I take you to be articulating a valuable pragmatist insight. I read the neopragmatist Rorty very intensely and closely, and I was strongly influenced by his anarchism. — plaque flag
You say that : what is "right" is what accomplishes the goal. I see the value in this, but I maintain that you are still trying to tell me a truth here. It's not just instrumental. If it is, it has no authority. It's only true if I believe it, in other words, given that your desire is presumably to persuade. — plaque flag
We agree very much on this. — plaque flag
I think it's clear that truth is….. “When a thing, in reality, meets all the prerequisites to be a dog, then it is a dog". — Judaka
My point is that this argument of mine is the product of my creative effort, it involves my biases, and my intentions and serves my goals. It is not mere truth. — Judaka
I imagine you are using the word "truth" to roughly reference "being in accordance with reality". — Judaka
Let me ask a simple question, is a dog a dog? I think most people would agree, that it's objectively true, that a dog is a dog. But why? I think it's fair to say that language isn't part of reality, and the categorisation of a dog as a dog isn't either. So, it must be logic that makes it true. — Judaka
I think it's fair to say that language isn't part of reality, and the categorisation of a dog as a dog isn't either. — Judaka
n the simplest terms, if a method achieves its goal then that is a truth, and it's this kind of truth we seek, not "that which is in accordance with reality", barely anyone gives a shit about that. — Judaka
The parrot, the photocell, and the chunk of iron can serve as instruments for the detection of red things or wet things, because they respond differentially to them. But those responses are not claims that things are red or wet, precisely because they do not understand those responses as having that meaning or content. By contrast, when you respond to red things or wet things by saying “That’s red,” or “That’s wet,” you do understand what you are saying, you do grasp the content, and you are applying the concepts red and wet. What is the difference that makes the difference here? What practical know-how have you got that the parrot, the photocell, and the chunk of iron do not? I think the answer is that you, but not they, can use your response as the premise in inferences. For you, but not for them, your reponse is situated in a network of connections to other sentences, connections that underwrite inferential moves to it and from it. You are disposed to accept the inference from “That’s red,” to “That’s colored,”, to reject the move to “That’s green,”, and to accept the move to it from “That’s a stoplight.” You are willing to make the move from “It’s wet,” to “There is water about,” to infer it from “It is raining,” to take it as ruling out the claim “We are in a desert,” and so on. Because you have the practical ability to sort inferences in which it appears as a premise or conclusion into good ones and bad ones, your response “That’s red,” or “It’s wet,” is the making of a move in a language game, the staking of a claim, the taking of a stand that commits you to other such claims, precludes some others, and that could be justified by still others. Having practical mastery of that inferentially articulated space—what Wilfrid Sellars calls “the space of reasons”—is what understanding the concepts red and wet consists in. The responsive, merely classificatory, non-inferential ability to respond differentially to red and wet things is at most a necessary condition of exercising that understanding, not a sufficient one. — Brandom
Time is not objectively linear - there is no inherent temporal separability between past and present. Rather, we enact this cut within the phenomenon of experiencing temporality, and the boundaries and properties of ‘the past’ and ‘the present, living being’ remain dynamic, ever-changing in relation to each other, whenever and however they intra-act (as opposed to interact which implies pre-determined boundaries/properties). — Possibility
The apparent determinacy of the past is inseparable from its present intra-action, enacting a particular embodied cut within such intra-action that delineates ‘the past’ from agencies of observation, including ‘the present’. Any difference between one such agential cut and another may not be obvious, but it is NOT zero.
Both the past and the future are full of possibilities in which we can ‘partake’. We are continually reconfiguring, reworking and re-articulating ‘the past’, including what we have previously considered to be ‘determined’ or ‘actual’. — Possibility
I applaud the insistence of relevance. I agree with your cynicism (hence my thread on the foolishness of ontology). But you seem to be on the edge of performative contradiction. What's the truth about the goal you have in making that very claim ? Let's assume you want to convince me. Then the statement is true because I believe it ? — plaque flag
So this is more of what I'd call us realizing our ontological centrality. This entangles the conceptual aspect of the world with the human community's inferential standards. — plaque flag
But what about the future though? Isn't it necessary to have a "cut" between future and past, to distinguish between what is possible and what is impossible. Perhaps you don't believe this? — Metaphysician Undercover
Do you really believe this? The possibilities of the past are known as counterfactuals, and that's completely different from the possibilities of the future. If you really believe what you say here, can you explain to me how the past, which we've previously considered to be determined, could consist of real possibilities which we could choose from, to actualize through our actions, just like we do with future possibilities. I mean, aren't you saying we can choose to change things in the past? — Metaphysician Undercover
The belief that grammatical categories reflect the underlying structure of the world is a continuing seductive habit of mind worth questioning. — Barad
Quantum physics requires a new logical framework that understands the constitutive role of measurement processes in the construction of knowledge. — Barad
A condition for objective knowledge is that the referent is a phenomenon (and not an observer-independent object)…The crucial identifying feature of phenomena is that they include ‘all relevant features of the experimental arrangement’.
Ontology confuses me, I'm not sure I understand your claims. I may not be a great discussion partner for discussing ontology. — Judaka
When a thing is referred to correctly, that creates "truth". In other words, truth is not a reflection of reality, it's a quality given to a reference. — Judaka
The word "truth" doesn't carry the weight many seem to think it does, it really needs to be contextualised. — Judaka
I use 'ontology' as a synonym of 'philosophy' in its more 'scientific' ambition to articulate the structure of reality. — plaque flag
I think you are making the point that assertions are true or false. — plaque flag
Along these lines, talk of a world independent of human experience is confused or absurd. So I reject scientific realism as nonempirical -- basically a useful fiction that ignores the normatively subjectivity it nevertheless depends on without being forced to notice it. Bad ontology doesn't necessarily prevent technology from improving. — plaque flag
Being able to call a statement true has certain metacognitive uses, but mostly 'P is true' doesn't add anything to 'P.' — plaque flag
But what is it to assert P ? Is there something irreducible here ? Is there a raw bottom-most essence of language that just 'is' the conceptual aspect of the real ? — plaque flag
I suppose you are talking about how we feel about the world of appearances*1, in which we are entangled & embodied, as opposed to what we believe about its ultimate objective cosmic reality. In other words, Phenomenology vs Ontology. For example, "how do you feel about God" versus "do you believe that God is really out there?"Perhaps philosophy's essence is its tenacious investigation of the subject's contribution to experience and how this contribution affects what we ought to believe. — plaque flag
There's subjectivity in describing things. If you want to articulate the structure of reality, my view is that your aspiration is doomed from the start. Articulation is inherently subjective. — Judaka
The logic for P being true is invented. What does irreducible mean? — Judaka
The logic of language is invented, all of it. — Judaka
In language, we refer to things with words, and there is a meaning to referring to something as something. That's all language is really. — Judaka
I suppose you are talking about how we feel about the world of appearances*1, in which we are entangled & embodied, as opposed to what we believe about its ultimate objective cosmic reality. — Gnomon
In other words, Phenomenology vs Ontology. For example, "how do you feel about God" versus "do you believe that God is really out there?" — Gnomon
*1. Nagel's query about "what is it like to be bat" : the subjective feeling of being a sound-seeing flying mammal? For us primarily visual mammals --- like all consciousness questions --- that un-experienced experience is hard to imagine, and even harder to explain in words. The bat is "entangled" in the same physical world, but experiences different subjective sensations, due to unique features of its embodiment. — Gnomon
That is of course an articulation of the structure of reality, which by its own testimony is subjective (biased, unjustified, etc.) — plaque flag
How much can we say about the blueness of blue ? Blue is just blue. In the same way, assertion might be something so fundamental that assertions about assertions just muddy the water. — plaque flag
Don't you think culture is somewhat constrained by biology ? Translation seems to be common and relatively successful. — plaque flag
This sounds like the default 'nomenclature' theory effectively criticized by Saussure and Wittgenstein. — plaque flag
Do you associate subjective with unjustified? That would be unfortunate, it's sad how this word has been butchered.
As I've already explained, and you seemingly agreed with, my argument is the result of my creative effort, it's got my biases, my choices, my views attached. "Articulation is inherently subjective", that's my understanding of articulation, my understanding of "inherently", my rules for applying "inherently", my understanding of "subjective" my rules for applying "subjective". I chose the words and not some other words. I sequenced them as they are. It's my creation, and its construction is tied to my thinking. — Judaka
That's far from a comprehensive explanation, and I could've written this much better but it should be enough that you understand my perspective, maybe. — Judaka
A characteristic distinguishing feature of linguistic practices is their protean character, their plasticity and malleability, the way in which language constantly overflows itself, so that any established pattern of usage is immediately built on, developed, and transformed. The very act of using linguistic expressions or applying concepts transforms the content of those expressions or concepts. The way in which discursive norms incorporate and are transformed by novel contingencies arising from their usage is not itself a contingent, but a necessary feature of the practices in which they are implicit. It is easy to see why one would see the whole enterprise of semantic theorizing as wrong–headed if one thinks that, insofar as language has an essence, that essence consists in its restless self–transformation (not coincidentally reminiscent of Nietzsche’s “self–overcoming”). Any theoretical postulation of common meanings associated with expression types that has the goal of systematically deriving all the various proprieties of the use of those expressions according to uniform principles will be seen as itself inevitably doomed to immediate obsolescence as the elusive target practices overflow and evolve beyond those captured by what can only be a still, dead snapshot of a living, growing, moving process. It is an appreciation of this distinctive feature of discursive practice that should be seen as standing behind Wittgenstein’s pessimism about the feasibility and advisability of philosophers engaging in semantic theorizing…
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[T]he idea that the most basic linguistic know–how is not mastery of proprieties of use that can be expressed once and for all in a fixed set of rules, but the capacity to stay afloat and find and make one’s way on the surface of the raging white–water river of discursive communal practice that we always find ourselves having been thrown into (Wittgensteinian Geworfenheit) is itself a pragmatist insight. It is one that Dewey endorses and applauds. And it is a pragmatist thought that owes more to Hegel than it does to Kant. — Robert Brandom
So even a word like "truth", I don't think a dictionary definition helps that much, we need to ask, what does it mean to refer to something as truth, and what are the rules for it? What does it mean for something to be truth and how should we treat something upon knowing that it's the truth? All of these questions are relevant to understanding the word, though context can influence this greatly. — Judaka
The concept dog is different from any actual dog, yet in some sense it makes that actual dog possible as a dog. — plaque flag
"I see", said the blind philosopher. So, as a "naive realist" you disagree with Aristotle, Descartes, & Kant that we can't believe our perceiving eyes, because they deceive us with subjective beliefs about the non-self "other" (unreal or ideal) world that our senses purport to inform us of?*1 Hence, your worldview is direct & monistic with no filters?*2 No need for philosophical doubt about percepts? And no need for notions of Ideal Forms underlying the Facts. Do we still need the gods, though, to bestow upon us The Given?*3I'm definitely more interested in what we think and ought to think. As a phenomenological direct realist (a phrase I may have made up), I don't believe in a world of appearances and yet some other world of realities. . . . Indirect realists [ dualists ] are pretty much doomed to misunderstand the project, thinking it focuses on appearances rather than realities. Actually it focuses on how realities are given. — plaque flag
Note that such direct realism doesn't pretend to infallibility or omniscience. Reality is profoundly horizonal (we know the mountain has another side, that we could definitely get clearer on Hegel, etc.) We can be wrong, confused, see things at different levels of clarity. The physicists sees the chair in the kitchen in ways that the child can't, for the physicist has learned to enrich the object by weaving it into the scientific image. A philosopher will also see the chair in more complex and complete way than the child. — plaque flag
I happen to agree with that assessment, except to point-out that scientistic Materialism is a metaphysical monism. Hence, Brain & Mind are not two different substances, but simply a singular machine with the function of interpreting Reality in a way that behooves a temporary material creature in a sometimes hostile world. For the purposes of a life-preserving mechanism, the subjective Self is the "crucial" fact of Reality. That's one way of resolving the "confusion of dualism".In my opinion, the hard problem is made harder (pointlessly harder) by the confusions of dualism. I will perhaps please the Spiritual crowd by agreeing with them that the subject is absolutely crucial. I reject scientific realism understood as the dead pure object existing utterly apart from an embodied subject. — plaque flag
My point is that you were doing what I'd call articulating the structure of reality in that very statement. Can we help but articulate the structure of reality ? — plaque flag
I realize that they are your words. I think you mostly had to conform to semantic norms that transcend you, because I understand you all too well otherwise. But surely those particular words are a function of you in particular as well. — plaque flag
Your comments on language all seem quite reasonable to me. You might like these passages. — plaque flag
I apologize for my dumminess! My naive notion of "direct realism" is limited to the Wiki summary. Since I have no formal training in the abstruse enigmas of academic philosophy, your clarification must have sailed right over my little pointy head. Can you read me into your more sophisticated view, without getting into technicalities that will only confuse me further. I sense that our worldviews are not far apart, but perhaps on the other side of the mountain. :smile:I think you may have a 'naive' view of phenomenological direct realism. I went out of my way to spare you the confusion. — plaque flag
Surely the dog is what it is absent the concept or more precisely name, "dog". — Janus
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