the aroma of coffee. — Banno

Yes, obviously you and I treat sensations differently, and no, it is not possible to reconcile the contradiction intrinsic to those differences. You ask how is it that we can talk about sensations, but I ask what is it about sensations that enable them to be talked about. Your question treats language use as subject, presupposing sensation as that which satisfies the criteria by which we can talk about anything. My question treats sensation as subject, presupposing only that we can talk about anything iff it meets certain criteria. Your question has always an affirmative response, but mine has always negative, hence the impossibility of reconciling the differences.

Reason hides in obscurity, but perhaps the science does not. Do you not see that it is not aroma as sensation that arrives in the brain? If aroma is a chemical form of energy affecting a certain sensory device in one way, but the energy changes form to electrical energy affecting the nerves in a different way, which merely represents the chemical energy, and it is then the case the chemical energy is never transferred to the brain…..how can it be the sensation that is received in the brain, to be talked about?

Furthermore, do you see there is no physiological sensory apparatus in a human being that inputs electrical or electrostatic energy alone, such that a 100% efficiency is possible to obtain in the transition between the energy in sensory devices and the information energy carried by nerves? From which follows necessarily that all outputs of physiological sensory devices are representational, and therefore not of the same form, and cannot carry the exact same informational content, as the originating perceptions.

If all language construction and use originates in the brain, and no chemical information given from the sensation of aroma is ever received in the brain, it cannot be aroma to which language construction and use is directed.
————

You want obscure? I’ll give you obscure:
(Figure of speech; I know you don’t actually want it. Just sayin’)

…..Science has advanced by leaps and bounds. The nerves transferring nose energy has been isolated. Some device is invented….or, hell, falls out of the sky…who cares….and it is figured out how it can be attached to those nerves. What are the chances the amazing device would output an odor? For shits and giggles, let’s say it does. What kind of device would that have to be, then? Why….wouldn’t it have to be a nose? Well, it couldn’t be a nose, for if it was it wouldn’t be some amazing device that just fell out of the sky. Which leaves the theory of irreversibility in self-contained thermodynamic processes in macrostates, which translates into the impossibility of any device attached to nerves outputting the exact same information inputted to them. So it is clear…..of course it is…..noses cannot deliver to the brain what the brain is actually using. And if all language use arises in the brain….yaddayaddayadda.

Odd, innit? The proper metaphysician and the scientist both use the same term for that which is untranslatable…..phenomenon. Between what the nose puts out as sensation and what the brain receives as mere information, the untranslatable gap between is a phenomenon. Physics and metaphysics doctrines alike both maintain the immediate presupposition that no human is ever consciously aware of either peripheral nerve activity on the one hand, and sensory output on the other, which grounds both empirically and logically, that sensation itself is never what is talked about.

See how simple it is, really? The opposite of obscure, which leaves you alone with your disappointment. But maybe now you can at least be entertained at the same time.

I came across a good example of the ineffable in the thread called "The Will". When the free will prevents a person from doing something, as in the case of resisting an habitual activity, and instead of replacing the habitual activity with another activity, it simply prevents the activity from occurring, how could we describe what the will is doing in this case? The will is acting, but we cannot call what it is doing an activity without contradicting what has been stipulated.

I propose that this is where we meet with the appearance of "the ineffable". Any time that we can make a statement about something, and the statement is reasonable (some of course will argue that the above statement with a "free will" is not reasonable), yet what is stated cannot be described without contradiction, then we have the ineffable.

Another example is if we try to talk about what happened prior to the beginning of the universe (Big Bang). Since there was no time at this time, it makes it impossible to talk about. So any time that we propose an activity which is not a physical activity (describable in the terms of physics), then we have the appearance of something ineffable.

Of course, this is only an appearance, and in truth we can avoid assuming the reality of the ineffable by adjusting the way that we look at, and describe things, by employing different principles. So for instance, when we adopt dualist principles we allow for the reality of activity which is not physical activity, and we bring this realm of activity, which appeared to be ineffable, into our domain of discourse by positing the principles which allow for that.

One has to be made free from language, even though language leads and controls the conversation in acknowledging just this. Fascinating to behold the world unhinged from the categories of ordinary thought. Mystical. — Constance

Why do we have to be made free from language? Would it even be desirable?

Mystical, yes. But true?

Truth is bound to language. And if the mystical is not true, because it is outside of language, in what way can we claim that it is reasonable?

I think that it's difficult to maintain some of these distinctions while seeking the mystical. If one has experienced the mystical then they can philosophize about it. But if one is seeking the mystical, to be unbound by language, then I think that's likely when we've hit the boundary of philosophy. (also, something funny here -- when mystics disagree)

The queerness of this being, since here we are talking about it, can we then predicate anything worthwhile of the beyond-language within language? There may be the mystical, the un-speakable -- but is all such talk about the unspeakable itself worthless, or not?

I think the mystics make a case that's interesting. However, what's really interesting is how common the paths to mysticism are. Usually they require people to dis-identify with their body, to abstain from certain desires, to undergo rituals, chants, group practices, and so on. So part of me believes, if there be a mystical that cannot be talked of at all, that there are some commonalities between mystical claims -- and so I'm hesitant to say it cannot be known. So there seems, given the thought that there is an unknown that cannot be said (and hence ineffable), there has to be a distinction between what is common to mystical claims and what is truly ineffable.

Should it be known? Maybe not. But I'm not sure that it cannot be known.

But this movement, call it (Kierkegaard called it that) from first order ordinariness to acknowledging one's throwness is universal, belongs to the structure of conscious awareness itself. Granted, from this, one can go different ways. I find myself doing serious reading in the so called French theological turn, with Jean luc Marion, Michel Henry, Emanuel Levinas and others examining Husserl's reduction and epoche and its radical disclosure once we realize that that great Kantian division in being is all wrong: the appearance IS being.

Husserl, then Heidegger then all the post Heideggerian thinking (that I certainly do not keep up with; you know, I have another life) leads some extraordinary revelations that are not contained within discussions of ordinary language, but are found outside of these, in the world; and then back to discussion.

But with analytic thinking, extraordinary revelations are simply off the table, which is why it has been in crisis for a long time now. It has run the course of everyday language possibilities. I object to materialism because this term carries considerable baggage in its exit from scientific contexts to metaphysics. Heideggerian/post Heideggerian thought pulls emphatically away from this. — Constance

@Joshs already pointed out how, in the list of begats, both analytic and continental philosophy goes back to Frege. While that's not enough to say they are similar, what makes me say they are similar is how both traditions have people who identify with their tradition as the better way to do philosophy, and both traditions are also reactions to "failed" philosophy programs -- and in their various reactions to their shared history a lot of the philosophers began to converge, in spite of their independent traditions, on questions of the mind and existence and such.

I think the differences are institutional, and what's more what is institutionalized are aesthetics of reason. Aesthetics are a necessary component to human judgment, and certainly needed to teach human judgment -- but are they true? Are they the sorts of things which lead us to say, this is the one way to do philosophy? I think not.

And, further, having no personal institutional ambitions -- though I certainly benefit from the institutions -- I like to note how we're free to pick and choose how we want to. If the difference is more due to history and aesthetics, and the pursuit is roughly the same -- the ceaseless battle against human stupidity -- then the difference isn't worth pitting philosophers against one another in a kind of project to be the architectonic who knew all along what was going on.

Rather, given I don't even have institutional ambitions, philosophy is more personal, social, and connective. It is something done for pleasure, rather than a competition.

In that light, I'd say that neither materialism nor phenomenology are terms worth fighting over, because only people educated in this stuff would really get something out of the distinction, and it'll most likely be forgotten as interests change anyways. Marxism provides a whole other context for thinking about materialism other-than the modern scientific project. And by no accident do I quote Epicurus, given Marx's dissertation was on Epicurus, and there's a certain harmony between the two philosophies -- though they have different end-goals.

-- this all simply to complicate this narrative about continental and analytic philosophy. I think it might be doing you a disservice, here.

But ask Husserl about this. When you confront the world phenomenologically, you are NOT seeing a natural world at all. You are witnessing phenomena. Have you read his Cartesian Meditations? — Constance

Husserl is one I've read selections from -- I have a reader I've read but I haven't done the deep work. So, yes I've read parts, but no I haven't read it all. He's someone I need to, but he's still far enough away from present interests that I've sorta just kept him there :D

How does he know what I am or am not seeing, from his vantage? How would we be able to differentiate a person who sees the world, when attending to experience as experience, not as a projection on a screen which emanates outward from a self, but as a world which encompasses and composes the self? Turn Husserl on his head, and what do you get? If the subject has a primacy, how could one differentiate a true from a false claim about what is seen?

I would never disagree that goodness is what we care about. I would ask that the question go one step further: what is it t care about something? What is the anatomy of a care, for it has parts: I care about my cat being free of fleas. Now, analyze this phenomenologically you find an agency of caring, me, and that which is the object of my caring, my cat, but what do I care about specifically? I am looking for the essential feature: just as Kant looked for the essential feature of a rational judgment, and pulled away from particulars to generalize, so I am looking for the essential ethical feature, the kind of thing that, were it absent, the ethicality would vanish as well. What I care about is my cat's suffering (as well as mine having to deal with fleas around the house). What makes this a care all is the value, the measure of pain and pleasure and joy and suffering and everything in between, that is in the balance, at risk, whatever.

It is a transcendental argument, just like Kant's, for it serves as an index to transcendence. Where Kant's CPR was an index to pure reason, Here I postulate the idea of pure value, adding quickly that I by no means think there is anything such as a pure anything. This kind of thinking only serves to underscore a feature of an unknowable primordial unity. — Constance

Cool.

(EDIT: Just to be clear -- cool for sharing, and I'm glad you did. Just bookmarking the thought for now)

I don't follow why you believe that knowledge of how to ride a bike is not also at least partially ineffable (knowledge) in principle, especially given your hesitation to concede that an exhaustive list of instructions would give one knowledge. — Luke

I'd say it's because it's teachable. It'd be more interesting to say something is ineffable because it's not even teachable, or not even learn-able, rather than because we don't know something.

It'd be more interesting to say something is ineffable because it's not even teachable, or not even learn-able, rather than because we don't know something. — Moliere

"Ineffable" doesn't mean "not teachable". As per the definition I gave earlier, it means "ncapable of being expressed or described in words"; i.e. "not sayable".

Furthermore, I am not arguing that something is ineffable because we don't know it. Instead, I'm saying that it's ineffable when we do know it but can't express that knowledge in words; when we can't say it.

"Ineffable" doesn't mean "not teachable". As per the definition I gave earlier, it means "ncapable of being expressed or described in words"; i.e. "not sayable". — Luke

Didn't I already acknowledge this, in saying "sure, I'm using the word in a special way"? Surely we're still able to make distinctions?

But if it's really just down to what dictionary dot com says, then sure.

I am not arguing that something is ineffable because we don't know it. Instead, I'm saying that it's ineffable when we do know it but can't express that knowledge in words; when we can't say it. — Luke

I'm following.

Dualists one and all. As humans are by their very nature. Or, perhaps, the very nature of their intelligence. And the later-modern advent of phenomenology becomes self-justified, in that no one likes the idea that we cannot immediately describe our own sensations, as early-modern metaphysics demands. Rather than wait for the system to complete its task as a whole, it is claimed as possible to circumvent half of it, yet still lay claim to knowledge. Abysmally short-sighted, I must say. — Mww

It's not clear what you are trying to say here. Phenomenology does not purport to investigate anything like "raw data" if that is what you were suggesting. Phenomenology consists in the attempt to reflect on experience, on the nature of perception, from the perspective of how it seems, and leaving aside the question of whether that "seeming" reflects any independent "objective" reality. It is, ideally, merely a descriptive discipline, a cultivation of our ability to pay attention to our experiences.

Didn't I already acknowledge this, in saying "sure, I'm using the word in a special way"? Surely we're still able to make distinctions? — Moliere

Sure we can make distinctions. I just thought we were discussing the possibility of ineffability according to its common definition, rather than your “special” definition.

I'd say it's because it's teachable. It'd be more interesting to say something is ineffable because it's not even teachable, or not even learn-able, rather than because we don't know something. — Moliere

The most important aspects of the practice of any art cannot be taught. So, they are not teachable, but they are learnable in the sense that you can, with practice, improve.

Same goes for meditation; you can be instructed as to how to sit, how to breath, how to hold your shoulders, your head, your tongue and so on, but that's it, the rest, the important part, is entirely up to you.

It is, ideally, merely a descriptive discipline, a cultivation of our ability to pay attention to our experiences. — Janus

Isn't phenomenology a collection of different ideas, with some shared approaches, themes and influences? I thought the original project of Husserl's was to create a new foundation for certain knowledge - a kind of rationalist, Platonist approach befitting a mathematician. :wink:

The most important aspects of the practice of any art cannot be taught. So, they are not teachable, but they are learnable in the sense that you can, with practice, improve.

Same goes for meditation; you can be instructed as to how to sit, how to breath, how to hold your shoulders, your head, your tongue and so on, but that's it, the rest, the important part, is entirely up to you — Janus

I think I see teaching and learning as always involving practice. And, I'm hesitant to believe that the most important aspects of any practice cannot be taught, because of Stanislavski.

Stanislavski is the first person that comes to mind when I think of the teaching of art -- and sure Stanislavski acknowledges that the actor must continue to improve and grow and practice, he acknowledges that his method is open-ended (and written in the form of a dialogue for that very reason), and yet he wrote it to teach actors how to act, and it's still used to this day, among other works, due to the open-ended nature of teaching acting, or teaching art more generally.

Is meditation a craft in this way? Probably not. So there'd be room for another distinction of effability -- a the thousand plateaus upon us :D

But I think philosophy is closer to a craft like art is a craft. So in asking after the ineffable, I pretty much have in mind things like the limits of language, the limits of reason, the limits of knowledge -- that sort of thing. And the mystical provides interesting cases for different preferences of inference.

Yes, obviously you and I treat sensations differently, and no, it is not possible to reconcile the contradiction intrinsic to those differences. You ask how is it that we can talk about sensations, but I ask what is it about sensations that enable them to be talked about. Your question treats language use as subject, presupposing sensation as that which satisfies the criteria by which we can talk about anything. My question treats sensation as subject, presupposing only that we can talk about anything iff it meets certain criteria. Your question has always an affirmative response, but mine has always negative, hence the impossibility of reconciling the differences. — Mww

Thank you for a considered response.

Is your claim that a methodological difference leads to incommensurability? That would be odd. One of the things I'm asking is what sort of thing we talk about when we use words such as "sensation"; that's the same as the question you give yourself: "what is it about sensations that enable them to be talked about". It's no answer to that to reply that sensations are not something we talk about... you are talking about them.

We do talk about the aroma of coffee.

It's not clear what your nose-machine example is attempting to show. It is clear that there is a difference between talk of chemicals and talk of the aroma of coffee. However, it is the chemical composition of coffee that gives it that aroma.

• 2-methylpyridine is responsible for roasted notes.
• Pyrazines can create nuttiness, like 2,3-Dimethylpyrazine, or a burnt smell, like 2-Ethyl-3-methylpyrazine.
• The more advanced phases of the roast lead to caramelization of sugars. This produces furans and furanones such as 4-Hydroxy-2,5-dimethyl-3(2H)-furanone, which has caramel notes.
• The breakdown of amino acids in aldehydes during Strecker Degradation also creates aroma-producing volatile compounds. 3-methylbutanal creates fruity and sweet aromas.
• Ketones are also very aromatic and are the result of auto-oxidation of fatty acids, such as propanone. Ketones usually provide fruity or musty notes (β-damascenone is a ketone with the odor of fruit tea) and buttery flavors are created by smaller ketones such as 2,3-butanedione.

- What Creates Coffee Aroma?

If all language construction and use originates in the brain, and no chemical information given from the sensation of aroma is ever received in the brain, it cannot be aroma to which language construction and use is directed. — Mww

Language use and construction does not "originate in the brain" but in the interaction of multiple brains within a shared environment, which includes coffee. Chemicals do cause the aroma of coffee. And we do talk about that aroma, which might rather eccentrically be worded as "it is the aroma to which language construction and use is directed".

If you like, and by way of putting in place something in contrast to what you appear to be saying, the aroma of coffee is at least in part a social construct and is based on the chemistry of roasted coffee beans.

But, perhaps by way of a partial reconciliation, I will add that the aroma of coffee is not reducible to chemistry. There is an aspect of it that is not mere chemistry, but involves ritual, pleasure, anticipation, awakening, and so on.

These are also not ineffable: we are talking about them.

Hence something along the lines of anomalous monism is taking place here, where there are two distinct ways of speaking about the same thing, for what of a better differentiation, one chemical, the other intentional.

Isn't phenomenology a collection of different ideas, with some shared approaches, themes and influences? I thought the original project of Husserl's was to create a new foundation for certain knowledge - a kind of rationalist, Platonist approach befitting a mathematician. — Tom Storm

Husserl was criticised by Heidegger for, according to the latter, falling back into a kind of Cartesain dualism and concern with epistemic certainty, so yes, there have been different phenomenological approaches.

On the other hand we cannot be more certain of anything than how things seem to us, but the only possible inter-subjective corroboration of a phenomenologist's findings is the assent or dissent that comes with recognizing that what is presented does or does not accord with one's own experience.

And, I'm hesitant to believe that the most important aspects of any practice cannot be taught, because of Stanislavski. — Moliere

I'd say that of course pointers can be given, but no explication of a set of rules to follow that, if followed, will make one a good actor is possible in my view. So, although I know nothing about Stanislavski, I suspect that his teaching would consist more in showing than in saying. The student then either "gets it" or doesn't. You cannot teach how to become a good painter or poet, although you can teach certain basic techniques.

This also brings me to think of aesthetics; you can't teach people to see beauty, or harmonious composition, and you can't explain what beauty or harmonious composition is; people either see it, come to see it, or they don't.

But I think philosophy is closer to a craft like art is a craft. So in asking after the ineffable, I pretty much have in mind things like the limits of language, the limits of reason, the limits of knowledge -- that sort of thing. And the mystical provides interesting cases for different preferences of inference — Moliere

I agree with this.

So, although I know nothing about Stanislavski, I suspect that his teaching would consist more in showing than in saying. The student then either "gets it" or doesn't. You cannot teach how to become a good painter or poet, although you can teach certain basic techniques.

This also brings me to think of aesthetics; you can't teach people to see beauty, or harmonious composition, and you can't explain what beauty or harmonious composition is; people either see it, come to see it, or they don't. — Janus

Cool.

At least I see where our disagreement lies. I believe these things are teachable, but yes it involves showing rather than saying.

I guess what it comes down to, then, is that which is shown ineffable?

Or, more subtly, in what cases is that which is shown ineffable, and why?

Truth is bound to language. And if the mystical is not true, because it is outside of language, in what way can we claim that it is reasonable?

I think that it's difficult to maintain some of these distinctions while seeking the mystical. If one has experienced the mystical then they can philosophize about it. But if one is seeking the mystical, to be unbound by language, then I think that's likely when we've hit the boundary of philosophy. (also, something funny here -- when mystics disagree)

The queerness of this being, since here we are talking about it, can we then predicate anything worthwhile of the beyond-language within language? There may be the mystical, the un-speakable -- but is all such talk about the unspeakable itself worthless, or not? — Moliere

Well phrased, again. Mysticism is then nonsense, but it is an error to read "nonsense" here as a pejorative.

, , it would be wrong to treat teaching as moving something from one mind to another. It is better thought of as bringing about certain behaviours in one's students. Hence it is a public exercise.

Improving is a public enterprise. It can be seen, or it amounts to nothing.

I guess what it comes down to, then, is that which is shown ineffable?

Or, more subtly, in what cases is that which is shown ineffable, and why? — Moliere

I don't believe that what can only be shown, not said, is effable, because I understand the word to denote that which can be clearly explained.

Think of a culinary recipe, for example. If it is exhaustively set out and followed rigorously, results are guaranteed. To my way of thinking that would be an example of effability. No such definite instructions can be given for how to paint a picture, compose a musical piece or write a poem, because the requirement there is analogous to creating your own unique culinary dish.

it would be wrong to treat teaching as moving something from one mind to another. It is better thought of as bringing about certain behaviours in one's students. Hence it is a public exercise.

Improving is a public enterprise. It can be seen, or it amounts to nothing. — Banno

The personal experience which leads to improvement is not at all public, although of course the results may be.

Mysticism is then nonsense, but it is an error to read "nonsense" here as a pejorative. — Banno

Better to say 'non-sense' instead in order to avoid that error.

Mysticism is then nonsense, but it is an error to read "nonsense" here as a pejorative. — Banno

It would also be an error to read nonsense as a synonym for ineffable?

:wink: Yes*. Much of what has been said here seems to rely on that erroneous equation. A similar error would be to suppose that what can only be shown - the sound of a clarinet, the aroma of coffee, how to ride a bike - is thereby ineffable.

As if, having shown the duck-rabbit, we could not discuss it.

*although nonsense can't be true...

It would be wrong to treat teaching as moving something from one mind to another. It is better thought of as bringing about certain behaviours in one's students. Hence it is a public exercise.

Improving is a public enterprise. It can be seen, or it amounts to nothing. — Banno

I'm not sure what I'd want to construe teaching as, but it's what comes to mind when thinking about if something counts as ineffable -- if it can be taught, then it's not ineffable.

Institutionally, I'd say that the transfer isn't between minds as much as generations. Knowledge is transferred on to enough people that they can continue doing things together -- itself defined by the knowledge. In this sense, for what @Constance mentioned earlier, churches and such could count as store-houses of knowledge in the same way that universities are since they are institutions which transfer that knowledge down from one generation to the next. But then I'd say it's not ineffable -- strange, perhaps, to a naturalistic worldview, but not ineffable.

I think I'm hesitant with things like "behaviors" more than "public" -- I agree that it's public. But what counts as public may not always be behaviors.

↪Janus, ↪Moliere, it would be wrong to treat teaching as moving something from one mind to another. It is better thought of as bringing about certain behaviours in one's students. Hence it is a public exercise.

Improving is a public enterprise. It can be seen, or it amounts to nothing. — Banno

What is it that is seen when we publicly observe a behavior? Is the public appearance of the behavior the moving of something from the behavior to each of the minds who are witnessing it, unmediated by individual interpretation?

Sure we can make distinctions. I just thought we were discussing the possibility of ineffability according to its common definition, rather than your “special” definition. — Luke

Well, I think that explains our collective confusion. :D

the transfer — Moliere

Notice the metaphor. It easily becomes reified.

What is transferred? In teaching someone to play, they become able to move their fingers in a certain way. In teaching someone to add, they become able to participate in a group of language games such as sharing, bookkeeping, calculating change. It's the action that counts, after all.

Is the public appearance of the behavior the moving of something from the behavior to each of the minds who are witnessing it, — Joshs

No.

The personal experience which leads to improvement is not at all public, although of course the results are. — Janus

If someone has the personal experience and yet does not demonstrate the act, we say they talk the talk but don't walk the walk. Like someone who has read the book but never picked up a guitar.

We do talk about the aroma of coffee. — Banno

Yes, we do. We also talk about swimming like fish, flying like birds, going to the ends of the Earth.

And we do talk about that aroma, which might rather eccentrically be worded as "it is the aroma to which language construction and use is directed". — Banno

Eccentrically indeed.
————

it is the chemical composition of coffee that gives it that aroma. — Banno

Yep, sure is. All those chemicals you took the pains to research? Nary a one of ‘em ever registers on the brain as a sensation.

the aroma of coffee is not reducible to chemistry. — Banno

Than what was the point conveyed by listing the chemicals as the source of the aroma of coffee?

involves ritual, pleasure, anticipation, awakening, and so on. — Banno

Yes, these are aesthetic judgements concerning human feelings, rather than the discursive judgements concerning human experience. More dualism.
————

there are two distinct ways of speaking about the same thing, for what of a better differentiation, one chemical, the other intentional. — Banno

I can think of a better one: mine is one of the abstract, yours is the reification of the abstract. Mine is trees, yours is…..ehhhh, you know.

Yes, we do. We also talk about swimming like fish, flying like birds, going to the ends of the Earth. — Mww

Your argument is that talk of sensations is metaphorical? "The coffee is too bitter" is about a sensation, but is not a metaphor. I don't agree that your counter-instance works.

Nary a one of ‘em ever registers on the brain as a sensation. — Mww

That'll be, so far as it is true, because you are mixing the physical brain with the intentional sensation. And so far as it is false, the chemical 2-methylpyridine is responsible for the roasted notes of the aroma.

the aroma of coffee is not reducible to chemistry.
— Banno

Than what was the point conveyed by listing the chemicals as the source of the aroma of coffee? — Mww

To point out that despite the aroma of coffee not being reducible to chemistry, it is caused by chemistry.

involves ritual, pleasure, anticipation, awakening, and so on.
— Banno

Yes, these are aesthetic judgements concerning human feelings, rather than the discursive judgements concerning human experience. More dualism. — Mww

The dualism here is not metaphysical, but two different ways of talking about the same thing. Not unlike the piece of paper being a dollar bill.

What is it that is seen when we observe a behavior? Is the public appearance of the behavior the moving of something from the behavior to each of the minds who are witnessing it, unmediated by individual interpretation? — Joshs

Right, is there a public appearance of anything over and above the appearances to each of the individuals who constitute the witnessing public? Are each of those individual appearances identical? Of course they are, presumably,all appearances of the 'same' thing, but what exactly does that "sameness" consist in if not abstract generalization?

Notice the metaphor. It easily becomes reified.

What is transferred? In teaching someone to play, they become able to move their fingers in a certain way. In teaching someone to add, they become able to participate in a group of language games such as sharing, bookkeeping, calculating change. It's the action that counts, after all. — Banno

Upon learning how to play a person should be able to play, and able to judge, and set on a path where the student doesn't need the teacher but can progress in their own way.

So, yes, it's the action that counts. And it's public. "Behaviors" just has a connotation from psychology I'm not so sure about. Abilities might go better for me. I agree that one teaches others to be able. But part of that isn't just an ability, but just because of the way we are, part of it is how to live. A teacher rubs off on their students. So not only is ability transferred, but so is some ethical component.

Abilities might go better for me. — Moliere

I'll not push the point.

So not only is ability transferred, — Moliere

Not transferred, as nothing moves from brain to brain; the ability is developed, perhaps?

. In teaching someone to add, they become able to participate in a group of language games such as sharing, bookkeeping, calculating change. It's the action that counts, after all. — Banno

I would just add that ‘action’ should be specified even more finely in terms of sense of meaning rather than via general terms like bookkeeping and calculating. The action counts not as a token of a general conceptual category, and not in Quine’s understanding of behavior in objectively causal terms, but as belonging to a partially shared situational inter-action.

For instance, in PI Wittgenstein analyzes the word ‘calculating’’ in terms of actual use( rather than ‘in the head’’), showing that there is no such general meaning , only a family of context-specific senses. How do we know that someone is calculating? By way of actions within a contextual language game that determine always freshly what calculating performs , how it is used.

Improving is a public enterprise. It can be seen, or it amounts to nothing. — Banno

What about all the internal behaviour, which can't be seen? This is what is commonly called thinking. A person learns one thing here, another thing there, and something else from someone else, not necessarily displaying anything publicly yet, of what has been learned in these various places, though keeping the teachings in mind as considerations. Then through a process of synthesis, the person mixes up a bit of this with a bit of that, along with some of the other thing, also throwing in some innovation, and displays something original and unique to the public. The critical aspect here is the synthesis, and this is a private enterprise. Sure, improvement can be seen if it is displayed in public, but where it occurs is within what is private.