No. Something existed prior to our naming practices — Isaac

So, just so I understand this...

Are you really objecting to anyone claiming that humans had experience prior to language use?

Wow.

So then, no sex, no eating, no being full of fear at the sound of the bear, etc? Really? As if all of that does not count at any time prior to language?

All the stuff existed prior to our naming, but the fact about what was 'the cell' and what wasn't 'the cell' didn't exist prior to our naming it. — Isaac

I agree, and I think the same applies to what we variously decide to name "experience".

Are you really objecting to anyone claiming that humans had experience prior to language use?

Wow.

So then, no sex, no eating, no being full of fear at the sound of the bear, etc? Really? — creativesoul

Isaac will correct me if I've misunderstood, but I don't think that's what he means. At least that is not what we've been discussing, which is the various ways of defining experience, not whether it exists without language. That said, on certain views it would be possible to say that without language there is no experience; not that I would be inclined to agree with that..

I'd say that what we count as the toddler's experience depends on how we define the word "experience". The toddler's experience is what it is regardless of how we define it. — Janus

...there is no fact of the matter concerning whether experience is internal, a combination of internal and external or neither internal nor external... — Janus

Are you sure about the last statement above?

Are you sure about the last statement above? — creativesoul

I have no doubt that it is matter of definition, as I've explained.

Look again. You've contradicted that.

So, just so I understand this...

Are you really objecting to anyone claiming that humans had experience prior to language use? — creativesoul

No.

Isaac will correct me if I've misunderstood, but I don't think that's what he means. At least that is not what we've been discussing, which is the various ways of defining experience, not whether it exists without language. — Janus

That's it, yes.

Look. Below are five Xs...

X X X X X

I'm going to say those middle three Xs are ' a jabberwocky', that's just what a jabberwocky is.

Now, did those three Xs exist prior to my naming them? Yes.

Could I have included the two Xs either side in my definition of 'a jabberwocky'? Yes, clearly I could have, but I didn't.

Could someone else come along and say 'a jabberwocky' is actually the first four Xs? Yes, obviously they could.

None of this has any bearing whatsoever on the existence of the three, four, or five Xs involved in what we're variously calling 'a jabberwocky'.

If you think I've contradicted myself then all you have to do is quote the purportedly contradictory statements I've made and we can look at it.

Now, did those three Xs exist prior to my naming them? Yes. — Isaac

Those Xs are not the sort of thing that exist in their entirety prior to naming and descriptive practices.

If you think I've contradicted myself then all you have to do is quote the purportedly contradictory statements I've made and we can look at it. — Janus

I did.

how could non-verbal images be used to symbolize abstract notions.....generality — Janus

(grain of sand/beach)

specificity — Janus

(Grain of sand/this beach)

exception — Janus

(Grain of sand/not this beach)

pattern — Janus

(Grain of sand/beach; this beach; not this beach; any beach; all beaches)

All parenteticals can be images, obviously. Now, perhaps I’m treating your “abstract notions” as universals, which may have particulars as their objects. I did that because, technically speaking, abstract notions are pure conceptions that do not have objects of their own, which makes explicit they cannot be represented by either words or images, but only the relations which constitute them, may.
————

Now my claim has just been that a complex argument or train of thought involving abstract concepts cannot be followed except in symbolic language terms. — Janus

Agreed, with the caveat “cannot be followed”. It remains that while it is rather absurd to suppose I have a complex argument with myself, I can nonetheless have a complex chain of thought comprised of a series of conjoined images, which, of course, no one else could follow. Or, in fact, even know about. To objectify my chain of thought, such that another could both know and possibly understand it, language would be necessary.

No, if some thought does not need words then the proposition "some thought does not need words" is true. "Thought does not need words" is a blanket statement which is equivalent to "all thought does not need words". — Janus

That is incorrect. You have made a category mistake, caused by equivocation. You are equivocating between "thought" as referring to numerous specific and particular instances of thought, in "some thought does not need words", and "thought" as referring to one general conception in "thought does not need words".

Notice "some thought" in the first case, refers to a multiplicity, a plurality of particular instances (that's what "some" indicates), while "thought" in the second case refers to one general concept, a universal. Your failure to make this distinction between "thought" referring to a group of particulars, and "thought" referring to one general concept, a universal, is a prime example of a very common form of equivocation.

The principal difference between a particular and a universal is that all properties (including accidentals) are necessary to the individual, whereas all properties of all the particulars in a type (universal) are not necessary to the type. So, in "some people are white", white is necessary to all those individuals who are white. And, white is also necessary to each member of that group referred to by "some people". However, white is not needed to be a person. Therefore "people are not necessarily white" remains true, while "some people are necessarily white" is also true.

Some things we think about are themselves existentially dependent upon words. — creativesoul

Special Relativity...a physical relation of the Universe to us....does not need words. To think about Special Relativity and form his theory thereof, Einstein used his imagination; to record the objects of his imagination as a theory he used words and symbols. When I think about the theory, I use the words of it, but not the symbols because I am not proving the hypotheses contained by the theory, to form in me the images the words represent, just the reverse of what Einstein did. So, yes, my thought about SR depends on Einstein’s words, insofar as the images I think for myself are given from the affects the external words perceived as mere objects prescribe, to which I assign my own understanding. This works quite well for SR and GR, but not so well for QM. At least for me.
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the content of that toddler's experience depends upon how we define the word "experience". That cannot be right. — creativesoul

It could be right, if experience is define as having content. Or, if a principle of a theory of experience mandates that an empty experience is impossible. Herein, experience is not so much defined, as necessarily conditioned, is susceptible to certain criteria in order to be an experience. Biggest mistake in metaphysics, is reification; experience is not a thing, it is an logical end given from consistently determinable logical means.
—————-

Those and many other experiences existed in their entirety prior to our naming and descriptive practices.
— creativesoul

No. Something existed prior to our naming practices. — Isaac

Keyword: practices. The practice of, the innate ability to, name, may be as necessary to human intelligence as reason itself, but the actual employment of that ability does not occur absent that which is to be named. And that is conditioned by time, insofar as there is only and always a mere undetermined something prior to its name. That which is a mere something, is phenomenon; that which is named, is conception, which may or may not be given from phenomenon, but is so necessarily with respect to real objects.

That which is a mere something, is phenomenon; that which is named, is conception, which may or may not be given from phenomenon, but is so necessarily with respect to real objects. — Mww

The point I was making was one of selection, or filtering. We select from among a range of options which phenomena, to use (possibly abuse) your terminology, we are to make a concept.

Boundaries are the easiest example (but not the only). The boundary separating tree from not-tree is real, a phenomena we sense, but it is not the only available real boundary. We could have drawn a boundary between the solids and the liquids, named one one thing and one another. We didn't. We looked at the boundary created by the biological systems and used them. Thus, those systems (and their physical parts) are 'tree', and anything else is 'not tree'. But it needn't have been that way. There are other boundaries we could have chosen.

Hence, our naming practices (here choosing which boundary to use) determine, to a degree, what a tree is and what it isn't.

We select from among a range of options which phenomena, to use (possibly abuse) your terminology, we are to make a concept. — Isaac

I see what you’re saying, but I find it rather inefficient. According to the Old Guys, each perception generates only its own phenomenon, so a range of them, for any one perception, generates inefficiency. But we do, on the other hand, select from a range of options what constitutes each phenomenon, which is the purview of the productive imagination, so there is a selection process in there.
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The boundary separating tree from not-tree is real, a phenomena we sense, but it is not the only available real boundary. — Isaac

Again, I somewhat agree, your boundary being my limitation, both being real. Each property of any object has its own boundary/limitation, the totality of them determining te phenomenon as such, and from that, how the object is to be named.

Something like that?

I think a major sticking point between Old Guys and New Guys is.....where are phenomena to be found, in the complete picture.

we do, on the other hand, select from a range of options what constitutes each phenomenon, which is the purview of the productive imagination, so there is a selection process in there. — Mww

That's actually what I meant. Clumsy writing on my part which I can only put down to an attempt to use 'philosophy' terms!

Each property of any object has its own boundary/limitation, the totality of them determining te phenomenon as such, and from that, how the object is to be named.

Something like that? — Mww

Maybe not the totality though. There may be properties which are just of no interest to us at all, and so play no part in determining an object. But in general, yes, that's the picture I have.

I think a major sticking point between Old Guys and New Guys is.....where are phenomena to be found, in the complete picture. — Mww

Now, I'd have to understand properly what you mean by 'phenomena' to answer that...

The way I think about signs has been influenced by Peirce. To give a basic account: according to Peirce a symbol is something that signifies something else but does not resemble it. An ikon is something that signifies something else by resemblance or representation. And a basic sign, such as smoke being a sign of fire for example, signifies by material association acquired by inference or expectation from the experience of constant conjunctions of things.

Words are symbols in this sense that they do not resemble or have any material associations, but do have conventional associations, with the things they represent. So not all signs are symbols in this understanding. — Janus

Derrida’s analyses of language attempted to show that what you are calling word symbols, and what Peirce calls ikon, have both conventional and inherently meaningful expressive relations with what they stand for . There is research corroborating Derrida’s claim that word symbols are not as strictly conventional as you might think. For instance , auditory characteristics of phonemes have been found to be non-arbitrarily linked to the meanings they symbolize.

Now my claim has just been that a complex argument or train of thought involving abstract concepts cannot be followed except in symbolic language terms. That said, I don't totally rule out the possibility, but I know I can't do it, and I cannot imagine how others could. But even if it were possible, how could it be shown to be such in any case? — Janus

Would you grant that a music composer is creating abstract concepts through their medium , and may consider music to be a more effective way , and perhaps the only, way to produce the deepest form of abstract thinking? And that a visual artist or dancer may make the same claim about their art? And even an actor may claim that the silences and pauses, the facial expressions and gestures , can convey more in the way. of abstract ideas than the use of words?
I would suggest that the differences among these non-verbal forms of expression are continuous with the differences within varying uses of verbal language. For instance , poetic language conveys differently than prose, and story-telling produces ideas differently than
theoretical verbiage. And words that belong to song lyrics work differently than these other examples.

Eugene Gendlin studied how verbal language and bodily felt meaning reciprocally determine and enhance each other , and developed techniques for tapping into the experiential intricacy of bodily felt sense, which is wider than verbal concepts at the same that it stands as the generating process behind verbal conceptualization.
We use a sense of the whole situation in many crucial situations in an implicit way. This is often referred to as
‘intuition’ , but it is not a phenomenon restricted to only certain circumstances. It is this relevance that makes any word meaningful to us. In generating new concepts , we do t have the new words till a fair bit into the process. Prior to the creation of new words , we have a sense of what we mean that we can refer back to and manipulate. It has a bodily quality to it. We can create thought experiments and invent new ideas well before we are able to find new word names.

Threads like these make me wish there was no "external world."

So, just so I understand this...

Are you really objecting to anyone claiming that humans had experience prior to language use?
— creativesoul

No. — Isaac

Good.

Isaac will correct me if I've misunderstood, but I don't think that's what he means. At least that is not what we've been discussing, which is the various ways of defining experience, not whether it exists without language.
— Janus

That's it, yes.

Understood. There are a plurality of accepted usages/definitions of the term "experience". Those definitions have no bearing whatsoever upon that which is being picked out by the term. What experience consists of and/or amounts to is not up to us. It is not a matter of definition, and nothing else. The notion that it is a matter of definition and nothing else) and all that follows from it is precisely what I'm rejecting. It's dead wrong. There are a number of ways to show this.

I'll start here...

Consider a group of humans living in England during the 14th century. There were famous artists, artisans, craftsmen, theatre, nobility, royalty, and everyday life. There were struggles. There were defeats. There were victories. There was class warfare, politics, truth, and lies. There were common beliefs. There were disparate fringe beliefs. There were worldviews. There were social conventions and rules governing behaviour. There was fairness and injustice. There were romantic relationships, infidelities, and loneliness. There was starvation and excess. There were murders and victims thereof. There were hunting expeditions, games, jousting events, etc. There were people who were proud. There were people who were ashamed. It was a society of people.


Here's the salient fact of the matter:The term "experience" had not yet been coined.


So, either no one in that time had experiences, or they did. I can only trust that no one here would deny that those people had experiences. Thus, since they did, and did so long before the term was coined, it only follows that human experience existed in its entirety prior to the term "experience". As a matter of backwards causation alone, that which existed in its entirety prior to being picked out to the exclusion of all else and subsequently further described is not effected, affected, determined, and/or otherwise influenced in any way whatsoever by the accounting practice. Human experience emerged prior to our ability to take it into account. What human experience is amounts to what it consists of, and that is quite clearly not up to us. Rather, it is up to us to get the definition right(to arrive at true statements about human experience and what it consists of), and that requires keeping the right sorts of things in mind during our endeavor to acquire and/or accrue knowledge about human experience.

I'm guessing that there's a bit Quine influencing your thinking here. In Ontological Relativity he argues<roughly> that what we choose to focus upon and/or later talk about is arbitrary. That is to say that the distinctions we draw and maintain are arbitrarily chosen. In Quine's view, to be is to be the value of a variable. That is to say that to be is to be talked about. This is akin to Witt's notion that "the limits of my language are the limits of my world".

Such frameworks are the linguistic equivalent of someone trying to pour thousands of gallons of water into a five gallon bucket. The world includes much more than one's worldview.

since they did, and did so long before the term was coined, it only follows that human experience existed in its entirety prior to the term "experience". — creativesoul

Not at all.

Take my example of 'cells'. We didn't have cell theory back in the 14th century. So did the people back then have cells?

It’s been established that some thoughts need words....thoughts with words as their object. — Mww

So, that could be established henceforth as a basic agreement.

Some thought needs words.

While I could agree that "thoughts with words as their object" is a description of one example of thought that needs words, I would not agree that that is the only kind. Nor do I find that that description is capable of taking into account all thought that needs words. As before, all thought that needs words is thought that is existentially dependent upon words. Such thought are the kind that cannot possibly exist without words, and those include more than just thought that has words as it's object.

Let's suppose a very different case...

Consider the curious case of a cat thinking about the contents of its food bowl. I have just such a curious cat named "Cookie". Cookie will come to me, wherever I may be around the property, make eye contact with me, and then immediately take off as fast as she can back towards the kitchen, where her food bowl is. I mean, she tears out of the area with claws extended. It's quite memorable. Sometimes, if I'm lying on the bed, she'll sit around on the floor for quite some time waiting for me to look at her. If too much time passes, she will begin tearing around in circles, claws extended, on the rug at the foot of the bed. If, after doing this, I continue to remain in place without ever having made eye contact, she will then begin tearing a path between the rug and kitchen, through the bedroom doorway, going back and forth between the two areas, tearing around in circles on the rug during each visit to the bedroom. Finally, if all that happens and I still have not acknowledged her presence, she will jump on the bed, na dmake her presence known by meowing at me, while placing herself into my immediate proximity, within mere inches.

After she has my attention, regardless of my whereabouts, she will lead me to the bowl stopping every few feet or so to look back at me, as if to ensure that I'm following her. Clearly the curious cat Cookie cannot think about the word "food bowl". So, words are not the object of her thought. The contents of the food bowl is. Despite not being able to think about words, she can nevertheless think about the fact that her bowl is empty. She can want me to pour food in the bowl.

Her thinking that her bowl is empty is an excellent example of thought that needs words despite not having words as their object. It is a very curious example. In this particular case, her thoughts do not have words as their object. Her thoughts are however, about the bowl. That particular bowl is the sort of thing that is itself existentially dependent upon language. That bowl is the resultant product of many a linguistic endeavor. From the initial conceptual drawings, through all of the different engineering inherent to the manufacturing processes, the emergence of that particular bowl was facilitated by words. That bowl is existentially dependent upon words.

Thinking about A is existentially dependent upon A. If A is existentially dependent upon words, then thinking about A is as well.

Let Cookie's food bowl be A.

We didn't have cell theory back in the 14th century. So did the people back then have cells? — Isaac

Are you serious?

:brow:

Apparently you think you see a contradiction; I don't see it, so unless you explain there is nothing to discuss.

Agreed, with the caveat “cannot be followed”. It remains that while it is rather absurd to suppose I have a complex argument with myself, I can nonetheless have a complex chain of thought comprised of a series of conjoined images, which, of course, no one else could follow. — Mww

OK, I can't do it, so I'll have to take your word for it that you can.

Derrida’s analyses of language attempted to show that what you are calling word symbols, and what Peirce calls ikon, have both conventional and inherently meaningful expressive relations with what they stand for . There is research corroborating Derrida’s claim that word symbols are not as strictly conventional as you might think. For instance , auditory characteristics of phonemes have been found to be non-arbitrarily linked to the meanings they symbolize. — Joshs

I don't deny that ikons may accumulate conventional associations, but all that is necessary for understanding what an ikon represents is the ability to see the similarity between it and what it represents. We see that in paleolithic cave paintings. I also don't deny that words may be onomatopoeic or their sounds non-arbitrarily associated with what they symbolize. But in both cases such relationships are not essential to their function.

Would you grant that a music composer is creating abstract concepts through their medium , and may consider music to be a more effective way , and perhaps the only, way to produce the deepest form of abstract thinking? — Joshs

No, for me music (without lyrics) conveys only feeling. Abstract concepts are determinate; I don't think music, like so-called "abstract" art, is rightly thought of as being abstract, but is non-representational and concrete; more concrete in a sense than representational art. Which is not to say that abstract art and music cannot evoke images or associations; but the images and/ or associations evoked, and whether there are images and/ or associations evoked, may be different for each individual.

We can create thought experiments and invent new ideas well before we are able to find new word names. — Joshs

Sure, we don't need new words, just new combinations of existing words, in order to produce novel ideas. I do it every time I write a poem. We cannot create thought experiments and invent new ideas without words, though; or at least I can't, and if someone tells me they can then I can only take their word for it, as there can be no other way to demonstrate whether what they claim is true or not. They may really be able to do something I cannot, or they may be deceiving themselves, who knows?

I put it to you that whether or not experience is external, internal, and/or both is something that is not up to us any more than whether or not our biological machinery, the tree, leaves, and light are. Would you agree with that as well?
— creativesoul

No, I think it's just a matter of definition, nothing more. — Janus

The toddler's experience is what it is regardless of how we define it.
— Janus — creativesoul

I'm still not sure what you have in mind. Did you perhaps think that when I said the toddler's experience is what it is, I meant that it is, regardless of our ways of thinking about it, either internal or external, etc.? Because if that's what you were thinking you were mistaken: I simply meant that the toddler's experience is what it is in the sense that whatever she experiences, she experiences.

You've claimed that experience is a matter of definition and nothing more, and that experience is what it is regardless of how we define it. Those two claims are mutually exclusive. If the one is true, the other is not, and vice versa. That is the epitome of self-contradiction - by definition, ironically enough.

No, for me music (without lyrics) conveys only feeling. Abstract concepts are determinate; I don't think music, like so-called "abstract" art, is rightly thought of as being abstract, but is non-representational and concrete. — Janus

“Only feeling” is the very core of abstract meaning. It is an impressionistic kind of verbiage. Rather than describing feeling as indeterminate, I would say that the word puts into sharper focus what feeling already locates in a general way. Is feeling non-representational? Is music non-representational? Did you know that if you put a group of people in a room and ask them to draw images that are evoked by a piece of instrumental music played to the group, many would draw similar images? That sounds representational to me. Is a Haiku representational in the way that an instruction manual is? Are there not forms of modern poetry that are abstract in the way that abstract art is? Does metaphorical language represent or invent?

You've claimed that experience is a matter of definition and nothing more, and that experience is what it is regardless of how we define it. — creativesoul

No, I didn't claim that. I said that whether experience is thought of as internal or external etc,, is a matter of definition. If you can quote something I wrote that you think claims what you say then do so.

I'll have to respond later; it's 7.22 AM here and I'm off to work...