Can you find a use for them? Is there a meaning beyond that use?

The answer is the usual pragmatic one. Show that there is any actual mystery here. If we form a concept, it had some application. It was a constraint on possibility which served a purpose.

(Even if that purpose might seem really generic, or really minor.)

Can you find a use for them? Is there a meaning beyond that use? — apokrisis

Yes, I used the term in the context of numbers and/or God. What more do you want me to say?

What was your purpose then?

(Pretty clearly, it was to suggest there might be a "dilemma" worth discussing. So given the familiarity of this debate, were you planning to offer anything new?)

What was your purpose then? — apokrisis

The purpose was to explore the meaning of the term "abstractions of the mind"? As in the OP, what are they, are they real or just metaphysical?

...are they real or just metaphysical? — Posty McPostface

...or demonstrably useful?

(Again, is there a good reason to debate realism vs idealism for the billionth time when you have pragmatism as the better choice?)

...or demonstrably useful?

(Again, is there a good reason to debate realism vs idealism for the billionth time when you have pragmatism as the better choice?) — apokrisis

Then how else would you phrase the issue instead of resorting to terms like "abstractions of the mind"?

Well "maths, numbers" are clearly a useful "abstraction of the mind" concept or universal. Whether numbers "exist" or are "actual" generally tends to be a word or language game.
The concept of God is found useful by many as a way to give higher meaning purpose and value not only to their own lives but to the universe in general.
So for many "abstractions of the mind" are just as real and valuable as physical material entities.

Then how else would you phrase the issue instead of resorting to terms like "abstractions of the mind"? — Posty McPostface

Conceptions. Habits of sign. "God" and "two" exist as words in a language. And as such, they mediate some pragmatic conceptual relation we might have with the real world.

Now of course you can go on from that to talk about whether they in fact relate us conceptually to the "real world" or just "metaphysically possible worlds", or whatever other kind of world you want to then name.

But that boils down to modality. Two-ness is being conceived of as completely generic - true of all possible worlds (where counting would work). And God is conceived of as completely fictional - not actually true of the actual world ... for the atheist at least.

So semiosis provides the larger encompassing framework already. It subsumes "material realities of the world" and "abstractions of the mind" into an over-arching semiotic relation. It cannot be a simple case of either/or - either God and two physically exists, or else mentally exists. It is already being said that for the words to exist, and be used within a language system, requires that both the mind and the world are "places" where they "exist". The existence is in fact the process which is a relation that works. Something about the world, and something about the mind, must be in fruitful co-ordination.

So God must be a useful fiction when the purpose was the regulation of traditional human societies. Two must be a useful generality once humans started to conceive of the world in terms of mathematical-strength signs.

Of course, there is aways something "out there" - that God-shaped hole to fill in a society seeking to be ruled by less earth-bound rules, that two-shaped identity to be discovered everywhere that counting appears to work.

But also there is always something "in here" - the participant in a language community capable of finding such a habit of interpretance a functional way to operate.

So your OP was setting things up for a false dilemma - something exists either in the world or in the mind. Pragmatism presumes that the existence of that something - the sign: some word that gets regularly used - must speak to a relationship that works. And for that to be the case, it exists as a unity bridging mind and world.

Of course - the next familiar Kantian difficulty - it is the "world" as it is for "us".

So it is the world as the phenomenal or an Umwelt, not the world as the noumenal. And it is us as an emergent modeller, not us as some Cartesian and unphysical res cogitans.

Well "maths, numbers" are clearly a useful "abstraction of the mind" concept or universal. Whether numbers "exist" or are "actual" generally tends to be a word or language game. — prothero

But, I highlighted the fact that we use "God" and "the number two" as abstractions of the mind. If they exist, then, they exist as abstractions of the mind, and nothing else. So, then what are abstractions of the mind if nothing else than a rigid designator of sorts? I'm sure in a possible world the same abstractions of the mind exist, maybe with different wording; but, that means it's not just generally speaking a language game of sorts.

"God" and "two" exist as words in a language. And as such, they mediate some pragmatic conceptual relation we might have with the real world. — apokrisis

Or again, they're just abstractions of the mind and nothing else. If they modally exist in other possible worlds, then that presupposes they have some function further than simply being abstractions of the mind. Again, rigid designators of sorts.

Now of course you can go on from that to talk about whether they in fact relate us conceptually to the "real world" or just "metaphysically possible worlds", or whatever other kind of world you want to then name. — apokrisis

But, that's an important distinction to make, surely?

But that boils down to modality. Two-ness is being conceived of as completely generic - true of all possible worlds (where counting would work). And God is conceived of as completely fictional - not actually true of the actual world ... for the atheist at least. — apokrisis

So, modally speaking, we have the number two and God being used interchangeably as abstractions of the mind. Hence, they appear real in any possible world.

So semiosis provides the larger encompassing framework already. It subsumes "material realities of the world" and "abstractions of the mind" into an over-arching semiotic relation. It cannot be a simple case of either/or - either God and two physically exists, or else mentally exists. It is already being said that for the words to exist, and be used within a language system, requires that both the mind and the world are "places" where they "exist". The existence is in fact the process which is a relation that works. Something about the world, and something about the mind, must be in fruitful co-ordination. — apokrisis

I'm not quite getting your gist here. Are you saying that pragmatically, they serve no further utility to use than using a different language game? Again, if they are modally independent of synthetic a priori judgments, then they exist universally.

Of course - the next familiar Kantian difficulty - it is the "world" as it is for "us".

So it is the world as the phenomenal or an Umwelt, not the world as the noumenal. And it is us as an emergent modeller, not us as some Cartesian and unphysical res cogitans. — apokrisis

You lost me here, care to expand?

Thanks for posting!

Just to harp on Kant. I think, that abstractions of the mind exist in a modal independent sense that makes possible synthetic a priori judgments. It would be the case that two exists as a rigid designator of these modally independent abstractions of the mind, that are possible in every possible world.

Just something to consider in regards to the topic.

My first forum post, way back, was about the reality of number. I argued that numbers are real on the basis that they are the same for anyone who can count, and also because they make actual predictions; to put it another way, because you can be wrong about them, then they are real. If I ask you to show me a number, you will point to a symbol - but that is what it is, a symbol. The number itself is a quantity which can only be grasped by a mind that is capable of counting. So on that basis, I argued that numbers are real but not existent - at least, not existent in the way that tables, chairs, and stars are existent, because they only exist in and for a rational intellect.

And indeed on that basis, I then went on to argue that God might also be ‘real but not existent’, but I’ll save that for later.

My first forum post, way back, was about the reality of number. I argued that numbers are real on the basis that they are the same for anyone who can count, and also because they make actual predictions; to put it another way, because you can be wrong about them, then they are real. If I ask you to show me a number, you will point to a symbol - but that is what it is, a symbol. The number itself is a quantity which can only be grasped by a mind that is capable of counting. So on that basis, I argued that numbers are real but not existent - at least, not existent in the way that tables, chairs, and stars are existent, because they only exist in and for a rational intellect.

And indeed on that basis, I then went on to argue that God might also be ‘real but not existent’, but I’ll save that for later. — Wayfarer

I do recall that you indeed posited that numbers are tantamount to affirming the concept of God. But, to ground what you have pondered over dutifully, I would assert that abstractions of the mind can be real in a Meinong's jungle of sorts. They can be abstractions of logical entities grounded in a non-modally dependant sense. What do you think about that?

So, modally speaking, we have the number two and God being used interchangeably as abstractions of the mind. — Posty McPostface

The modal distinctions I made were narratively different. Two would be general rather than particular. God would be fictional rather than factual.

Are you saying that pragmatically, they serve no further utility to use than using a different language game? Again, if they are modally independent of synthetic a priori judgments, then they exist universally. — Posty McPostface

I wouldn't focus on these two particular examples - two and God. My argument is that "abstractions of the mind" are only "conceptions of a world". So before we get into anything else, the first step is to avoid getting sucked into a Platonistic framing of the options. I would begin in the pragmatism of "language games" - though "form of life" would be the better term, if we must invoke Wittgenstein.

Pragmatism isn't just a game, but life itself. We are constrained by nature to make it work in the long run. And "we" are ultimately the product of the game more than its author. So again, it is about shifting away from the opposing extremes and telling the story from the balanced middle.

With two-ness and the divine, we can see them as important to our conceptions of ourselves, as we exist in a world. If we express it that way, we can see that both sides of the equation matter.

If we are talking about dogs and cats, or turnips and potatoes, there is no big deal. It seems we are talking about physical stuff that is just "out there" right now in relation to us and what we might think about those things "in here". The separation - and the regulative interaction that epistemic separation enables - feels direct and immediate. No mystery.

But talk about numbers and creators touch upon the kind of generalities that must now somehow incorporate "us" - our own being or existence as both physical and mental entities. So that alone is shifting the modal register. Two speaks to the greater generality that is entification itself - separability or countability. While God speaks to the desire for a causal explanation - a general reason for the particular individuations we might observe.

So on the one hand, there is a definite shift to a metaphysical register of reference. Pragmatism is about a conception of the world with us in it. It seems to be about the everyday human scale view of turnips and dogs. And then we find ourselves talking about "things" - like two and God - that must be classed as transcending that human scale view. That appears to break the spell of ordinary language. We feel we must be talking about either abstractions that actually also exist, or abstractions that are merely pure imaginative inventions.

But that is why - pragmatically - we have science (and maths). The appropriate thing to do, we have found through our adventures in philosophy, is to step up another level in semiotic scale and start describing reality from an "objective" rather than a "subjective" point of view.

So we resolve the Platonic dilemma not by deciding in favour of universals, generalities or abstracta being either "creations of the mind" or "facts of the world", but by establishing a systematically larger point of view that can achieve the level of pragmatic understanding we seek. The "world with us in it" becomes the world as a well-informed scientist or natural philosopher sees it - if that happens to be what you agree is the proper step up in viewpoint.

As I say, learning to see the world that way involves habits that then produce that form of selfhood. It is a form of life. And many would immediately leap forward to say the naturalistic image of nature is something they must hate and resist ... as it threatens their own habitual identity. :)

However setting that aside, the resolution of the paradox - abstracta: mental or real? - lies in seeing that everyday language is a pragmatic form of life. And then having formed a habit of conception that successfully presents the world with us in it, we are going to encounter the world as it currently seems much larger than just us. That then presents the next challenge we might want to answer. And the only actual tool to hand is the sign relation or semiosis.

This is the post in question.

Here I want to consider whether there is a difference between what is real and what exists.

'Exist' is derived from a root meaning to 'be apart', where 'ex' = apart from or outside, and 'ist' = be. Ex-ist then means to be a separable object, to be 'this thing' as distinct from 'that thing'. This applies to all the existing objects of perception - chairs, tables, stars, planets, and so on - everything which we would normally call 'a thing'. So we could say that 'things exist'. No surprises there, and I don't think anyone would disagree with that proposition.

Now to introduce a metaphysical concern. I was thinking about 'God', in the sense understood by classical metaphysics and theology. Whereas the things of perception are composed of parts and have a beginning and an end in time, 'God' is, according to classical theology, 'simple' - that is, not composed of parts- and 'eternal', that is, not beginning or ending in time.

Therefore, 'God' does not 'exist', being of a different nature to anything we normally perceive. Theologians would say 'God' was superior to or beyond existence (for example, Pseudo-Dionysius; Eckhardt; Tillich.) I don't think this is a controversial statement either, when the terms are defined this way (and leaving aside whether you believe in God or not, although if you don't the discussion might be irrelevant or meaningless.)

But this made me wonder whether 'what exists' and 'what is real' might, in fact, be different. For example, consider number. Obviously we all concur on what a number is, and mathematics is lawful; in other words, we can't just make up our own laws of numbers. But numbers don't 'exist' in the same sense that objects of perception do; there is no object called 'seven'. You might point at the numeral, 7, but that is just a symbol. What we concur on is a number of objects, but the number cannot be said to exist independent of its apprehension, at least, not in the same way objects apparently do. In what realm or sphere do numbers exist? 'Where' are numbers? Surely in the intellectual realm, of which perception is an irreducible part. So numbers are not 'objective' in the same way that 'things' are. Sure, mathematical laws are there to be discovered; but no-one could argue that maths existed before humans discovered it.

However this line of argument might indicate that what is real might be different to what exists.

I started wondering, this is perhaps related to the Platonic distinction between 'intelligible objects' and 'objects of perception'. Objects of perception - ordinary things - only exist, in the Platonic view, because they conform to, and are instances of, laws. Particular things are simply ephemeral instances of the eternal forms, but in themselves, they have no actual being. Their actual being is conferred by the fact that they conform to laws (logos?). So 'existence' in this sense, and I think this is the sense it was intended by the Platonic and neo-Platonic schools, is illusory. Earthly objects of perception exist, but only in a transitory and imperfect way. They are 'mortal' - perishable, never perfect, and always transient. Whereas the archetypal forms exist in the One Mind and are apprehended by Nous: while they do not exist they provide the basis for all existing things by creating the pattern, the ratio, whereby things are formed. They are real, above and beyond the existence of wordly things; but they don't actually exist. They don't need to exist; things do the hard work of existence.

So the ordinary worldly person is caught up in 'his or her particular things', and thus is ensnared in illusory and ephemeral concerns. Whereas the Philosopher, by realising the transitory nature of ordinary objects of perception, learns to contemplate within him or herself, the eternal Law whereby things become manifest according to their ratio, and by being Disinterested, in the original sense of that word.

Do you think this is a valid interpretation of neo-platonism? Do you think it makes the case that what is real, and what exists, might be different? And if this is so, is this a restatement of the main theme of classical metaphysics? Or is it a novel idea?

Actually the first response to that OP was from 180 Proof, who responded quite positively. (Indeed I think it was the only positive interaction I was to have with him.)

That's a phenomenal breakdown of the issue. Yet, it still stands that 'abstractions of the mind' can be conferred with 'intelligible objects'. My noesis is increasing as I go along reading this.

Modally speaking, intelligible objects are tantamount to saying that they exist independently of particular. They form the substance of the world in a neo-Platonic fashion.

So we resolve the Platonic dilemma not by deciding in favour of universals, generalities or abstracta being either "creations of the mind" or "facts of the world", but by establishing a systematically larger point of view that can achieve the level of pragmatic understanding we seek. The "world with us in it" becomes the world as a well-informed scientist or natural philosopher sees it - if that happens to be what you agree is the proper step up in viewpoint. — apokrisis

Well, yes. We can submit to a collectivism of solipsistic manners of language games; but, intelligible objects persist after we are gone into some void of spirituality.

intelligible objects are tantamount to saying that they exist independently of particular. — Posty McPostface

They exist independently of particular minds, but are nevertheless only perceptible to a rational intellect. Hence, ‘real ideas’ - which is close to the meaning of ‘objective idealism’. And actually I’m totally onboard with the paragraph that you have snipped from Apokrisis above; not a coincidence, I suspect, because if you google ‘objective idealism’, one of the primary exponents is Pierce.

Anyway, to try and drive the point a bit further - one of my [many] scrap-book quotes is from Einstein, who said, in dialogue with Hindu mystical poet, Tagore, that ‘I cannot prove scientifically that Truth must be conceived as a Truth that is valid independent of humanity; but I believe it firmly. I believe, for instance, that the Pythagorean theorem in geometry states something that is approximately true, independent of the existence of man.’ But what I think even Einstein overlooks in saying this, is the fact that the Pythagorean theorem is something that can only be seen by a rational intellect. So even though it is ‘mind-independent’ in the sense of independent of your or my mind, it is also mind-dependent in that it can only be grasped by a mind. It is, I think, what Augustine intended by the term ‘an intelligible object’ [and probably literally, as the Pythagorean theorem is one of the kinds of principles that even an Augustine would have been aware of.]

So I think it is a huge, unstated assumption that we understand what exactly the status of such principles is; we seem to think that evolutionary theory ‘explains’ these kinds of ideas. Whereas I am of the view that when h.sapiens evolved to the point of being able to grasp such principles, then we ‘transcended the biological’. That is why Platonists felt that there was a link between geometry, mathematics, and ‘higher truth’ - because you’re actually seeing into the ‘domain of forms’, the underlying ideas which give rise to, or even underwrite, the ‘phenomenal domain’. That is what scientists are actually seeing, but I don’t know if they always appreciate the philosophical significance of their insights. Instead they are always trying to seek ‘the cause’ in ‘the effect’ from the Platonic point of view, due to the influence of empiricism, as the ‘vertical dimension’ of Platonic epistemology is precisely what was lost in the transition to modernity.

Anyway, to try and drive the point a bit further - one of my [many] scrap-book quotes is from Einstein, who said, in dialogue with Hindu mystical poet, Tagore, that ‘I cannot prove scientifically that Truth must be conceived as a Truth that is valid independent of humanity; but I believe it firmly. — Wayfarer

I believe this was answered by Kant in his Prolegomena. We can have synthetic a priori judgments made and in this view, intelligible objects are a feature of the world, not our way of thinking or us or language games or forms of life as @apokrisis suggests.

Your second sentence contradicts the first; because the precise import of Kant’s ‘Copernican revolution in philosophy’ is that things conform to thoughts, not thoughts to things.

Your second sentence contradicts the first; because the precise import of Kant’s ‘Copernican revolution in philosophy’ is that things conform to thoughts, not thoughts to things. — Wayfarer

That can be interpreted as just a proof by inversion, I think.

Good luck with that in a Kant tute. :wink:

But, you do get the significance of viewing things this way, don't you? I mean, if mental abstractions are a feature of the world and not only the mind, then it's almost a spiritual revelation of sorts.

All this makes me want to take a community college class in mathematics, heh. I think I will.

Indeed. Now you’re getting it. :ok:

But, I highlighted the fact that we use "God" and "the number two" as abstractions of the mind. If they exist, then, they exist as abstractions of the mind, and nothing else — Posty McPostface

Except any mathematical realist or devoted theist would take exception with the notion that God and Numbers are just "abstractions of the mind" as would any neo Platonist. Any good idealist would grant you your premise, but go on to state all of our experiences are "abstractions of the mind". So I am not sure where your premise gets you. You seem to wish to say you can somehow tell "abstractions of the mind" from other things which apparently have some other type of existence or reality. I do not think it is that easy, clear cut or agreed upon.

‘Real but immaterial’ suits me. There are ornate arguments deployed against the reality of number, because if it is true that they’re real but incorporeal, then it mitigates against materialism and even some forms of naturalism; which is, at the same time, embarrassing, considering how important maths is to science. It’s my favorite theme. :wink:

One can say that the number two exists as an abstraction of the mind. — Posty McPostface

"the mind"? Singular?

That strikes me as odd.

If I ask you for two bananas, do I know what to expect?