Arbitrary stuff invariably allows for lots of mischief; which, again, I am not necessarily up in arms against, because from my lazy chair, I enjoy letting the laws of nature run their course. — alcontali

Only complete maniacs such as myself or 5 sigma geniuses such as yourself have the luxury of letting the laws of nature run their course. :wink:

It's about how math emerged onto the world stage solely by virtue of our attribution of specific non-negotiable meaning to certain marks and quantities and how that evolved into also talking about non physical things with meaningful marks...
— creativesoul

Quantities, i.e. numbers, are not even needed for inadvertently dragging in an entire bureaucracy of verifiable formalisms, rules and regulations: — alcontali

The topic is meaning. The contention is whether or not math is meaningful. You've argued in the negative. I'm arguing in the affirmative.

Numbers reference quantities. Numbers name specific amounts. Numbers are the meaningful marks that we use to count things. Math and all of it's rules are existentially dependent upon language. Talking about language happens in the following three ways.

We are talking about a.)that which is already meaningful prior to our talking(all who are learning the rules of math/language), b.)that which is as a result thereof(as in the case of talking about that the rules that we stipulate), and c.)that which exists prior to our language itself.

All meaning is existentially dependent upon a creature capable of drawing correlations between different things. There are no exceptions.

Numbers are meaningful because they are mathematical symbols and all symbols become meaningful by virtue of being part of a mental correlation drawn by a creature capable of basic thought/belief formation. Without numbers and quantities, there could be no counting. All math is existentially dependent upon arithmetic.

To further make my own case, mathematics emerged onto the world stage via human thought/belief. Math is language. Language is meaningful. Math is symbol. Symbol is meaninfull. Math is measuring. Measuring is meaningful.

Math is meaningful.

Well played. :clap:

So, let me just ask you this (as I am having trouble with it): does a game with rules, such as basketball, have meaning outside of its meaningful value in personal taste/judgment to so many people? Because I think @alcontali might say that pure mathematics is a lot like basketball in that it is something like a game with rules.

Math is meaningful. — creativesoul

I guess that you say that because you attach a value judgement to the terms "meaningful" ("good") and "meaningless" ("bad").

I don't.

Furthermore, fake morality often throws a spanner in the works. If you cannot view the technical term "meaningless" as morally neutral, then you will invariably look for meaning/semantics, where there isn't any, especially by design.

In semiotics, the meaning of a sign is its place in a sign relation, in other words, the set of roles that it occupies within a given sign relation. A symbol, which is the most abstract, does not resemble or bear any physical relation to the thing that it represents in any way. Peirce's model assumes that in order for a sign to be meaningful, it must refer to something external and cannot be self-contained, as it is for Saussure.

Mathematics is symbol manipulation only, of symbols of which the meaning has been completely stripped away:

According to formalism, the truths expressed in logic and mathematics are not about numbers, sets, or triangles or any other contensive subject matter — in fact, they aren't "about" anything at all.

Furthermore, these "truths" are not correspondence-theory "true", because they do not correspond to anything in the real, physical world. So, I disagree with the use of the term "truth". It should be:

The theorems expressed in logic and mathematics are not about numbers, sets, or triangles ... they aren't "about" anything at all.

Math is meaningful.
— creativesoul

I guess that you say that because you attach a value judgement to the terms "meaningful" ("good") and "meaningless" ("bad").

I don't.

Furthermore, fake morality often throws a spanner in the works. If you cannot view the technical term "meaningless" as morally neutral, then you will invariably look for meaning/semantics, where there isn't any, especially by design. — alcontali

You guess wrong.

It's not about good/bad. It's not about morality. Red herrings aren't acceptable.

Meaningless means lacking meaning. Meaningless things lack meaning. They do not have what it takes. It has nothing to do with morality and everything to do with what all meaning is existentially dependent upon as well as what math is.

Poisoning the well is not acceptable either.

I can make my own case.

I'm being reminded of apo by this sudden turn of events... this slide into rhetoric and personal insult.

I suggest your concept of 'the real world' is just as nebulous, as say, 'the imaginary component of a complex number'. Both are concepts which stand or fall on their contextual utility with respect to human affairs. Both involve a grammar of usage which structures their relationship with other concepts.

Suppose I said 'football is not about anything'....or 'doing philosophy is not about anything'...
Neither statement is generally open to a truth value, but such values are assigned contextually in specific social transactions in which a consensual domain is being sought.

IMO It is the glossing over of such social contexts which generates much of the 'word salad' on threads like this, but of course even that activity no doubt has its social recreational function.

Well played. :clap:

So, let me just ask you this (as I am having trouble with it): does a game with rules, such as basketball, have meaning outside of its meaningful value in personal taste/judgment to so many people? Because I think alcontali might say that pure mathematics is a lot like basketball in that it is something like a game with rules. — Noah Te Stroete

Personal taste/preference aren't that relevant here. They are one result of things becoming meaningful.

Basketball is meaningful because it is existentially dependent upon certain language use, and that language remains in use. The same holds good with math.

It really is an odd state of affairs when someone is doing both, engaging in a conversation regarding meaning while arguing vehemently and exclusively about something that they do not think/believe is meaningful...

Well aside from all the love and affection being bestowed upon me, the bulk of the conversation is about something that they claim is not meaningful. What's the topic about again?

Not 'odd' at all according to Derrida. Aporia is inevitable. Every assertion involves its negation as a backcloth to establish its ephemeral semantic import..

Suppose I said 'football is not about anything'....or 'doing philosophy is not about anything' ... Neither statement is generally open to a truth value ... — fresco

When I read the literal words of David Hilbert (formalist) I seem to pretty much always agree, because apparently, I experience things in the same way as he does. Sometimes I can explain why I agree with David Hilbert, but sometimes I cannot. Sometimes it is mere intuition.

When I read what Brouwer (constructivist) says, I usually cringe, because his views sound utmost heretical to me. As far as I am concerned, he is an accomplice of Satan.

Now, the strange thing is that I do not have this problem with Stephen Kleene, even though he is also a constructivist. I just happen to like his work really much. That is probably why I just ignore it when he writes something that I disagree with.

I subscribe to formalism but also to Platonism in mathematics. That choice is just an opinion.

Thankyou for the Brouwer reference. I certainly think he was correct with respect his critique of the law of the excluded middle (as evidenced, in my mind, by the concept of complementarity in quantum physics).
But you have not processed my suggestion to examine what you mean by 'the real world'. For example, there is the pov that 'reality is a social construction', but I have no knowledge of whether Brouwer's constructivism is related to that.

You ask 'what words are about'. — fresco

No, I asked what human-caused scribbles and sounds mean, among many other questions. You aren't answering the questions.

They are about 'ephemeral agreement about action decisions' whether in internal or extenal dialogue. They are not about 'things' except insofar that 'things' are contextual focusings of attention towards which action might be directed. 'Things' are actively 'thinged' by thingers ! — fresco

:brow: Huh-wha? They are about agreements about action decisions?
Earlier, you said:

But your lay term 'aboutness' is vacuous, because unless you are a naive realist you have no 'bedrock'. My 'cordination of coordination' rests on the bedrock of 'action decisions' involved in physical, psychological and social 'prediction and control'. — fresco

If 'aboutness' is vacuous, how is it that you've used it twice in one sentence to describe what words are about? I asked you how 'aboutness' could be vacuous, but you again ignored the question and then contradict your own statement by using the word. :confused:

So to think 'meaning' is about independently existing 'things' is to assume a 'bedrock' which is in essence 'quicksand', because it fails to take into account the subtle dynamics of linguistic interactions which constantly shift or negotiate the focal boundaries of 'thinghood'. — fresco

I never said 'meaning' is about independently existing 'things'. I said 'meaning' is the relationship between causes and their effects. You aren't paying attention.

So the 'direct answer' to your question has been given. 'Words' are behavioral markers in the process of organising actions to fulfil human needs. They could be considered to be 'the currency of thought', and like monetary currency their 'value' can change according to context. — fresco

What are humans if not things? Another contradiction

So, from that pov, which is supported by my references, any failure to take this on board constitues an incestuous 'language game' involving futile demands for words to define words...futile because its like asking 'how many dollars is a dollar worth' ?
Q: What does a dollar/word mean ? A: What action you can perform with it.

BTW Your 'scribbles' are equivalent to banknotes/coins/poker chips, etc. — fresco

Another misinterpretation of my statements. I have never said that words ultimately define words. Words are just types of visual and auditory cues. We try to get at the cause of the experiences we have, whether it be a car horn, a knock at the door, words being spoken, the sting of an ant, a hand waving, scribbles on paper, steam rising from water, smell of smoke, upset stomach, etc. By getting at the cause, we get at the meaning of the sensory impression.

Words (spoken/auditory or written/visual) are just a type of sensory impression that we understand through experience over time to mean some idea some person wanted to convey. The idea isn't just other words. It is other types of visual, auditory, tactile, gustatory, olfactory sensory impressions, which are themselves about the world.

When someone says, "I don't feel so good." What are those sounds about? What do they mean? It means that the person has a pain somewhere in their body. Pain isn't just another word. It is a feeling. If you ask them, "what do you mean?", they may be more specific and define the pain as throbbing in their head and dizziness. The fact that they used other words to define their pain does not mean that words define words. It means that words are the only means we have to communicate to others things in our experience that aren't words.

What we do with words is communicate, or invoke, our other types of sensory impressions in other's minds.

Some philosophers hold words, or language use itself as the foundation of all of our thinking. That we can't think without words, or language. That simply isn't the case. Animals and infant humans are thinkers without any understanding of language. How can you even learn a language without being able to think prior to learning it? How can you learn anything at all without thinking?

I have referenced Ildefonso's story numerous times on this forum. If his story doesn't put to rest the claim that we can't think without words, then I don't know what would. The only reason people could think that we can't think without words is because they are unaware of Ildefonso's story.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Man_Without_Words

Ildefonso is a deaf man that didn't learn what language was until he was an adult. He didn't understand why people moved their mouths at each other. Once Susan Schaller took the time to teach him what language was about (which wasn't easy), Ildefonso wasn't surprised that he could think, he was surprised to learn that we had a shared symbol for all the states-of-affairs in the world, including his own ideas, which allowed him to communicate them to others.

I see ! So 'cause' = 'meaning'...good luck with that one!

Let me know if you follow up my references.
Thankyou for the conversation so far.

NB. In terms of your flair for combative philosophy you might appreciate this critique of the Schaller study.

It has been suggested that the characterization of Ildefonso as entirely "languageless" may be an oversimplification. In the same review, Padden speculates that "Schaller may have been teaching language to Ildefonso, but more accurately, she was teaching him how to map a new set of symbols on a most likely already existent framework of symbolic competence."

I see ! So 'cause' = 'meaning'...good luck with that one!

Let me know if you follow up my references. — fresco

I did.

There have been problems defining deconstruction. Derrida claimed that all of his essays were attempts to define what deconstruction is,[26]:4 and that deconstruction is necessarily complicated and difficult to explain since it actively criticises the very language needed to explain it.

In the early 1970s, Searle had a brief exchange with Jacques Derrida regarding speech-act theory. The exchange was characterized by a degree of mutual hostility between the philosophers, each of whom accused the other of having misunderstood his basic points.[25]:29[citation needed] Searle was particularly hostile to Derrida's deconstructionist framework and much later refused to let his response to Derrida be printed along with Derrida's papers in the 1988 collection Limited Inc. Searle did not consider Derrida's approach to be legitimate philosophy, or even intelligible writing, and argued that he did not want to legitimize the deconstructionist point of view by paying any attention to it. Consequently, some critics[48] have considered the exchange to be a series of elaborate misunderstandings rather than a debate, while others[49] have seen either Derrida or Searle gaining the upper hand. The level of hostility can be seen from Searle's statement that "It would be a mistake to regard Derrida's discussion of Austin as a confrontation between two prominent philosophical traditions", to which Derrida replied that that sentence was "the only sentence of the 'reply' to which I can subscribe".[50] Commentators have frequently interpreted the exchange as a prominent example of a confrontation between analytic and Continental philosophies. — Wikipedia

It seems that other prominent philosophers don't even think that Derrida's Deconstruction theory is legitimate philosophy.

How is it that you can criticize something that you say doesn't exist? What are you criticizing? "Language" is a string of scribbles, not the actual act using signs to refer to other signs. So, scribbles can be about something else that isn't scribbles. Your end up contradicting yourself and defeating your own argument by criticizing something that isn't a word with words.

What you and Derrida seem to be saying is that it is signs all the way down. Good luck with that one.

NB. In terms of your flair for combative philosophy you might appreciate this critique of the Schaller study.
It has been suggested that the characterization of Ildefonso as entirely "languageless" may be an oversimplification. In the same review, Padden speculates that "Schaller may have been teaching language to Ildefonso, but more accurately, she was teaching him how to map a new set of symbols on a most likely already existent framework of symbolic competence." — Wikipedia

Like I said, how can we learn language (how to map a new set of symbols) if we don't already think, or know how symbolism works - if there isn't already an aboutness to our experiences? Sure, Idelfonso could already understand symbolism in that some feeling is an indicator of some state of his body, or some state of the world. How do you expect some person to learn language if they don't already represent things in their mind?

I understand (I think) what each of you thinks meaning is. What I don’t understand is how you both can’t be right at the same time. I am dumb. We all can agree on that!

Yes. Opinions on Derrida tend to polarize due to his iconoclasm.
Have a go with Maturana. He doesn't do 'mind' or 'thinking'...only behavior.
'

Yes. Opinions on Derrida tend to polarize due to his iconoclasm.
Have a go with Maturana. He doesn't do 'mind' or 'thinking'...only behavior. — fresco

To whom is this a reply?

Sorry, that was to Harry.

I'm pleased you say you undedstand what each of us is talking about. I doubt whether each of us understands the other !

You seem to be using the word "meaning" in at least three different senses:
Meaning as the definition of a word
Meaning as the interpretation of a set of ideas
Meaning as significance.

They all seem to get mashed up together. I think things would have been clearer if you had defined your term better at the beginning. — T Clark

Bingo.

I certainly think he was correct with respect his critique of the law of the excluded middle (as evidenced, in my mind, by the concept of complementarity in quantum physics). — fresco

As far as I am concerned, the "quantum physics license" applies when investigating particles to which the size of a photon is noticeable, given the fact that light is so important to the process of visual observation; and electrical current and electromagnetic radiation for the purpose of measurement. That is probably the same as saying that the wave length and the distance measured are too close in each other's range. In those circumstances, we can reasonably expect disturbances to practices that are normal at larger scale, and therefore things to become fishy.

It's not even that the law of the excluded middle no longer applies. We may just no longer be able to observe it. For all practical purposes, we can probably treat them as the same situation: "cannot possibly be observed" versus "not there at all".

When things get too big or too small, normal expectations will not be met. The example that is the most interesting to me in that respect, is the Eddington limit. I personally suspect that there is also a corresponding lower limit (minimum size of a celestial body), and that it is in fact a range. However, in the standard model where "matter causes gravity" it will not be analysed as such. Why would you look for something that your standard model predicts not possibly to be there?

Still, I do not really like physics, because you cannot do it with just pen and paper. Real-world disciplines do not suit my lifestyle of limiting the tools to just a (virtual) pen and paper, i.e. a linux laptop.

In some sense, we could even say that the law of the excluded middle, and probably a lot of other laws, only apply in our typical scale range, i.e. when it is about things that are not too big and not too small.

Complementarity is not a 'size' issue. It's in part a 'set membership' issue...particle versus wave.. which were thought to be mutually exclusive.
I have no problem in accepting pure mathematics as an intellectual exercise, often with later surprising applicability. (I believe, for example, that the equations applicable to electric power transmission lines were formulated in the 17th. century).

You seem to be using the word "meaning" in at least three different senses:
Meaning as the definition of a word
Meaning as the interpretation of a set of ideas
Meaning as significance.

They all seem to get mashed up together. I think things would have been clearer if you had defined your term better at the beginning.
— T Clark

Bingo. — S

And yet a criterion for all meaning has been offered since, shortly afterward. There are no examples to the contrary. It's what all meaning has in common that makes it what it is.

When one attempts to take account of meaning by definition s/he will inevitably find themselves stuck talking about the meaning of "meaning".

All terminological definitions are meaningful as a result of the criterion I've put forth, including all senses of the term "meaning".

What's not to love?

You've merely repeated (surprise, surprise) your heavily criticised prior position, from a prior discussion, which logically implies a form of idealism.

And there are counterexamples to this, but of course you won't acknowledge them whilst you cling to your position. And you cling to your position like Tara Reid clings to alcohol and fame.

I understand (I think) what each of you thinks meaning is. What I don’t understand is how you both can’t be right at the same time. I am dumb. We all can agree on that! — Noah Te Stroete

Fresco/Derrida claims meaning doesn't exist. I say it does. How can we both be right?

Opinions on Derrida tend to polarize due to his iconoclasm.
Have a go with Maturana. He doesn't do 'mind' or 'thinking'...only behavior. — fresco

Maturana is a p-zombie?

See my 'existence' thread !

You've merely repeated (surprise, surprise) your heavily criticised prior position, from a prior discussion, which logically implies a form of idealism.

And there are counterexamples to this, but of course you won't acknowledge them whilst you cling to your position. And you cling to your position like Tara Reid clings to alcohol and fame. — S

Sigh...

No. He's a behaviourist. The problem here, of course, is that behaviour is but one part of meaning, when it is, and not all behaviour is meaningful.

If behavior is the effect of some cause, the cause is the meaning of the behavior. In this sense, purpose is the cause of the behavior, and is therefore the meaning of the behavior. Purpose and meaning are the same.