Again, this leads to saying that there is no meaning prior to language, that meaning is a language construct, that language is necessary for meaning, and/or that meaning is existentially dependent upon language.

Some language less creatures are capable of forming, having, and/or holding belief that is meaningful as well as true or false.
— creativesoul

Your view seems reasonable to me, but I prefer to use/understand some of your keywords differently. — Pie

Which is to prefer doing different things with the very same words/marks. There's nothing - in and of itself - wrong with doing that, and I am quite curious to see exactly what you're going to do differently than me.

The philosophers who want to find truth and meaning in full-fledged language are reacting to problems in their context, naturally trying to make sense of claims that a play a role in inferences --- of what they themselves, already at a high level of development, are doing.

Indeed.

They were taking account of their own thought and belief while attempting to sort out the differences between true and false belief/statements/propositions as well as what ought to count as good/adequate enough reason to believe something or another. Any and all philosophical positions are the result of metacognitive endeavors such as these. They knew they were fallible. The general aim was to minimize the likelihood of being mistaken(of forming, having, and/or holding false belief) while increasing the likelihood of better understanding the world and/or themselves . This, in turn, required pinpointing exactly how they could be mistaken to begin with, what sorts of things they could have been mistaken about, as well as in what sorts of ways.

An admirable endeavor, even to this day...

However, when that endeavor results in holding a philosophical position that - when maintained - leads to an outright denial of language less creature's ability to form, have, and/or hold belief, then it's clearly wrong somewhere along the line. Language less creatures are capable of having meaningful experiences(of forming thought and/or belief), it's just not the sort of thought and belief that could be appropriately described and/or characterized as having an attitude towards a proposition such that they hold it as true(believe it).

I don't think philosophers must or even do insist that other understandings/uses of 'meaning' are invalid.

Whether or not they are invalid isn't under consideration. That is determined by how consistent their language use is, as well as whether or not any argument given follows the rules of correct inference.

Language less belief negates/falsifies current conventional understanding. If there is such a thing as meaningful language less thought and/or belief, then current convention is wrong. It has nothing to do with validity(consistent language use that follows the rules of correct inference), and everything to do with truth and/or contradicting what's happened and/or is happening. We already know it's valid, that's how we arrived at the logical consequence that shed light upon the inherently inadequate framework. It's where it leads that is problematic.

If a language less creature is capable of forming meaningful true belief, then meaning and truth are prior to language, and not all belief is equivalent to a propositional attitude.
— creativesoul

Another implicit premise here seems to be that languageless creatures can't have propositional attitudes. To me the question arises...how could we tell ? — Pie

Good eye!

All propositions are existentially dependent upon(emerge via) common language use. They all consist of words. Language less creatures do not have language, do not understand words, and thus cannot understand propositions. Propositions are utterly meaningless to language less creatures. They cannot have an attitude towards some proposition or another such that they believe it to be true, and/or take it to be the case.

Can we, locked in language, help but attributing such 'attitudes' in trying to understand such creatures ?

When it comes to ourselves, we ought not try to stop doing that, at least, whenever it's appropriate to do so. I mean the belief that approach has proven quite useful. S knows that P... is as well.

Generally speaking, if we wish to acquire knowledge of how human thought and belief initially emerges, we must begin with ourselves, and when it comes to describing much of our own thought and belief in terms of propositional attitudes we can do so quite successfully. So, the practice has some very good use, and has led to acquiring knowledge about ourselves and/or the world which can help us to much better situate ourselves and/or one another in the world. However, like many - arguably most - useful practices, this one too has a limited scope of rightful/sensible application. It is only capable of properly accounting for some of our own complex belief, and it's completely incapable of taking account of language less creatures' belief. Most cannot even admit of such belief!



Imagine a white sheet hanging over a wire fence in the middle of an expansive meadow where sheep are commonly found grazing. Someone two acres away from the sheet mistakes it for a sheep. That person believes that the sheet is a sheep. The person does not - cannot - believe that "the sheet is a sheep" is true.

The same type of critique holds good regarding Russell's stopped clock. The person believed that a stopped clock was working. They most certainly did not have any attitude at all towards the proposition "the stopped clock is working" when and while they trusted what a stopped clock said about the time.

Which is to prefer doing different things with the very same words/marks. There's nothing - in and of itself - wrong with doing that — creativesoul

:up:

They knew they were fallible. The general aim was to minimize the likelihood of being mistaken(of forming, having, and/or holding false belief) while increasing the likelihood of better understanding the world and/or themselves . — creativesoul

:up:

Language less creatures do not have language, do not understand words, and thus cannot understand propositions. Propositions are utterly meaningless to language less creatures. — creativesoul

:up:

The issue seems to be whether beliefs are best understood or not in terms of propositions.

I am quite curious to see exactly what you're going to do differently than me. — creativesoul

Lately I find Sellar's myth of Jones illuminating. Note that Jones lives in a implicitly behaviorist society. They don't even think of themwselves as such, because it's Jones who first postulates 'internal speech' or 'talking without talking.' In the same way that the atomic theory could prove itself with increased powers of prediction and control, Jones' peers come to embrace thoughts as useful fictions. With practice, they even get good at guessing what they are thinking.

Now Jones could even extend his theory to creatures who never talk at all, explaining the beaver's movements in terms of its belief that food was waiting on the other side. Note that beliefs are still propsitional here, without us being committed to the animal 'having' them 'directly ' (inside their postulated ghostly consciousness.)

They most certainly did not have any attitude at all towards the proposition "the stopped clock is working" when and while they trusted what a stopped clock said about the time. — creativesoul

:up:

The issue seems to be whether beliefs are best understood or not in terms of propositions. — Pie

We have no other way to contemplate our own thought and belief save common language replete with naming and descriptive practices. That brute fact has given rise to all sorts of different language games. Throughout the history of Western civilization there have been scores upon scores of individuals creating and/or inventing new ways to talk about human experiences. From Plato through Dennett there have been ingenious individuals employing some accounting practice or another, that they themselves 'invented', as a novel way of talking about human thought and belief.

The shared fatal flaw of them all is that none of them draw and maintain the distinction between thought and belief, and thinking about thought and belief in terms of their basic elemental constituency and existential dependency.

I am quite curious to see exactly what you're going to do differently than me.
— creativesoul

Lately I find Sellar's myth of Jones illuminating. Note that Jones lives in a implicitly behaviorist society. They don't even think of themwselves as such, because it's Jones who first postulates 'internal speech' or 'talking without talking.' In the same way that the atomic theory could prove itself with increased powers of prediction and control, Jones' peers come to embrace thoughts as useful fictions. With practice, they even get good at guessing what they are thinking.

On behaviourism...

Given that there are any number of possible reasons why we may exhibit some behaviour or another, behaviour alone cannot always reliably inform us of anothers' thought and belief. The sheer volume of people on social media telling the viewer what this or that behaviour means would be better sized if most everyone already knew that outward behaviour alone does not constitute sufficient reason to believe and/or adequate evidence to conclude that the observer can be certain what the candidate under consideration is thinking. Rather, it's more along the lines of good evidence that is not quite strong enough. Reliably true conclusions about the thought and/or belief of others requires more than just outward observable behaviours.

Now Jones could even extend his theory to creatures who never talk at all, explaining the beaver's movements in terms of its belief that food was waiting on the other side. Note that beliefs are still propositional] here, without us being committed to the animal 'having' them 'directly ' (inside their postulated ghostly consciousness.)

Above emphasis is mine.

That's a common practice across the board! I've participated in countless discussions, and been a participant in a debate on this very forum concerning that very idea(that the content of thought and belief is propositional). It makes perfect sense for us to go through such a stage in our development. I mean that's how we learned to talk about others as well as ourselves. We talk about how happy our dogs are upon our arrival. We talk about how our cats' behaviour differs significantly from our dogs in those same situations. Nature show narrators often talk about how species of male birds 'perform for the females', 'hope to get the females attention', and other such things.

We say things like our cat believes that it's food bowl is empty. There's certainly no good reason to deny saying such a thing. People talk like that all the time, and few if any have qualms about doing so. The results can bring about positive change in that such conversations bring people closer together, develop friendships, etc. Common ground and all. So, it's not a horrible thing - in and of itself. However, talking about language less minds can also result in fostering language games that inhibit the users' ability to acquire understanding of themselves and/or other animals by virtue of false belief formation and/or the subsequent perpetuation each time people talk like that. That seems to be the case, writ large, right now. Anthropomorphism was inevitable. I mean, we had to have already been guilty of attributing human features and/or characteristics to things not human in order to become aware of our having done so. The only way to avoid such a practice is to develop some sort of good idea regarding what the nature of language less thought and belief amounts to. We know it cannot consist of propositional attitude(s).

When we try to parse the cat's belief in propositional terms, we're confusing the contents of our report with the content of what we're reporting upon. unless we draw and maintain the distinction between the cat's belief and our report thereof in terms of their respective elemental constituency. Our report is language use, and as such consists of words. Language less belief does not - cannot - consist of language and/or words! The same critique holds good if we replace "words" with "propositions". So, those are accounting malpractices when inappropriately applied to things incapable of developing an attitude towards some proposition or other.

We can do a great job of talking about language less creatures' belief so long as we go about doing so in the best way we know how. When we say that a cat believes that a mouse is behind a tree, we are not saying that a cat has an attitude towards the proposition "a mouse is behind a tree" such that it takes it to be the case(or true).

What are we saying then, about language less belief? What could it possibly consist of?

What is needed is a bare minimum criterion for what counts as thought and/or belief. This bare minimum would need to be simple enough to include the initial emergence of the most rudimentary thought and belief, rich enough in potential to be able to exhaust the most complex sorts of thinking such as thinking about our own thought and belief as a subject matter in its own right, and each and every thought and/or evolution thereof in the meantime. That seems like a taller order than it is. All we need is an adequate outline that has good bones, like an elemental structure capable of covering all that's important...

We're still in the early stages of properly taking account of meaningful human thought and belief.
Anthropomorphism is much more common than not! Most people do not place much, if any, value upon avoiding such mistakes. It's a fun way talk! All sorts of people attribute thought and belief that only humans are capable of forming, having, and/or holding to non human creatures. I've watched countless 'nature' documentaries about all sorts of different kinds of fauna and flora. I've more recently witnessed writers claim that certain species of crows somehow performed some sort of language less 'Bayesian reasoning'.

Given that there are any number of possible reasons why we may exhibit some behaviour or another, behaviour alone cannot always reliably inform us of anothers' thought and belief. — creativesoul

I suggest inferentialism.

Reliably true conclusions about the thought and/or belief of others requires more than just outward observable behaviours. — creativesoul

What if selves are thought of as being constituted by their doings and sayings ? Above you suggest a box that cannot be looked into by others, an approach I consider to have been shown wanting.

I've more recently witnessed writers claim that certain species of crows somehow performed some sort of language less 'Bayesian reasoning'. — creativesoul

It seems pointless to guess at what-it's-really-like-for-a-crow. If a model agrees with the data (I don't know the details), that seems like progress. Some physicists thought of atoms as mere aids to calculation, not really there, just useful for prediction, etc.

What is needed is a bare minimum criterion for what counts as thought and/or belief. — creativesoul

It'd be fun to find such a thing, but it seems indeed like a tall order. Does an ameoba have its reasons ?

Something like this ?

...is to be the kind of antiessentialist who, like Dewey, sees no breaks in the hierarchy of increasingly complex adjustments to novel stimulation – the hierarchy which has amoeba adjusting themselves to changed water temperature at the bottom, bees dancing and chess players check-mating in the middle, and people fomenting scientific, artistic, and political revolutions at the top (ORT, 109).

When we try to parse the cat's belief in propositional terms, we're confusing the contents of our report with the content of what we're reporting upon. — creativesoul

It need not be confusion. What if we tried to understand aliens who seemed to have a language ? Less confusion there, intuitively, but we are still trying to model behavior using postulate internal entities ( attributing human-like beliefs to a non-human, probing for explanatory/predictive power.)

Deleted

When we try to parse the cat's belief in propositional terms, we're confusing the contents of our report with the content of what we're reporting upon.
— creativesoul

It need not be confusion. What if we tried to understand aliens who seemed to have a language ? Less confusion there, intuitively, but we are still trying to model behavior using postulate internal entities ( attributing human-like beliefs to a non-human, probing for explanatory/predictive power.) — Pie

I feel like the alien or the cat. i’m not sure I know what a human-like belief , or a proposition is. I don’t think it’s simply my own ignorance, but the fact that when concepts like ‘belief’ and ‘proposition’ are analyzed rigorously in terms of their conditions of possibility, we find no ‘there’ there. As Witt would argue ‘belief’ has a near infinity of potential senses, tied together not by an overarching categorical frame , but by family resemblance, which is not at all the same thing as a pre-existing rule or category. The logical form of a proposition S is P presupposes a pragmatic act of taking something AS something within a wider context of pragmatic relevance.

The proposition is an artificially worked -up idealization and abstraction derived from this pragmatic intentionality.
From this vantage, it is this primordial functioning of human language as person, situation and context-specific use that we need to compare with the perceptual and conceptual activities of other animals. Some argue that human intentionality is continuous with animal intentionality, more a matter of difference of degree than of kind.

I feel like the alien or the cat. i’m not sure I know what a human-like belief , or a proposition is. I don’t think it’s simply my own ignorance, but the fact that when concepts like ‘belief’ and ‘proposition’ are analyzed rigorously in terms of their conditions of possibility, we find no ‘there’ there. — Joshs

I really am open to what you say, but my theme lately is that...here we are public with only words to trade. I don't know how else to settle belief rationally. It's a fact that AI is pretty good at translating simple speech, and these models are built on mountains of scraped data, actual human conversation...so there is a strong pattern in our doings, strong enough for a machine to catch on.

I don't deny that there is stuff in our box of arbitrary complexity and richness, but I don't see how it can play a direct role.

Some argue that human intentionality is continuous with animal intentionality, more a matter of difference of degree than of kind. — Joshs

I love animals, and I'd like to believe this. I guess it hinges on how we take 'degree' and 'kind.' If it is only a degree, that degree is so substantial that we are currently alone in the conversation.

I really am open to what you say, but my theme lately is that...here we are public with only words to trade. I don't know how else to settle belief rationally. — Pie

My point is that belief is only one of myriad ways of sense-making , and far from the most important. Furthermore, the code cost of belief is not itself unitary.

As Ray Monk explains:

“In Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, Wittgenstein had investigated one form of language: the assertoric sentence, or 'proposition'. His defence of this was to say that other forms of language, questions and commands, can be regarded as modified assertions, so that a common core to all three can be identified (e.g., from The door is shut', we can derive 'Is the door shut? and 'Shut the door!"). Thus, by investigating the logical form of propositions, we can legitimately claim to be investigating the structure of our whole language. Using the notion of a language game, Wittgenstein now exposes this view to a merciless attack:

“But how many kinds of sentence are there? Say assertion, question, and command? -There are countless kinds: countless different kinds of use of what we call 'symbols', words', 'sentences. And this multiplicity is not something fixed, given once for all; but new types of language, new language games, as we may say, come into existence, and others become obsolete and get forgotten. (We can get a rough picture of this from the changes in mathematics.)
Here the term 'language game' is meant to bring into prominence the fact that the speaking of language is part of an activity, or of a form of life.Review the multiplicity of language games in the following examples, and in others:
Giving orders, and obeying them- Describing the appearance of an object, or giving itsmeasurements Constructing an object from a description (a drawing) Reporting an event- Speculating about an event Forming and testing a hypothesis- Presenting the results of an experiment in tables anddiagrams- Making up a story; and reading it Play-acting- Singing catches- Guessing riddles Making a joke; telling it- Solving a problem in practical arithmetic Translating from one language into another Asking, thanking, cursing, greeting, praying.”(P.I. #23)

My point is that belief is only one of myriad ways of sense-making , and far from the most important. — Joshs

I agree there are lots of ways to make sense. That belief is far from the most important is so far a mere claim. I tend to think it's central for philosophy anyway. I take the 'big event' to have been escaping superstition, claiming human autonomy (which is that of reason which is gloriously one and universal). Since then, if I can half-joke, we see lots of rebellions by those educated enough to pull off seductive self-contradicting irrationalisms which aren't obviously so. Yet I can't deny the attraction of some free-for-all it's-all-just-conceptual-art vision of philosophy. In fact, I used to try to defend and perform that vision. In the end, I think we want (among other institutions no doubt) something 'anal' and sober and careful.

Thus, by investigating the logical form of propositions, we can legitimately claim to be investigating the structure of our whole language. — Joshs

Inferentialism makes a good case for building a theory on assertions. If irony is the trope of tropes, we get lots of mileage from a little spin on an assertion. We philosophers especially might want to consider how central inferences are in the lives of the 'rational' animal...and what are premises and conclusions ? How do we explain ourselves to one another ? To ourselves ? Inferences.

— Pie

My point is that belief is only one of myriad ways of sense-making , and far from the most important.
— Joshs

I agree there are lots of ways to make sense. That belief is far from the most important is so far a mere claim. I tend to think it's central for philosophy anyway. — Pie

Perhaps I can get philosopher of science Joseph Rouse to make my point better than I can.

“A familiar conception of science emphasizes its role in justify­ing belief; we are accustomed to thinking of ourselves as believers who formulate and accept representations of how things are. The meaning and justification of those beliefs would then be the primary target for philosophical explication and assessment. Sellars, Brandom, McDowell, Haugeland, and others within this tradition suggest a different concep­tion of ourselves, which also changes the central tasks for science and philosophy. We are concept users who engage others and our partially shared surroundings in discursive practice. The primary phenomenon to understand naturalistically is not the content, justification, and truth of beliefs but instead the opening and sustaining of a “space of reasons” in which there could be conceptually articulated meaning and justification at all, including meaningful disagreement and conceptual difference.

This “space of reasons” is an ongoing pattern of interaction among our­selves and with our partially shared surroundings. As Ian Hacking once noted, “Whether a proposition is as it were up for grabs, as a candidate for being true-or-false, depends on whether we have ways to reason about it” (2002, 160). The space of reasons encompasses not only the claims that we take to be true or false but also the conceptual field and patterns of reasoning within which those claims become intelligible possibilities whose epistemic status can be assessed. Any determination of the con­tent, justification, or truth of beliefs emerges from that larger process of ongoing interaction. Whether conceived as second nature (McDowell 1994), discursive practice (Brandom 1994), constituted domains (Hauge­land 1998), or a functional linguistic pluralism (Price 2011), the space of reasons cannot be reduced to the various contents expressed or express­ible within it. The familiar epistemological conception of us as believers, who might ideally share a common representation of the world in the scientific image, thus conflates particular moves within discursive prac­tice or the space of reasons with the space or practice itself.”

The familiar epistemological conception of us as believers, who might ideally share a common representation of the world in the scientific image, thus conflates particular moves within discursive prac­tice or the space of reasons with the space or practice itself.” — Joshs

Food for thought. Thanks.

The familiar epistemological conception of us as believers, who might ideally share a common representation of the world in the scientific image, thus conflates particular moves within discursive prac­tice or the space of reasons with the space or practice itself. — Joshs

Do you actually....believe this ? Do you endorse this as a claim that I should take seriously ?

the opening and sustaining of a “space of reasons” in which there could be conceptually articulated meaning and justification at all, including meaningful disagreement and conceptual difference. — Joshs

FWIW, this is precisely what my "our minimal epistemic commitment" thread is about.

I like your quote, but I don't see it taking those pesky assertions down a notch.

Do you actually....believe this ? Do you endorse this as a claim that I should take seriously ? — Pie

Do I believe what, that there is a familiar epistemological conception of us as believers? Sure. What I invite you to take seriously is Rouse’s articulation of the relation between belief-justification and the space of reasons within which any such claims are intelligible.

It's about grammar.

That beliefs are propositional is not an observation, subject to verification or falsification. It's a definition. It serves to differentiate beliefs from other feelings and sensations. What characterises a belief is its propositional content together with an attitude: p is the case.

Beliefs are a way of explaining behaviour in an intentional fashion. They need not be, indeed almost certainly are not, some identifiable structure in the brain. They are a way of making sense of people's actions using intentional language. John went to the fridge because he wanted a beer and believed that there was beer in the fridge.

It works equally well for creatures that do not speak. The cat went to the food bowl because it was hungry and believed that the bowl might contain food. There's no need for the cat to be able to talk in order for this way of speaking to work. To think that therefore the cat must have a thing in it's brain that somehow corresponds to the belief is a category error, confusing a brain state with an intentional description.

Assertion have a key place in philosophical thinking because their analysis is relatively straightforward. We might have built a logic around questions, or perhaps commands, but we didn't. that's probably of historical interest as much as grammatical. Logic presents us with a way of setting out the grammar of assertions, a grammar that lends itself to the analysis of other intents. So a question is often an incomplete proposition together with an intent to elicit completion: "What food did you give the cat?" can be analysed as the incomplete proposition "You gave the cat x" together with an intent to elicit the missing individual.

How many kinds of sentence are there? Innumerable, of course, as many as there are sentences. Like Eucalyptus trees, their specification is fraught because of the way they intermix and cross over. But like Eucalyptus trees we can classify them based on their characteristics. We've already seen how questions are incomplete propositions with a particular intent. We can add direction of fit to derive a distinction between asserting and commanding: an assertion sets out how the world is, while a command (wish, promise, etc) sets out a way the world is desired to be; one changes the word to fit the world, the other changes the world to fit the words. Searle uses these to suggest a taxonomy for expressions. But of course any such taxonomy will be subject to the considerations of A Nice Derangement of Epitaphs, such that any such theory of meaning will be subject to instant revision:

There is no more chance of regularizing, or teaching, this process than there is of regularizing or teaching the process of creating new theories to cope with new data in any field—for that is what this process involves. — Davidson

What I invite you to take seriously is Rouse’s articulation of the relation between belief-justification and the space of reasons within which any such claims are intelligible. — Joshs

I like to think I take it quite seriously. I take it that the Enlightenment was the big event. This is when the space of reasons blossomed, when reason became autonomous. Philosophy 'is' (ideally) the flower of this space of reasons...and even its self-consciousness, as Brandom might put it. We evolve a metacognitive vocabulary so that we can not only endorse inferences, but explain why, in detail. We make explicit what we've always done, not only to do it even better, but just to know ourselves.

We invented words like 'premise' and 'conclusion,' long after there were premises and conclusions. An inferential semantics explains how claims are intelligible in terms of the inferences that are and are not allowed. "He closed his umbrella while it was raining, because he wanted to stay dry." This is confusion or nonsense without some extra context that rescues it. We can't know one concept without knowing many. To cash out the rational in the rational animal, we emphasize inferential.

They are a way of making sense of people's actions using intentional language. John went to the fridge because he wanted a beer and believed that there was beer in the fridge. — Banno

:up:
And given the importance of 'know thyself,'...

To think that therefore the cat must have a thing in it's brain that somehow corresponds to the belief is a category error, confusing a brain state with an intentional description. — Banno

Another approach: it's we who are making sense of the cat, and we aren't going to do that in cat-speak. Let them attribute a sequence of meows to us, if they care enough. It's only fair.

An inferential semantics explains how claims are intelligible in terms of the inferences that are and are not allowed. "He closed his umbrella while it was raining, because he wanted to stay dry." This is confusion or nonsense, without some context that rescues it. We can't know one concept without knowing many. To cash out the rational in the rational animal, we emphasize inferential. — Pie

What inference is or is not allowed only exists in its actual use.

“… we cannot appeal to social regularities or collectively presupposed norms within a practice: there are no such things, I have argued, but more important, if there were they would not thereby legitimately bind us. Any regularities in what practitioners have previously done does not thereby have any authority to bind subsequent performances to the same regularities. The familiar Wittgensteinian paradoxes about rule following similarly block any institution of norms merely by invocation of a rule, since no rule can specify its correct application to future instances (Wittgenstein 1953). Practices should instead be understood as comprising performances that are mutually interactive in partially shared circumstances.” (Rouse)

What Rouse is trying to do is show that our participation within normative practices is not simply a matter of conformity ( or not) to pre-established norms, but a continual re-framing and re-configuration. The norms continue to exist the same differently through their use, and their use re-defines their relevance and sense.

“Representationalist conceptions identify scientific understanding with some position or set of positions within the space of reasons—that is, as a body of knowledge. I instead locate scientific understanding in the ongoing reconfiguration of the entire space. The sciences continually revise the terms and inferential relations through which we understand the world, which aspects of the world are salient and significant within that understanding, and how those aspects of the world matter to our overall understanding.”

As Witt would argue ‘belief’ has a near infinity of potential senses, tied together not by an overarching categorical frame , but by family resemblance, which is not at all the same thing as a pre-existing rule or category. — Joshs

If you are referring to the concept of belief, you give me all I need, which is that it's essentially a public concept, however flexible. It's the clash of peanut butter and jelly. Speaking as peanut butter (you are what you eat), I say that jelly tends to emphasize how fuzzy and individual everything is semantically...and that this eventually (if pushed too far) lapses into self-subversion. Presumably you want this very point to be understood and to be right about something that applies or matters to both of us.

What Rouse is trying to do is show that our participation within normative practices is not simply a matter of conformity ( or not) to pre-established norms, but a continual re-framing and re-configuration. The norms continue to exist the same differently through their use, and their use re-defines their relevance and sense. — Joshs

@Pie, I doubt that you disagree with this; rather, it seems obvious, no?

In my previous discussion with @Joshs, the contention has been mostly determining what is in contention...

Presumably you want this very point to be understood and to be right about something that applies or matters to both of us — Pie

My wanting to be right will also involve a re-articulation of the very sense of being right. What matters to both of us in this will never be more than partially shared, and thus always ahead of us to be achieved more fully.

What Rouse is trying to do is show that our participation within normative practices is not simply a matter of conformity ( or not) to pre-established norms, but a continual re-framing and re-configuration. — Joshs

The situation might be described as an intergenerational dialectic, with science advancing one funeral at a time (if the old dogs refuse to learn new tricks.) Along with reason's autonomy and self-criticism comes endless dynamism, an endless revolution in the memes of seduction.

Being-there as being-in-the-world is primarily governed by logos…Coming into the world, one grows into a determinate tradition of speaking, seeing, interpreting. Being-in-the-world is an already-having-the-world-thus-and-so. This peculiar fact, that the world into which I enter, in which I awaken, is there for me in a determinate interpretedness, I designate terminologically as fore-having.

Dasein is history.
...
Dasein, whiling away its own time in each case, is at the same time always a generation. So a specific interpretedness precedes every Dasein in the shape of the generation itself. What is preserved in the generation is itself the outcome of earlier views and disputes, earlier interpretations and past concerns.
...
The wellspring of such persistent elements lies in the past, but they continue to have such an impact in the present that their dominance is taken for granted and their development forgotten. Such a forgotten past is inherent in the prevailing interpretedness of being-together-with-one-another. To the extent that Dasein lives from (cares about) this past, it is this past itself.
...
The world with which we are concerned and being-in itself are both interpreted within the parameters of a particular framework of intelligibility.
...
One has a timeworn conceptuality at one's disposal. It provides the fore-concept for the interpretation. The interpretedness of a 'time' is strictly determined by these structural factors and the variable forms of their realization. And it is precisely the unobtrusiveness of these factors --the fact that one is not aware of them -- which gives public interpretedness its taken-for-granted character. However, the 'fore'-character in the structure of interpretedness shows us that it is none other than what has already been that jumps ahead, as it were, of a present time pervaded by interpretedness. Guided by its interpretedness, expectant concern lives its own past. — Heidegger

This part is key : the 'fore'-character in the structure of interpretedness shows us that it is none other than what has already been that jumps ahead, as it were, of a present time pervaded by interpretedness.

Or: I am my past in the mode of no longer being it.

(I still ride w/ my boy Sartre.)

One is governed by habits of interpretation so automatic that one takes such interpretations for the essence of the world. We are self-interpreting interpreters acting upon and thinking mostly from inconspicuously automatic and therefore unquestionable interpretations of ourselves and the world. One might say that, with especially automatic ('unconscious') interpretations, culture is mistaken for nature, the contingent for the necessary. Sellars likes 'second nature' for this. Perhaps only a little bit of our second nature is 'available' for criticism or adjustment. The tacit is 'necessary' until it becomes contingent and questionable (and possibly editable) when pointed out.

So language is subject to convention and yet most interesting when breeching convention.

Why not? An error here is picturing language as fixed, as merely the transfer of information, rather than the construction of information. Or picturing it as happening inside individual minds when it happens in a public, and hence political, space that it, itself, creates.

The construction put the lie to realism, the public space puts the lie to idealism.

There's may not be an external, material world, but that there is a world is certain.

My wanting to be right will also involve a re-articulation of the very sense of being right. What matters to both of us in this will never be more than partially shared, and thus always ahead of us to be achieved more fully. — Joshs

:up:

Well said !

Or picturing it as happening inside individual minds when it happens in a public, and hence political, space that it, itself, creates. — Banno

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