. But the pure intuition is not going anywhere. Impossibilities are not possible, and, as a pure intuition, a causeless effect is impossible.

is not "catastrophically false". — RussellA

Ohfercrisakes.....that he wanted to deny it is every bit as false as he did deny it. He equally never did either.

Ohfercrisakes.....that he wanted to deny it is every bit as false as he did deny it. He equally never did either. — Mww

True, but that is not what was written.

You are ignoring the qualifier "as much as" which is qualifying the clause that follows it - "Kant wanted to deny metaphysics".

You are ignoring the qualifier..... — RussellA

And this is why I absolutely detest the ghastly stupidity of language games. DETEST, I tell ya!!

“As much as he wanted....” Exactly how much is that, anyway? WFT kinda qualifier would “as much as” be, without a quantitative measure to accompany it? Without a how much to go with the “as much”, who the hell cares about as much as he wanted? He wanted, however much it was. Which he didn’t in the first place. So of course “as much as” can be dismissed as a qualitative categorical condition and the falsity of the proposition stands unassailed.

There’s no mountain to be made from this molehill.

There are also aspects that are clearly deterministically explicable , like the child who didn’t understand or the schizophrenic who heard voices telling them to kill. In P.F. Strawson’s famous paper ‘Freedom and Resentment’, he distinguishes between such obvious examples where ethical judgement doesn’t apply, and examples where what he calls our reactive emotional-valuative moral attitudes do apply. He concludes that we should listen to our reactive emotions that drive us toward retributive justice. My question for you is how you parse valuative emotions like anger. Nussbaum and Pereboom reject anger because they see it as aimed at payback, retribution and revenge, which are backward looking valuations. — Joshs

I read the Strawson and I think he makes an excellent case for explaining the constitution of our mutual moral regard for others and how he shows that "the preparedness to acquiesce in that infliction of
suffering on the offender which is an essential part of punishment is all of a piece with this
whole range of attitudes of which I have been speaking." Yes, we do live in these complex attitudinal relationships with others, and, if I take his meaning, determinism, while he admits, the truth or falsity of a general thesis of determinism would not bear on the rationality" of our choices or attitudes, he wants to establish a compromise. This is not an ontology. It is not engaged in asking, what can we say about the the being and its foundational features? It is rather saying, we must have certain " reactive attitudes" (generalized or specific) in place in order for moral agency itself to make sense, and these presuppose accountability, responsibility, guilt, innocence and other.
An interesting enlightening essay for me. I too "lean" away from determinism in light of this kind of thinking. And all of the assumptions possessed within a society's system laws and morals have implicit prima facie validity. Of course, when taken as a whole, the system is massively imperfect. this land is mine. Why? Because I bought it, own it. How does the purchasing power of your position give you this right of ownership? I worked for it? Oh, you mean you "mixed your labor" in the world and this labor produced the right? But what if you didn't do a damn thing, and it was given to you? And what if the purchasing opportunity were only provided for a certain arbitrarily geographically determined few? And what if you legally manipulated the system....and what if you lived in a miserable environment and grew up with no educational standards at all and your purchasing power is near the minus numbers; and on and on.
The point I would make is that IN this defacto system of "reactive attitudes" the need for self correction pushes against this fabric of consensus, and enlightened objections are grounded in determinative arguments: A person's successes are determined by the mere giveness of circumstances and abilities. Failures have reasons. Strawson is right to say there is a tender balance in the inhibiting and permitting good will and compassion and this must go on (which I think is the gist).

But inquiry is the spoiler, as usual. And it is not that inquiry about basic assumptions is going to be popular. this is always reserved for the study hall. If those who write about such things were on a boat, and the boat sank, it would take most of the readership with it. At any rate, I look at freedom very differently. The hammer head flies off, I am thrown into a discontinuity, if only for a moment till processes take over once again. This second can be protracted. I think freedom lies there.