Nagel, commenting on Peirce’s platonist musings, says that Peirce’s idea of the ‘inward sympathy’ with nature is alarming to many people: — Wayfarer
The problem for me is that reason by itself tells us nothing, it is really just a good practice of consistent thinking — Janus
a critical mind will ask the question as to how we know this most attractive thought is actually true.
And I can't see any possible answer other than that it might "feel right". It isn't empirically verifiable, and it isn't logically necessary, so what other ground do we have? — Janus
Nagel's point is that if we are to be considered rational beings, then this is because we accept the testimony of reason, not because we are compelled to do so by the requirements of adaptation, but because we can see the truth of its statements. I think it is that power to discern apodictic truths which caused the ancients to grant it a kind of quasi-religious status, and conversely the tendency to deprecate reason as simply an evolved capacity is an indicator of a kind of deep irrationality. — Wayfarer
Nagel's point is that if we are to be considered rational beings, then this is because we accept the testimony of reason, not because we are compelled to do so by the requirements of adaptation, but because we can see the truth of its statements. I think it is that power to discern apodictic truths which caused the ancients to grant it a kind of quasi-religious status, and conversely the tendency to deprecate reason as simply an evolved capacity is an indicator of a kind of deep irrationality. — Wayfarer
In other words, reason suggests naturalism is false, or at least, incomplete, that there's an explanation needed to account for our preference for such self-evident truths? — Tom Storm
I think self-evident truths are supposed to be the fingerprints of the Divine. — plaque flag
Mathematical platonism has considerable philosophical significance. If the view is true, it will put great pressure on the physicalist idea that reality is exhausted by the physical. For platonism entails that reality extends far beyond the physical world and includes objects that aren’t part of the causal and spatiotemporal order studied by the physical sciences.[1] Mathematical platonism, if true, will also put great pressure on many naturalistic theories of knowledge. For there is little doubt that we possess mathematical knowledge. The truth of mathematical platonism would therefore establish that we have knowledge of abstract (and thus causally inefficacious) objects. This would be an important discovery, which many naturalistic theories of knowledge would struggle to accommodate. Mathematical platonism has considerable philosophical significance. If the view is true, it will put great pressure on the physicalist idea that reality is exhausted by the physical. For platonism entails that reality extends far beyond the physical world and includes objects that aren’t part of the causal and spatiotemporal order studied by the physical sciences.[1] Mathematical platonism, if true, will also put great pressure on many naturalistic theories of knowledge. For there is little doubt that we possess mathematical knowledge. The truth of mathematical platonism would therefore establish that we have knowledge of abstract (and thus causally inefficacious) objects. This would be an important discovery, which many naturalistic theories of knowledge would struggle to accommodate. — SEP, Platonism in Philosophy of Mathematics
the tendency to deprecate reason as simply an evolved capacity is an indicator of a kind of deep irrationality. — Wayfarer
Trying to explain how reasonable creatures emerged in the first place from simpler conditions is perhaps the most spectacular use of reason so far. Reason is honored in the use of it. — plaque flag
Which has among other things resulted in the scientific revolution. — Wayfarer
My tentative answer is that the world is the experience-of-the-world, and so the order we find in reason, is also the order we find in the world, because they're not ultimately separable (a lot rides on 'ultimately' in that sentence.) — Wayfarer
Logical necessity is nowadays often deemed to be a separate issue to physical causation (something I explored in this offsite post.) But that doesn't seem to me to address the 'unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics in the natural sciences' which time and again has produced predictions for which at the time there wasn't even the empirical means to test (e.g. relativity, Dirac's discovery of anti-matter.) I think these are all examples of Kant's synthetic a priori and a testimony to the power of reason. — Wayfarer
Nagel's point is that if we are to be considered rational beings, then this is because we accept the testimony of reason, not because we are compelled to do so by the requirements of adaptation, but because we can see the truth of its statements. I think it is that power to discern apodictic truths which caused the ancients to grant it a kind of quasi-religious status, and conversely the tendency to deprecate reason as simply an evolved capacity is an indicator of a kind of deep irrationality. — Wayfarer
Yes, but Mysterianism takes the "know nothing" approach only for very select few questions, such as "God" & "Consciousness". Which are mystifying simply because they are immaterial & metaphysical, hence beyond the scope of empirical evidence. But they are not beyond the scope of rational inference, from what physical & metaphysical evidence we do have access to.Well, there is mysterianism which takes a similar view. But I am not a philosopher - just interested in what the themes and issues are and what some people believe and why. — Tom Storm
"What some people believe and why" is a metaphysical question, that won't be answered with empirical evidence. — Gnomon
Yet, the general consensus of a Big Bang beginning, left a Big ("god") Gap to be filled by reasonable speculation — Gnomon
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