Oh by the way, what I am discussing versus a specific identity versus a general future event, is not so indirectly related to this passage in Ryle: — schopenhauer1
Yes. That's because, of course, there are, ex hypothesi no individual (actual) accidents to be averted. I don't see that Ryle is at all confused here.We can't name the individual accidents that were avoided, but can still maintain that the overall probability of an accident was reduced. — Banno
Surely, you are missing the point here. No-one doubts who will win the race. The question is how Zeno makes it appear that there is some question about that. The answer is that he considers the race from a certain, misleading, point of view. Ryle's project here is to understand how that illusion is created. Wittgenstein speaks of conjuring tricks. Austin, in Sense and Sensibilia has similar, but less brutal, descriptions of the process.Clearly, we have an answer to the problem of who will win the race between Achilles and the Tortoise. — Richard B
Ryle is not always precise in his language. "Data" just means the set-up of Achilles racing the tortoiseHe says, “Yet there is a very different answer which also seems to follow with equal cogency from the same data.” But what “data” is that? — Richard B
Yes, I think that's exactly what Ryle is saying about this problem.which are not rival solutions of the same problem, but rather solutions or would-be solutions of different problems, and which, none the less, seem to be irreconcilable with one another.” — Richard B
Well, he wants to diagnose why anyone would have taken Zeno's problem seriously - and, by the way, Zeno also took this problem seriously in that he believes that all change, including motion, is an illusion.So, why did Ryle not just declare a winner and be done with it? — Richard B
Yes, Zeno's problem is purely theoretical not, in some sense of the word, real. Which is why it is so tempting to simply declare the winner.To actual cake, or some abstract object call “a cake”? This is where I think Ryle presents a confusing picture. — Richard B
Well, yes. Zeno does have a metaphysical solution to the problem, which is to declare motion impossible. Philosophy has progressed to the point where we don't need to argue about that any more. Who says philosophy never makes any progress?But Ryle wants to say something additional, Zeno is putting forth an abstract platitude. But I say Zeno parades a metaphysical fiction disguised as a scientist hypothesis. — Richard B
Some idea of the complexity involved can be gleaned from The Possibilism-Actualism Debate. I doubt it's a road we would want to go down here. schopenhauer1's new thread shows how convolute that area becomes. — Banno
it's obviously not impossible that you could have had somewhat different genetics. — Banno
As to whether your genetics might have been completely different, that will depend on how you understand the designation. It's a minefield, and intuition is a poor guide. — Banno
Well, he wants to diagnose why anyone would have taken Zeno's problem seriously - and, by the way, Zeno also took this problem seriously in that he believes that all change, including motion, is an illusion. — Ludwig V
Yes, Zeno's problem is purely theoretical not, in some sense of the word, real. Which is why it is so tempting to simply declare the winner. — Ludwig V
That's certainly true. I didn't distinguish carefully enough between Zeno's thinking and ours. We have the benefit of an established distinction between theory and practice, which didn't exist in Zeno's time.this is not some fantasy world for Zeno, — Richard B
That's true. It would be interesting to know why you think that experience should be the arbiter in this case. By the way, I don't think that anyone thinks that Achilles won't overtake the tortoise.All I am saying is experience settles some questions not just lingustic analysis. And in this case, experience should be arbiter. — Richard B
Well, Zeno did. So have many other people. If you want to know why, read Ryle.it should be to ask why would anyone be tempted to take this serious to begin with. — Richard B
Yes. Isn't that implicit in "necessary but not sufficient"?But then this brings up ideas of different causes for the same outcome. — schopenhauer1
I would say it has to reach at least 100%. But maybe you don't?How much does the limit have to reach 100% for it to considered a necessity that everything had to be exactly the same? — schopenhauer1
using a rigid designation. — Banno
We have the benefit of an established distinction between theory and practice, which didn't exist in Zeno's time. — Ludwig V
I wish I had thought of that days ago. But I'm not sure it applies. Doesn't Ryle's argument about the future mean that rigid designators cannot be rigid in the future tense? — Ludwig V
The person Ludwig V is linked "as an individual person" by way of causal instance of gametes combining. — schopenhauer1
If the link is causal, it is empirical. Which means it is not necessary. — Ludwig V
That is similar to Kripke's causal-theory of proper names and use of rigid designators. — schopenhauer1
You say that as if it settled the matter. Is there a universal consensus that Kripke is necessarily right? That would indeed be remarkable. — Ludwig V
But if he was misled, — Ludwig V
And did Kripke invent causal necessity as well? — Ludwig V
Roughly, statements in the future tense cannot convey singular, but only general propositions, where statements in the present and past tense can convey both. More strictly, a statement to the effect that something will exist or happen is, in so far, a general statement. When I predict the next eclipse of the moon, I have indeed got the moon to make statements about, but I have not got her next eclipse to make statements about. — p.27
An apparent dig at Austin...?I mention this point because some people have got the idea from some of the professions though not, I think, the practices of philosophers, that doing philosophy consists or should consist of untying logical knots one at a time-as if, to burlesque the idea, it would have been quite proper and feasible for Hume on Monday to analyse the use of the term 'cause', and then on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday to move on to analyse seriatim the uses of the terms 'causeway', 'cautery' and ,caution', in alphabetical order. — p 31
I thought Socrates/Plato invented dialectic. What's the evidence that any pre-Socratics knew about dialectics? — Ludwig V
The portrait of Zeno and his tactics that emerges from Plato’s references makes it seem natural that Aristotle, in one of his lost dialogues, entitled Sophist, spoke of Zeno as the inventor of dialectic (D.L. 8.57; cf. 9.25; S.E. M. 7.7). Precisely what Aristotle meant by this remains a matter of speculation, given that Aristotle also attributes the invention of dialectic to Socrates (Arist. Metaph. M.4, 1078b25–30) and to Plato (Metaph. A.6, 987b31–3); he says he himself invented the theory of it (SE 34, 183b34–184b8). There is also the question of whether Aristotle viewed Zeno’s arguments as more eristic than properly dialectical. The difference, according to Aristotle, is that dialectical arguments proceed from endoxa or “views held by everyone or by most people or by the wise, that is, by all, most, or the especially famous and respected of the wise,” whereas eristic arguments proceed from what only seem to be, or what seems to follow from, endoxa (Top. 1.1, 100a29–30, b22–5). Aristotle clearly believes that some of Zeno’s assumptions have only a specious plausibility (see Top. 8.8, 160b7–9, SE 24, 279b17–21, Ph. 1.2, 233a21–31, Metaph. B.4.1001b13–16), so that they would by Aristotle’s own criteria be examples of eristic rather than properly dialectical arguments. For Aristotle, then, Zeno was a controversialist and paradox-monger, whose arguments were nevertheless both sophisticated enough to qualify him as the inventor of dialectic and were important for forcing clarification of concepts fundamental to natural science. Aristotle’s view of Zeno thus seems largely in accordance with Plato’s portrayal of him as a master of the art of contradiction.
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