It is clear that if Alice is thinking it's going to rain, then we are entitled to say she's thinking something. What is not clear is how we should take the further claim that "there is something Alice is thinking". Andrew M claims that the something Alice is thinking is a convenient fiction, and he calls this fiction an "abstract entity" without committing in any way to its independent existence.
If Bob is also thinking it's going to rain, we can say anaphorically that Bob is thinking the same thing as Alice, and here the convenience of @Andrew M's fiction becomes more apparent, for we may wish to talk about what they're both thinking in more general terms: anyone thinking it's going to rain has reason to take an umbrella, or, thinking it's going to rain is a reason to take an umbrella.
That you can translate what an Aristotelian, like @Andrew M, says, or what someone who may have stronger nominalist inclinations says, into terms we might call Platonist -- that is not at issue. Of course you can. But what do you say to convince us that there are Propositions? That there are Relations? Where does @Andrew M's way of talking or mine come up short? — Srap Tasmaner
Consider such a proposition as 'Edinburgh is north of London'. Here we have a relation between two places, and it seems plain that the relation subsists independently of our knowledge of it. When we come to know that Edinburgh is north of London, we come to know something which has to do only with Edinburgh and London: we do not cause the truth of the proposition by coming to know it, on the contrary we merely apprehend a fact which was there before we knew it. The part of the earth's surface where Edinburgh stands would be north of the part where London stands, even if there were no human being to know about north and south, and even if there were no minds at all in the universe. This is, of course, denied by many philosophers, either for Berkeley's reasons or for Kant's. But we have already considered these reasons, and decided that they are inadequate. We may therefore now assume it to be true that nothing mental is presupposed in the fact that Edinburgh is north of London. But this fact involves the relation 'north of', which is a universal; and it would be impossible for the whole fact to involve nothing mental if the relation 'north of', which is a constituent part of the fact, did involve anything mental. Hence we must admit that the relation, like the terms it relates, is not dependent upon thought, but belongs to the independent world which thought apprehends but does not create. — THE PROBLEMS OF PHILOSOPHY: CHAPTER IX. THE WORLD OF UNIVERSALS - Bertrand Russell
Well, I called Alice over the phone to ask whether she did think something about the rain or not, and she referred me to the {expletive} weather channel — Olivier5
Language is not an artifact, it is a dramatic labor constantly altered its terms through the discipline we urge each other to. — Gary M Washburn
If Bob is also thinking it's going to rain, we can say anaphorically that Bob is thinking the same thing as Alice — Srap Tasmaner
thinking it's going to rain is a reason to take an umbrella. — Srap Tasmaner
But what do you say to convince us that there are Propositions? That there are Relations? Where does Andrew M's way of talking or mine come up short? — Srap Tasmaner
it is not clear to me that if Sally thinks it's going to rain then there is an object Sally thinks. — Srap Tasmaner
Isn’t it perfectly clear that the proposition that it’s going to rain is the object of Alice’s belief? — Tristan L
that there are no propositions is a proposition — Tristan L
Propertyhood is a property. — Tristan L
with what right can we anaphorically say that Bob is thinking the same thing as Alice? Only by accepting that both are thinking about one and the same abstract entity, right? — Tristan L
if there is no causal connection between Alice’s thinking and Bob’s thinking — Tristan L
That's a horizontal plane of interaction. The vertical dimension is like this: — frank
The capacity for language is innate, as is a lion's capacity to bring down a zebra. — frank
reason a Ponzi scheme? Hierarchical? Or perhaps you're confusing identity with the identical? Which, of course, are opposites. One Steve and one Alice does not add up to two Alices or two Steves. Interactions of differences does not create sameness. The vertical trope of ideas is a power play, not reasoning. Identity displaces what would otherwise be identical, and certainly not the inverse. But the geometric trope on a vertical axis of ideas is meant to do violence against that displacement, and becomes the pretext for cruelty, and the assurance of ignorance in the guise of pretended wisdom. — Gary M Washburn
Actually, lions have to work very hard to learn that skill. — Gary M Washburn
But from where do you suppose anything "innate" comes — Gary M Washburn
But I left off the first part of your point:
if there is no causal connection between Alice’s thinking and Bob’s thinking — Tristan L
You claim that there is a causal connection between them, and that this is because they are both causally connected to something, a proposition, that is "not-spatial, not-tidesome (not-temporal), not-physical, not-mindly, and onefold (simple)"?
If that's the case, I don't know what you mean by "causal". — Srap Tasmaner
Question begging. — Srap Tasmaner
It’s just that two clouds being clouds requires the existence of couldhood — Tristan L
In meteorology, a cloud is an aerosol consisting of a visible mass of minute liquid droplets, frozen crystals, or other particles suspended in the atmosphere of a planetary body or similar space.[1] Water or various other chemicals may compose the droplets and crystals. On Earth, clouds are formed as a result of saturation of the air when it is cooled to its dew point, or when it gains sufficient moisture (usually in the form of water vapor) from an adjacent source to raise the dew point to the ambient temperature. — Wikipedia
If the question is whether ideas are real, is the difference between ordinary experience, poetic trope, and technical definition really the decider? — Gary M Washburn
Cloudhood need not be added to the discussion, for the meteorologist has already brought it in when defining what a cloud is. The only difference between him or her and the philosopher is that the latter is highly aware of cloudhood itself whereas the former only has a diffuse and subconscious awareness of it (unless she or he is also a philosopher). — Tristan L
Does the idea command order in the world, or does order in the world suggest the parameters of the idea? — Gary M Washburn
I see. The difference is that you know more about cloudhood than meteorologists do, even if they know more about clouds than you do. — Srap Tasmaner
If meteorologists discovered that cloud formation actually occurs in a way quite different from what they thought, that in a sense clouds aren't quite the sort of thing we thought they were, would your knowledge of cloudhood also change? Would you need to know they had made this discovery for your knowledge to change? — Srap Tasmaner
What if the discovery was that several sorts of things previously just called "clouds" were actually very different, so that the world "cloud" was now considered old-fashioned and misleading by meteorologists? What then? — Srap Tasmaner
This is more properly formulated as — Tristan L
From the beginning I've said that translating everything I say or anyone else says into Platonish proves nothing at all. — Srap Tasmaner
Odd even numbers [...] no instances. — Tristan L
You provided no [...] of talking. — Srap Tasmaner
Do you have anything that might persuade me? — Srap Tasmaner
I hope that I have given it to you. — Tristan L
two people have the same idea — Srap Tasmaner
Does "cloudhood" include what forms in a cloud chamber? — Gary M Washburn
if you arrogate all terms to your own, peculiar, understanding. — Gary M Washburn
If I don't take predicates as Properties that have independent existence, I don't have to take vacuous predicates as Properties that themselves have the Property of having no instances. — Srap Tasmaner
Vacuous singular terms (Santa Claus, the Bermuda Triangle, the present king of France) aren't going to do it either. — Srap Tasmaner
those [natural numbers and sets] actually do represent some kind of trouble for me — Srap Tasmaner
Well, it's been fun! — Srap Tasmaner
There are no even odd numbers, and since one cannot talk about what doesn’t exist (Parmenides already realized that), what we talk about must be the real and existing property of being an even odd number, musn’t it? — Tristan L
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