Let me stick with your sheep example and press on it. We find an animal and we decide to call it 'sheep'. I agree it makes no sense now to ask what justification I have for believing that the animal is a sheep and not something else. This is not the issue I am trying to bring out. The issue is that when I say to myself 'I shall call this a "sheep"', I am assuming that I have found something. I am assuming that there is some state of affairs for me to describe. The sceptic will ask, inevitably, why believe you have found anything? Why believe that there is anything for you to name at all?

The obvious answer is that we have sense perception. I can see that there is something there to be named. But if this has to be offered in answer to the sceptic, then constitutive rules don't stop the regress.

Sorry about this. Forgot to tag.

What you say doesn't make sense. You are claiming that the possibility of mistake is not grounds for questioning a belief. — Metaphysician Undercover

What you say doesn't make sense. You are claiming that the mere possibility of mistake is grounds for questioning a belief--and therefore that we have grounds for questioning all of our beliefs, which is absurd.

If we wait until a belief actually confounds our experience then it is an actual mistake, and the belief has already been proven wrong at this point. — Metaphysician Undercover

Why should we seriously doubt any of our present beliefs that have never previously been confounded by our experience? Perhaps you are unfamiliar with the expression, "learn from your mistakes."

Doubt is justified prior to the confounding experience, in order to avoid that mistake. Your position could only be correct if you didn't think it was reasonable to attempt to avoid mistake. But that's nonsense. — Metaphysician Undercover

None of us is infallible; i.e., it is impossible for any of us to avoid mistake. Therefore, it is indeed unreasonable to doubt any particular belief, simply because it might be mistaken. After all, doubting that belief could turn out to be the mistake, rather than maintaining it.

First of all, I was talking about the relationship between certainty, certitude, doubt, and mistake. I don't see how "constraints" is relevant — Metaphysician Undercover

Belief is a constraint on doubt. Doubts are always possible to manufacture on some grounds. So belief simply aims to constrain doubt to a reasonable degree.

You are taking some absolutist position. The only position that works is a relativist one.

Secondly, to say that a free choice decision by a human being is limited to a difference which doesn't make a difference, is clearly wrong, because then we wouldn't have to think about any of our decisions, because they wouldn't make a significant difference. — Metaphysician Undercover

I was talking about the freedoms of the world, not human freewill.

So a cat may have a chewed ear and yet still function as a cat. The chewed ear is a difference that doesn't make a difference.

I then enter that cat in the cat show. Now the chewed ear is a difference that makes a difference.

So as you have previously argued, everything in the world is individual. Even two identical things are located at individual points of spacetime. But categorical beliefs are about generalities - what things have in common that make them "the same". And so such beliefs have to also know how much actual difference can be ignored as being differences that are insignificant or unsurprising.

When is a mistake a mistake? When it is a significant difference to what was predicted.

You cannot genuinely (coherently and consistently) doubt that there are any 'thises' at all because to do so would undermine the coherence of all and any discourse.

You cannot genuinely (coherently and consistently) doubt that there any 'thises' because to do so would undermine the coherence of all and any discourse. — Janus

Yep. It is on the whole that it rings true. We believe in the world as a generality.

That leaves private concepts and notions and languages and so on. Which is an odd but interesting way for us to differ.

Because I reject the very notion of such things, and suppose myself to be following Wittgenstein in so doing. Yet you also understand Wittgenstein but apparently leave room for private mental furnishings.

How can this be? — Banno

I don't believe one can have private concepts, can they? Wouldn't that be akin to having a private language? Your use of the term "mental furnishings" isn't clear to me. All I'm saying is that there are things going on in the brain that coincide with actions quite apart from language, and that some of these actions demonstrate that primitive (prelinguistic) man had beliefs. I also think that Wittgenstein believed this to be the case, which was the reason I quoted him. These mental things (thoughts, states, etc.) are not concepts, because remember I think of them prior to language.

Even when we bring language into the picture, when I say, "I believe X," am I not referring to something that's unique to my mental thinking? It's not as though "my beliefs" only get their existence from language. The fact that it's mine shows that there is something that's unique to me, to my thinking. Don't confuse this with the idea that words get their meaning from how a community of language users, use certain words. There is nothing in me that gives concepts their meaning, no mental furnishings, if you will.

When you say, "I reject the very notion of such things," are you saying you don't believe there are mental states or thoughts going on in the brain prior to or along with one's actions? Again, I do believe these mental phenomena do reflect beliefs; and these beliefs, at least for me and my understanding of how beliefs can be shown, are a reflection of something internal.

How does it seem like this? Care to offer an example? Perhaps this is nitpicking, but in the feeble examples I can imagine, it usually seems more suitable to say "he/it thinks..." rather than "he/it believes..." That is, the "belief" seems short-term or fleeting.

Instead of there being non-linguistic beliefs, could it just be that we apply statements of belief to the non-linguistic behaviours of others in an attempt to explain those behaviours? — Luke

I have given examples in my writing, and I also have quoted Wittgenstein to you before about this very thing (OC 284, 285). Well, it's true that we can say that primitive man thinks, but thinks what? If we see primitive man building something, we can say that he thinks something, but can't we also say that he believes something. Doesn't the thinking reflect the beliefs? Isn't thinking a general term that we apply to many different ideas, whereas one's belief seems to be a subset of thinking.

It is true that we are applying statements of belief to non-linguistic man, just as I apply statements of belief about my dog. These statements do explain the behaviors, but they also tell us something about the nature of a belief. How do you explain people who have been deaf all their lives, who haven't had a language as part of their lives, who once being introduced to language talk about having a quite active thought life, and belief system apart from language? Language, it seems to me, is just a way for us to communicate what going on in the brain already. Language doesn't give life to this activity, the activity is there quite apart from language.

You cannot genuinely (coherently and consistently) doubt that there are any 'thises' at all because to do so would undermine the coherence of all and any discourse. — Janus

Sticking with our sheep example, I need not doubt that there are any things at all in order to make my point. I need only ask, in the specific case in which you are saying "this is a sheep", why you believe there is anything there at all. I needn't ask why you believe there are any 'thises' period. I can simply ask why, in this specific case, you believe that there is something there for you to name? If I can even raise that question, the regress goes on.

Best
PA

Perhaps language just evolved from scratch, like life. It's similar to asking how did we get from the absence of life to the presence of life unless there was some mystical dormant life force (where the dormant life force is analogous to your non-linguistic belief).

How are beliefs causally formed? It seems to be the case that beliefs arise causally within the mind based on the interactions between our sensory experiences and the world around us.
— Sam26

This seems to apply equally to linguistic beliefs, including those beliefs that we learn in school and which are taught to us by others. What about instincts and natural physical/bodily reflexes - do you consider these to be a kind of non-linguistic belief? Is there a way to distinguish these just by observing behaviour? — Luke

I do believe that language evolved from scratch, but not without very active and sophisticated brain phenomena. Even if you want to say they evolved together from one primitive state to another, I don't see how this hurts my position. I also don't think it's the same thing as going from the absence of life to the presence of life. I'm not saying we're going from the absence of something to the presence of something. I'm saying we're going from the presence of brain activity, to then, linguistic activity, which occurred very slowly and deliberately. Unless I'm misunderstanding you.

Causal beliefs can arise in the following manner: Mary was bitten by a snake, and as a result of the bite she now believes snakes are dangerous. This is a causal explanation of Mary's belief, namely, it shows the relationship between the bite and her belief. The bite is sufficient to cause her belief. This kind of explanation is different from beliefs that arise based on evidence, or what we deem to be evidence.

"Instincts and natural physical/bodily reflexes..." aren't beliefs, and no, I don't consider these to be non-linguistic beliefs. If these things show beliefs, then we could say that amoebas have beliefs, couldn't we?

An important point about knowledge is its juxtaposition with doubt, and this is a point that Wittgenstein makes over and over again in OC. I think it's an important point. The point isn't that I know and doubt at the same time, but that one's knowledge is always questionable, up to a point. If I say I know X, you might naturally want to know how it is that I know. You want to see for yourself that I'm not mistaken, so your questioning my knowledge. If it's something we both know, then there is no need for me to say to you that I know, especially if we both know that we know. A doubt just wouldn't arise, at least until there is good reason to doubt that we know. A teacher may have doubts about your knowledge of algebra, but after administering a test she no longer has any doubt about your knowledge. Also note the objective criteria involved. It does no good to just say that one knows, your assurance means nothing, it must be objectively demonstrated.

Thought = assumption.

Assumption is a general term. Prediction is more specific and that's the reason I don't use it. It refers only to those assumptions that represent events that will happen in the future. Retrodiction is the opposite term.

Assumptions can be thought of as imaginations that represent some aspect of reality.

Thinking = the process by which we generate assumptions.

It can be any process. This would be the general form of the concept of thinking. But some people don't like general terms so if we want to talk to them we need to specify these terms further. I am personally very fond of general terms. Anyways, thinking can also be defined narrowly, as a particular mechanism by which assumptions are generated. Which one? Let's ignore that for now.

Language = events that represent some other events. You can also add "for the purpose of communication between organisms" if you don't like general terms. But again, I like to start with general terms first.

Events that represent (or symbolize) other events are usually words and speech. But they can also be pictures.

Language is not dependent on thinking. You can write and speak and draw about things that have nothing to do with thinking. For example, the things you are representing could be imaginations or things that took place in the past. None of these involve thinking and thoughts.

Similarly, thinking is not dependent on language. You can think, i.e. make assumptions, without writing, talking or drawing. Your assumptions can manifest in your actions. This is the more natural way of thinking and it is known by the name "intuition". What we call "reason" is merely thinking that can be and is, often at the same time, expressed using language.

Which one came first?
I don't know. That's an empirical question.

It could be thinking. That's what my intuition suggests. But it could also be language. Or it could be both at the same time.

The point in talking about beliefs, prelinguistic and linguistic, is to point out that there are some beliefs that are foundational or basic to epistemology, that is, our epistemology rests on such beliefs. Moreover, these beliefs are outside of epistemology (outside justified true belief), which means they aren't subject to, or in need of justification. Nor should they be referred to as being true or false. As soon as you speak of these foundational or basic beliefs in reference to being justified, or as being true, or as something known, then you are bringing them into the domain of epistemology. Of course the classic example's used in this thread are Moore's proposition's that he claims to know, e.g., - "This is a hand," or "I live on the Earth."

In order for any (any that I'm aware of) epistemological theory to gain a foothold there must be some beliefs/propositions that are immune from reasonable doubt, at least generally. Even in science there must be things that are not doubted, things that are part of the nature of reality that are immune to reasonable doubt. For example, that we are humans, that we have legs and arms, that there are mountains and valleys, that the Earth has one moon, etc. - if this were not the case, then how could one conduct experiments with any assurance of gaining knowledge?

Note that I said "reasonable doubt," there are cases, although not many, where it would be reasonable to doubt foundational beliefs. Wittgenstein points these out when discussing Moore's propositions. However, we're talking about cases in which such beliefs cannot be reasonably doubted. In fact, it seems to be nonsensical to doubt them.

Mental furnishing would indeed be private concepts; so we agree that they do not enter into the conversation. So while a belief is uniquely yours, it is not private. What makes it yours is not something happening inside your mind, but that the actions explained by the belief are your actions.

Further, what is going on when one acts includes what is going on in the brain. The act of flicking on the light includes the hand moving, the electricity flowing and the light illuminating the room and alerting the burglar; and it also included the neural activity that caused the hand movement.

I wanted to be able to see where I was, so I flicked the light switch. I believed that flicking the switch would allow me to see the room. But I did not know the burglar was there, and so did not believe that flicking the switch would alert the burglar.

So while a belief is uniquely yours, it is not private. — Banno

The only thing that I would question is this statement. Why can't my belief be private? The language which states a belief is not private, but my belief, it would seem to me, starts out at being private before there is any showing or stating.

If these things show beliefs, then we could say that amoebas have beliefs, couldn't we? — Sam26

This is challenging for my suggestion that beliefs are explanations for actions. To take it a step further, does the air conditioner believe it is too hot when it turns itself on?

Sorry I don't follow?

There is nothing that is immune to doubt. We can doubt anything we want. And when we don't, it's merely because we decided not to do so.

Justification is merely about explaining why we think what we think. We already decided what to think and now what we're doing is describing our reasoning process to others.

Thinking is prior to justification.

The language which states a belief is not private, but my belief, it would seem to me, starts out at being private before there is any showing or stating. — Sam26

❡293, misquoted:

Now someone tells me that he knows what pain is only from his own case! --Suppose everyone had a box with something in it: we call it a "belief". No one can look into anyone else's box, and everyone says he knows what a belief is only by looking at his belief. --Here it would be quite possible for everyone to have something different in his box. One might even imagine such a thing constantly changing. --But suppose the word "belief" had a use in these people's language? --If so it would not be used as the name of a thing. The thing in the box has no place in the language-game at all; not even as a something: for the box might even be empty. --No, one can 'divide through' by the thing in the box; it cancels out, whatever it is.

And when we don't, it's merely because we decided not to do so. — Magnus Anderson

Why not: and when we do doubt, it is because we decided to do so? Why give precedence to doubt, and not certainty?

From watching you, I can list innumerable things that you take as indubitable. That you responded in English shows that you think this thread is in English. Are you saying that you doubt that the thread is in English? Not when you are writing. Only when you are engaging in philosophical frivolity.

That quote doesn't apply to what I'm talking about. The point in that quote is that the concept belief would have no meaning for us if it referred to something internal - something in the box. However, I'm not discussing concepts.

I don't doubt this thread is in English. But if I wanted to, I could. That's my point. Let me restate that: I don't doubt this thread is in English because I don't *want* to doubt it and not because I cannot doubt it (i.e. not because it's indubitable.)

And yes, we doubt because we choose to do so. We choose when we're going to doubt and when we're not going to doubt and we can do so using any kind of logic.

But if I wanted to, I could. — Magnus Anderson

Would that be rational? Would it be useful? Would it make sense?

Or would it indicate a failure to grasp what was going on here?

I'm not so sure it doesn't. A private belief would not enter into the conversation; would not be able to act as an explanation for one's behaviour. In so far as it could be meaningful, useful, it would have to be public.

The point is that nothing is immune to doubt. And what is rational and useful is relative.

The point is that nothing is immune to doubt. And what is rational and useful is relative. — Magnus Anderson

You left out two key words that I use in conjunction with doubt, reasonable and generally. Is it reasonable for me to doubt that I have two hands generally? Is it reasonable for me to doubt whether I'm currently sitting at my computer typing? Is it reasonable for me to doubt my own existence? These things are generally immune from ANY reasonable doubt, generally.

Who said anything about conversation, remember these beliefs are pre-linguistic. You're trying to stick what I'm saying into language, but it doesn't belong there, only insofar as we're talking about it. This is also why it doesn't fit PI 293.

I don't know. Is it? It's relative. You decide whether it is reasonable to doubt (i.e. whether you *should* doubt) or not. That's my point.

The point that Wittgenstein would make (as I interpret him), and I agree, is that how we use language is not relative. There's a kind of logic of use that is generated by language users, and the word doubt like other words has correct and incorrect uses. For example, let's say that I'm teaching you the game of chess, that is, I'm explaining the rules of the game, but you are doubting everything that I tell you. Now according to you it's okay, because doubting is a relative concept, that is, one can use it any way one sees fit, but how can this be the case? Aren't there rules of correct usage, or do you apply your own rules?

Also I don't think of what's reasonable as relative either, that is, it's not a matter of opinion.

I do believe that language evolved from scratch, but not without very active and sophisticated brain phenomena. Even if you want to say they evolved together from one primitive state to another, I don't see how this hurts my position. I also don't think it's the same thing as going from the absence of life to the presence of life. I'm not saying we're going from the absence of something to the presence of something. I'm saying we're going from the presence of brain activity, to then, linguistic activity, which occurred very slowly and deliberately. Unless I'm misunderstanding you. — Sam26

The analogy that I drew between non-linguistic beliefs and a dormant life force was made in response to your question/assertion that without non-linguistic beliefs, "what would be the springboard of language? How does one get from a mind of no thoughts and no beliefs, to a mind that is able to express one's thoughts linguistically?" This appears to indicate that language could not have evolved from scratch, without some assistance from non-linguistic beliefs. I tend to agree with Banno's complaint that this smacks too much of a private language.

Causal beliefs can arise in the following manner: Mary was bitten by a snake, and as a result of the bite she now believes snakes are dangerous. This is a causal explanation of Mary's belief, namely, it shows the relationship between the bite and her belief. The bite is sufficient to cause her belief. — Sam26

This example relies entirely on the shared meanings/concepts of words like "snake" and "dangerous". I really don't believe that Wittgenstein had much interest in what causes our beliefs or how our language developed, which is much more theory than description. I mention this only because you claim this to be your view based on your reading of Wittgenstein.

This kind of explanation is different from beliefs that arise based on evidence, or what we deem to be evidence — Sam26

How is it any different? Aren't the snake bite and its subsequent effects evidence that snakes can be dangerous?