the question ought to be asked, where do we acquire the ability to recognise general forms in the first place — Wayfarer
where do we acquire the ability to recognise general forms in the first place; — Wayfarer
Because if you can't recognise general forms, then you can't make general statements, which your statement 'we don't recognise general forms' is an example of. You have to know what a 'general statement' is, even to deny that you can make them; but if you know what it is, then you have to admit that such statements exist. — Wayfarer
Understood metaphysically, — Andrew M
where possible, and in a spirit of charity, read Platonists as positing universals as a shorthand for shared naming — bongo fury
You jest? (Forgive my irony failure if so.) — bongo fury
Wasn't Quine briefly gesturing to a nominalist translation of sets-talk in terms of shared naming before admitting sets as entities for the sake of exposition of the standard Platonism? And then wasn't Lazerowitz seeing the gesture as support for his proposal: where possible, and in a spirit of charity, read Platonists as positing universals as a shorthand for shared naming? — bongo fury
The broader point is that it is easy to be misled by language and there are plenty of examples of this in the history of philosophy. — Andrew M
The Nominalist, in their attempt to exorcise the Platonist spirits, can end up being a mirror-image or dual of the Platonist because of a deeper framing of the problem that neither side has recognized. — Andrew M
The Nominalist applies their razor to the immaterial side of that duality (because ghosts, extravagence, etc.), but finds they are left with an impoverished material world that provides no resources for solving the problem. — Andrew M
foundations of math, psychology of consciousness, theory of reference, theory of learning, logic of induction, semiotics etc — bongo fury
The Nominalist, in their attempt to exorcise the Platonist spirits, can end up being a mirror-image or dual of the Platonist because of a deeper framing of the problem that neither side has recognized.
— Andrew M
In the fond imaginings of a third kind of philosopher, yes of course... or, do you have examples of such a mirror symmetry? — bongo fury
Lazerowitz does begin with the same too-easy claim, but then proceeds with a perfectly useful analysis that might as well call itself nominalist, like the Quine piece cited. (I'm still not sure you grasped the point of the quoted extract nor Lazerowitz's point about it.) So, examples of the alleged symmetry are lacking. — bongo fury
Which problem? The "problem" of universals? The modern nominalist exchanges that for a more interesting investigation into all of the implications of shared naming... — bongo fury
foundations of math, psychology of consciousness, theory of reference, theory of learning, logic of induction, semiotics etc
— bongo fury
Is the material world supposed lacking in resources for these investigations? — bongo fury
We are not analyzing a phenomenon (e.g. thought) but a concept (e.g. that of thinking), and therefore the use of a word. So it may look as if what we were doing were Nominalism. Nominalists make the mistake of interpreting all words as names, and so of not really describing their use, but only, so to speak, giving a paper draft on such a description. — L. Wittgenstein, PI §383
or, do you have examples of such a mirror symmetry?
— bongo fury
Yes. The Platonist embellishes similarities as (capital-N, entity) Names, the Nominalist reduces similarities to (small-n, paper draft [*]) names. Neither side challenges that reclassification nor sheds any light on similarity. — Andrew M
You can call it nominalist, but are you telling us any more than how you're classifying it? ;-) — Andrew M
That's fine but it doesn't tell us anything about the ontology of the world, only about his preference. — Andrew M
What we do know is that in the course of our investigations of the world, we can identify similarities and differences in things. — Andrew M
That's the natural home that those terms arise in and by which we then classify things (according to our various purposes). — Andrew M
So classification itself depends on a prior notion of similarity and difference. — Andrew M
Lazerowitz's analysis is interesting and informative because he's investigating and forming a hypothesis about what philosophers are doing, — Andrew M
, not discussing how to classify similarity (per the Problem of Universals). — Andrew M
More broadly, an investigation and analysis of how language is used in various contexts is also interesting and informative. But, as Wittgenstein notes (quote below), that is not Nominalism. — Andrew M
let's assume we are talking about physical particulars and also about the talking of organisms such as ourselves, about those particulars, and let's be especially careful not to get confused when the two targets of our talk overlap, which they probably often must. — bongo fury
Per "material", yes, which is one side of a Platonic dualist framing that reiterates the reductionism implicit in Nominalism. — Andrew M
Similarity, for Nominalists, reduces to just names. Which precludes even the possibility of investigation. — Andrew M
Nominalists make the mistake of interpreting all words as names, and so of not really describing their use, but only, so to speak, giving a paper draft on such a description. — L. Wittgenstein, PI §383
We are not analyzing a phenomenon (e.g. thought) but a concept (e.g. that of thinking), and therefore the use of a word. — L. Wittgenstein, PI §383
Yes. The Platonist embellishes similarities as (capital-N, entity) Names, the Nominalist reduces similarities to (small-n, paper draft [*]) names. Neither side challenges that reclassification nor sheds any light on similarity.
— Andrew M
Yes, I know you think that outcome is inevitable, but I was wondering where, or if, you were finding any examples. — bongo fury
Goodman is associated with an extreme nominalism, or mistrust of any appeal to a notion of the similarity between two things, when this is thought of as independent of our linguistic propensities to apply the same term to them. — Oxford Reference - Quick Reference
Now it seems to me that if two things are [not similarnon-similar in a sense of similarity] independent of language, then applying the same term to them doesn't make them similar. — Andrew M
Now it seems to me that if two things are [notnever] similar independent of language, then applying the same term to them doesn't make them similar. — Andrew M
On the other hand, if two things are similarindependent of language, that doesn't imply the existence of a third entity for a language term to denote. — Andrew M
The issue in both cases is that similarity doesn't imply a name at all, whether in a Platonic or Nominal sense. — Andrew M
Do you mean,
Now it seems to me that if two things are [not similarnon-similar in a sense of similarity] independent of language, then applying the same term to them doesn't make them similar.
— Andrew M
?
To the nominalist ("extreme" :lol: or not) this sounds metaphysical, although possibly redeemable in terms of object- and meta-language. Are you in the habit of saying "F=ma, independent of language"? Would you then mean independent of any language (the talk just got metaphysical but through no fault of nominalism), or just higher-level ones? — bongo fury
If you mean,
Now it seems to me that if two things are [notnever] similar independent of language, then applying the same term to them doesn't make them similar.
— Andrew M
then of course the nominalist disagrees, and is interested in how language creates a similarity between the things. — bongo fury
On the other hand, if two things are similarindependent of language, that doesn't imply the existence of a third entity for a language term to denote.
— Andrew M
But it does often coincide with use of a general term applying to both: a shared name (or adjective or verb). Then we are presented (sooner or later) with the opportunity to reinterpret the general term as singular, and with questions about how such a choice affects just what entities (e.g. a third one) are thereby implied. Platonist and nominalist might come down on either side of the choice as expected, but the modern nominalist is often prepared to be agnostic on the matter, since there is no fact about it, and because a singular reading (referring to a collective or whole or essence or quality) might be a shorthand for the general reading (referring distributively to all the individual instances). — bongo fury
The main argument for fictionalism proceeds essentially by trying to eliminate all of the alternatives to fictionalism. The argument can be put like this:
1. Mathematical sentences like ‘4 is even’ should be read at face value; that is, they should be read as being of the form ‘Fa’ and, hence, as making straightforward claims about the nature of certain objects; e.g., ‘4 is even’ should be read as making a straightforward claim about the nature of the number 4. But
2. If sentences like ‘4 is even’ should be read at face value, and if moreover they are true, then there must actually exist objects of the kinds that they’re about; for instance, if ‘4 is even’ makes a straightforward claim about the nature of the number 4, and if this sentence is literally true, then there must actually exist such a thing as the number 4. Therefore, from (1) and (2), it follows that
3. If sentences like ‘4 is even’ are true, then there are such things as mathematical objects. But
If there are such things as mathematical objects, then they are abstract objects, i.e., nonspatiotemporal objects; for instance, if there is such a thing as the number 4, then it is an abstract object, not a physical or mental object. But
4. There are no such things as abstract objects.
abstract objects, platonists tell us, are wholly nonphysical, non-mental, nonspatial, nontemporal, and noncausal. Thus, on this view, the number 3 exists independently of us and our thinking, but it does not exist in space or time, it is not a physical or mental object, and it does not enter into causal relations with other objects.
That is, that language presupposes a world for language to be about. — Andrew M
(the talk just got metaphysical but through no fault of nominalism) — bongo fury
For example, would you agree that two brontosaurus dinosaurs were similar in the sense of both having four legs before the emergence of human beings and human language? — Andrew M
So I'm unclear on how you would make sense of that project. It seems to require rejecting the convention I stated above, — Andrew M
, but for what purpose? — Andrew M
foundations of math, psychology of consciousness, theory of reference, theory of learning, logic of induction, semiotics etc? [...] plenty of philosophy [...] cheerfully non-metaphysical — bongo fury
I assume there is no empirical fact about it, in the sense of an observable difference. However there may be logical (or absurdity) arguments against one or the other of those choices. For example, the Third Man argument which is an infinite regress argument against Plato's Theory of Forms. — Andrew M
This feeds a suspicion that metaphysics is not being easily given up by some of its supposed critics, who need to disparage nominalism because they would rather not be shown a way out. — bongo fury
The point is that theses the the effect that they don't exist, or are fictional, etc. have the same status as the theses that they do. — Snakes Alive
The way out is to see that we are social animals who think and talk with symbols, whose wholly fictional connection to things is a matter we have to (and learn successfully to) constantly convince each other we are agreed about. — bongo fury
But clearly something has gone wrong, as the things that a language (or other symbol system) likens to one another clearly don't have to be contemporaneous with it. So of course we can agree on that. But it doesn't get us any nearer to the chimerical "world without language". — bongo fury
Too right. There won't be any fact of the matter of implicit conventions, of course, but one that seems to me to be just as widely asserted is that language presupposes a world already formed/carved/sorted in the terms of the language. (Don't blame me.) — bongo fury
The way out is to see that we are social animals who think and talk with symbols, whose wholly fictional connection to things is a matter we have to (and learn successfully to) constantly convince each other we are agreed about. Often we can agree that a word points at an abstraction, and often that is because doing so serves as a shorthand for reference to all of the more concrete instances abstracted from. — bongo fury
You're missing the point on a basic level. Were this the case, there would be no need for arguments such as 'mathematical fictionalism'. The whole rationale for that argument, which is the subject of many learned papers, is the fact that numbers appear to be real, which undermines materialist views of what exists. — Wayfarer
What are you talking about? — Snakes Alive
That is, people can agree on one fiction or another (per their preference), but not on how the world is independent of their agreement. — Andrew M
That is not what the Lazerowitz paper (whichever one you're referring to) is about, nor is it what's outlined in this thread. And that is not the position he would hold, as you would know if you read the OP carefully, rather than 'presuming.'Much of Lazerwitz' paper is about the non-reality of universals, so I presume he would have to hold to something very like mathematical fictionalism on the same grounds. — Wayfarer
Wasn't the world prior to the emergence of life a world without language? — Andrew M
There won't be any fact of the matter of implicit conventions, of course, but one that seems to me to be just as widely asserted is that language presupposes a world already formed/carved/sorted in the terms of the language. (Don't blame me.)
— bongo fury
Not "in the terms of the language". For example, scientific language changed as Newtonian mechanics was superseded by relativity and quantum mechanics, and will presumably continue to change in the future. But the world itself didn't change on account of humans using different language to talk about it. — Andrew M
Then it seems your position precludes any rational basis for agreement. That is, people can agree on one fiction or another (per their preference), but not on how the world is independent of their agreement. — Andrew M
The point is not a denial of realism about universals or whatever. The point is that any hypothesis as to their reality, pro or con, is equally metaphysical in the relevant sense, and is a matter of proposing to use words in a certain way. — Snakes Alive
Wasn't the world prior to the emergence of life a world without language?
— Andrew M
Depends... Is my garden a world without language? And calling a part of it a tree is correct because it is, independent of language? — bongo fury
So implicit conventions are a matter of fact? Or do you mean that no one reasonably could, considering your argument, persist in the opinion that a theory was speaking "the language of the universe"?
Not that I'm one of those; my point was that both positions are metaphysical (although possibly redeemable in terms of object- and meta-language), and usually dispensible. — bongo fury
But "how the world is, independent of our agreement", though a laudable consideration in some contexts, is metaphysical claptrap in most. Science is on Neurath's boat, remaking it from earlier versions of itself, not from something meta. — bongo fury
The answer doesn't depend on those questions. — Andrew M
On conventional use, there was no language prior to the emergence of life. — Andrew M
Any theory that describes the universe is going to depend on human language. There's no implication that the universe itself would depend on human language. — Andrew M
Some important-seeming questions of the 'globalising' variety will always arise. The trick is to be prepared to recognise when one's efforts have developed the symptoms described in the OP, and to then have the humility (or strategic sense) to retreat to more solid ground. — bongo fury
Neurath's boat works fine as a metaphor for how we investigate the world from within it, — Andrew M
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