Not sure what it is yet...

Doesn't seem to work very well for some things... :wink:

It plays on the meaning of "the entire novel" to give a different answer than what would usually be expected. So it's wordplay. The usual answer would be that the novel didn't exist in its entirety when it was only half complete.

Half complete novels exist in their entirety.

"In it's entirety" is the key phrase. Being amenable to evolutionary progression, that's a moving target. It's meant to focus upon basic elemental constituency... what things consist of.

Call it what you like.

Half complete novels exist in their entirety. — creativesoul

What's the point of even saying that, though? Given what you mean, who is disagreeing with you? Yes, a half complete novel exists in its entirety as a half complete novel, not as an entire, fully complete novel.

Anyone can come up with ambiguous statements and cause an argument over them in light of the different answers.

What I'm doing here with the odd claim is attempting to drive an existential wedge between reports of things and what's being reported upon.
— creativesoul

Why does it matter? — jamalrob

It matters to be able to take proper account of things in terms of their basic/rudimentary elemental constituency. That, in turn, enables an account of the evolutionary progression of that particular thing. The content of all reports shares a basic set of elementary constituents. They consist of the same things. Language use is one. Language is required to report upon thought/belief. If thought/belief begins simply and grows/evolves in it's complexity, then our account must satisfy this:It must be amenable to evolutionary progression.

Thought/belief(insert any mental ongoings of your choosing) is on the left, and a report(the first) thereof is on the right. What's on the right requires rather complex common language replete with names for mental ongoings. What's on the left does not always. Whatever the left is existentially dependent upon, so too is the right, but not always the other way around.

What does the thought/belief of a creature that has never spoken about it consist of?

Can't be common language. Propositions are existentially dependent upon predication. Predication... language. Can't be propositional content either.

What does the thought/belief of a creature that has never spoken about it consist of? — creativesoul

I’m going with “understanding”. Just a guess.

I’d rather be informed of what it consists of, to tell the truth.

He's been the captain ever since Melville made him so. — creativesoul

We're entirely in agreement. My mistake if I thought otherwise.

No worries. It seemed that way to me as well. This time!

:wink:

I’m going with “understanding”. Just a guess.

I’d rather be informed of what it consists of, to tell the truth. — Mww

There we go.

Pardon me for having a habit - and a bad one at that - of mistakenly assuming that everyone else has as good a grasp upon my own linguistic framework/conceptual scheme as I do.

"Understanding" doesn't help here as best I can tell. I mean, on my view all understanding consists of thought/belief. In addition, there's a bit of common sense nuance concerning it. Understanding cannot be false, so... there's that.

In short, to directly answer the question...

All thought/belief consists entirely of mental correlations drawn between different things. With a non linguistic creature all of those things are directly perceptible.

All thought/belief consists entirely of mental correlations drawn between different things. — creativesoul

Ok, but.....what things?

With a non linguistic creature all of those things are directly perceptible. — creativesoul

So “what things” are things directly perceptible. Ok.

Does that mean non-linguistic creatures can’t remember things?

Moved the following discussion into this thread...

Imagine a language-less creature that has just touched fire for the first time. (...) All that is needed is a creature capable of drawing correlations between their own behaviour(the touching) and the pain that immediately ensued.
— creativesoul

For the language-less creature, it is sufficient to say his correlations are given from instinct. — Mww

It's usually not a good sign when someone asks another to elaborate upon another's thought/belief system(worldview) and then immediately refuses to accept the terms. Prior to enabling themselves to follow a line of thought that results from several key notions therein, such a person makes it literally impossible for themselves to follow along.

To answer the question...

I reject the proposition/statement:"Language-less creatures draw correlations that are given from instinct" on the following grounds...

1.Being given presupposes a giver. Unnecessarily multiplying entities is unacceptable on my view.

2. Correlations are not given to the non linguistic thinking/believing creature. To quite the contrary correlations between different things are drawn by the creature - often for the very first time. We can watch that happen. We can set the stage. We are not giving them the correlations. They draw them themselves. We cannot literally watch it happen because we cannot physically and/or literally get into the mind of another. That's of no relevant/germane/applicable negative consequence for we need not be able to.

Sometimes we can know beyond any and all reasonable doubt that another creature has drawn correlations between different things. We can often know exactly what things. Pavlov's dog drew a correlation between the bell and being fed. His involuntary tell was excessive salivation.

The earlier fire example...

Is it not an error of equivocation, to suggest that just because a language-less creature, e.g., preserves his well-being instinctively, he is drawing correlations? — Mww

What difference does that make? It would not be an error I've made. I've certainly made no such suggestion. In fact, you're the one invoking "instinct" here and then using it as an alternative explanation and suggesting an equivocation fallacy?

Drawing correlations between different things begins happening long before the creature becomes aware of their own mental ongoings. Correlations begin as simply as possible, and grow in complexity thereafter.

At the moment of a creature's biological conception, there is no thought/belief(correlation).

Isn’t it rather the case we think he must be making correlations because correlation is the only way humans can think anything at all? Including, what it’s like to be a language-less creature merely from his observable reactions. — Mww

Having a good grasp upon human thought/belief is the best possible starting point.

I would not dare claim to know what it's like to be a language less creature. I do not know what it's like to be an apple pie. I can clearly set out the basic elemental constituents of both language-less thought/belief and apple pie nonetheless.

What we're reporting upon(the thought/belief of a language-less creature) is not existentially dependent upon language. Our report most certainly is.
— creativesoul

Any report of ours is existentially dependent on language. That does not grant us authority to report on the thought/belief of language-less creatures... — Mww

Agreed.

On your view, what constitutes sufficient/adequate ground for us to acquire knowledge regarding the thought/belief content of language-less creatures?

All thought/belief consists entirely of mental correlations drawn between different things.
— creativesoul

Ok, but.....what things? — Mww

Depends upon the candidate under consideration. It's an exhaustive outline not a specific example. That happens when you work from universal criterion. You end up with an outline.

Bells and being fed... touching fire and feeling pain...

With a non linguistic creature all of those things are directly perceptible.
— creativesoul

So “what things”... — Mww

Bells and being fed... touching fire and feeling pain...

Does that mean non-linguistic creatures can’t remember things?

I wouldn't say that much. Remembering is drawing correlations...

Point:
There are no false statements in a sound syllogism. It is impossible to falsify a true statement.
— creativesoul

Counterpoint:
Except when the statement was never true in the first place, re: in the case of the time-evolved knowledge that conditions the premises. — Mww

That's not an exception. It was never a sound syllogism in the first place. The point was that one candidate is verifiable and the other is not. I'm choosing the former, and you're choosing the latter...

Falsification of valid syllogisms is possible merely by not holding with the conditions in the premises, yes. — Mww

Yes? Not what I said. Falsification of all valid syllogisms happens the very same way... we check to see if what's said corresponds to what's happened and/or is happening.

It's usually not a good sign..... — creativesoul

Hey....you told me to imagine, I did, and the product of the imagining was sufficiently explained by instinct.

...immediately refuses to accept the terms..... — creativesoul

There haven’t yet been any terms to refuse. Only general conditions (thought/belief is drawing correlations....), which I have accepted as good groundwork.
———————

I reject the proposition/statement:"Language-less creatures draw correlations that are given from instinct" on the following grounds...

You:
1. Being given presupposes a giver. Unnecessarily multiplying entities is unacceptable on my view.
2. Correlations are not given to the non linguistic thinking/believing creature..... — creativesoul

Me:
1. Yes, but being given from merely presupposes a source, which is not necessarily an external entity, per se, but could just be an internal constituent of the thought/belief process.
2. No, not so much given to, agreed, which seems to imply some outside origin, but rather.....as you say, correlations between different things are drawn by the creature. Again, the subtle difference between my given from and your changing it to given to.

Nevertheless, your rejection of instinct is all fine and dandy.....it is your theory after all....... but as yet you haven’t replaced it with anything. You may have been better served by agreeing instinct is indeed sufficient, but something else is necessary, in keeping with the hypotheses of your thought/belief theory.
———————

Is it not an error of equivocation, to suggest that just because a language-less creature, e.g., preserves his well-being instinctively, he is drawing correlations?
— Mww

What difference does that make? It would not be an error I've made.......

All I’m saying is that it would be an error of equivocation, if instinct is entirely sufficient to explain our observations of action/reaction in language-less creatures. It would not be such an error, if the theory of thought/belief in language-less creatures is demonstrated as being predicated necessarily on correlations they actually make, and make in some manner that cannot at all be mere instinct.

................Drawing correlations between different things begins happening long before the creature becomes aware of their own mental ongoings. — creativesoul

Ironically enough......so does instinct. Just sayin’.

By the way, isn’t saying “mental ongoings” with respect to language-less creatures, if not an error of equivocation, nonetheless an anthropomorphism, of a minor sort? Humans have brains and any human knows he has mental ongoings, so does it follow necessarily that any creature with a brain has mental ongoings?

Don’t worry, not important, really. There are behaviors in language-less creatures that would be quite difficult, and somewhat unreasonable I suppose, to attribute to instinct alone.
————————

I would not dare claim to know what it's like to be a language less creature. (...) I can clearly set out the basic elemental constituents of both language-less thought/belief and apple pie nonetheless. — creativesoul

Pies don’t do anything, dogs do stuff.

But go ahead and list those elemental constituents. I would think the creature list should be a whole lot longer than the pie list, right?

On your view, what constitutes sufficient/adequate ground for us to acquire knowledge regarding the thought/belief content of language-less creatures? — creativesoul

If all thought/belief is, is the correlation between perceptible things, then all I need to know language-less creatures possess thought/belief, is to observe action/reaction in one.

But the sufficient ground to acquire knowledge of a language-less creature’s though/belief content, is altogether impossible for me, for the simple reason that I have no access to it. In effect, I would have to be one, in order to know what it’s like to operate as one. Hell, I don’t even know the content of your thought/belief, other than it possibly resembles mine, and we are the same kind of creature. To suppose there is sufficient ground to acquire knowledge of the internal mental ongoings of a creature diametrically opposite to me, is......well......unintelligible.

This is why I don’t fancy talking about language-less creatures, with respect to mental ongoings in general, and the possibility of thought/belief as its ends, in particular. We generate all kinds of theories concerning our own thought/belief system, but at least we’re in the same reference frame as the theory, rather than theorizing about a reference frame of which we can have no part.

If you brought up language -less creature’s thought/belief merely to make a point about something else, please tell me what that point is.

That's not an exception. It was never a sound syllogism in the first place. — creativesoul

Oh, but it was certainly sound to all those considering it. It would have been impossible for them to think it wasn’t. In its time, it was the rule; in a later time it is the exception.

But I know what you mean; all truly sound syllogisms are not time-dependent. But any sound syllogism not time dependent, is also not empirical.

All I’m saying is that to consider sound logic we must at the same time consider what truth really is.

Glory be to all rabbit holes!!!!!

I've no interest in continuing with you . We're way too far apart, and you do not seem to be capable of accurately reporting upon what I have claimed. So... continued misunderstanding/misinterpretation/misattribution of meaning is guaranteed.

For someone who fancies themselves as understanding Kant, it's quite odd to me than you seem to have so much trouble with the simple task of accurately reporting upon what another says.

I would disagree and say that any fiction is a compilation of prior reality, mixed up into something which only appears novel.

All things exist in their entirety prior to the first report of them. — creativesoul

I would just reword it a little to;
Anything in existence is real in it's entirely, regardless of anyone/thing seeing or knowing about it.

↪fishfry I would disagree and say that any fiction is a compilation of prior reality, mixed up into something which only appears novel. — Razorback kitten

Yes of course. Moby Dick is based on the true story of the Essex, a whaling ship sunk by a whale. All fiction is based on reality. Even science fiction always has recognizable themes from our own lives.

That doesn't mean that Captain Ahab existed a moment before Melville conceived and wrote him into existence.

I apologize if I've forgotten exactly what point we were making. Perhaps we're in agreement on something of importance. Fictional entities are interesting to me because I like the idea of mathematical fictionalism. Math is fiction exactly like Moby Dick is. And like Moby Dick, math is based on reality; but it is not itself reality. Math, like a novel, has value because it's interesting and enjoyable and because it gives us insight into life. It need not be literally true to have value. That's a good way to look at math.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Essex_(whaleship)

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/fictionalism-mathematics/

I say Captain Ahab was already there before he was thought into existence. For the same reason I can invent a random word at will, like fragalagadingdong and although it's never been heard in its entirety before, all the component parts were there, which I jumbled up together. The first words spoken by humans were a bridge between sounds they could already make and some action or object of reference.

Free will or original thought are illusions. I feel like I have free will but logically I know that cannot be. If I invent something new, which looks and seems new to everyone, it is only as a response to the need for said things invention to begin with.

...original thought are illusions. — Razorback kitten

Wrong and worthy of it's own thread.

Right and not worth arguing about

I say Captain Ahab was already there before he was thought into existence. For the same reason I can invent a random word at will, like fragalagadingdong and although it's never been heard in its entirety before, all the component parts were there, which I jumbled up together. The first words spoken by humans were a bridge between sounds they could already make and some action or object of reference.

Free will or original thought are illusions. I feel like I have free will but logically I know that cannot be. If I invent something new, which looks and seems new to everyone, it is only as a response to the need for said things invention to begin with. — Razorback kitten

Well ok. I understand. We can say for example that, if we agree on an alphabet of symbols, such as the English alphabet, in some sense every possible finite-length string already exists. From a, aa, aaa, ... to z, zz, zzz... The conceptual or abstract space of all possible finite-length strings of letters and punctuation marks already exists. Just as the sculptor extracts the statue that was already in the stone; the novelist simply selects one long finite string out of all the ones that could possibly exist.

You COULD look at it this way, if you chose to deny human creativity. And as you say that free will and original thought are illusions, I see that I'm reading you correctly.

I disagree, but I can't justify it! For all I know you're depressingly correct.

But wait. Can't we accept your point yet save creativity? Out of ALL the possible configurations present within the stone, the sculptor chooses one. Out of all the possible finite strings of symbols, the novelist chooses one finite string that tells a story about a tragic whaling expedition.

So even if we accept that every possibility is potential; doesn't it still take an act of human creativity to select one of those potentials and make it actual?

And when we do creative work, we discover that it's damned difficult to turn those potentials to actuals. We have a great idea for an essay or article in our minds but the thing doesn't write itself, we must struggle. The mathematician knows what's true but struggles for years with the proof. In theory the proof was already inherent in the axioms; but in practice, only the long struggle brings it out.

It's the struggle of the artist in bringing the potential into the actual that matters. So I still believe in creativity.

The obvious flaw with the claim that there are no novel thoughts is that throughout history there have been.

That's more than adequate ground to reject the claim that there are no novel thoughts.

There are. Good enough for me.

Whenever a creature draws a correlation between different things for the first time... it's novel. Whenever a plurality of individuals draws the same correlations between the same things, they have the same thought(s). When a plurality of individuals all do it for the first time, the same novel thought is had by a plurality of creatures. Such is the groundwork for shared meaning(language).