• J
    822
    the issue is contingent on what one interprets the term “thought” to signify.javra

    I tend to agree, based on the interesting responses to the OP. The key cleavage seems to be whether thought is meant to be essentially sentential or propositional, as opposed to "representational". As usual with philosophical terms, there's no dictionary we can consult about this, and usage differs, so we have to make our best choices for clarity as we go along.
  • J
    822
    I wasn't as clear as I should have been, thanks for your patience.
  • javra
    2.6k
    The key cleavage seems to be whether thought is meant to be essentially sentential or propositional, as opposed to "representational".J

    Some thoughts in considering this:

    Were thought essentially propositional, a person who for example ponders and arrives at conclusions solely via use of mental images (and, hence, not via use of any internal monologue) would then not be engaging in any thought. Which seems quite odd to affirm as far as commonsense understandings of thinking go. Or are propositions meant to be understood as sometimes being languageless? (Sentences certainly can’t be). If so, then plenty of non-human animals give all indications of using propositions all the time. But this doesn’t seem right either.

    On the other hand, were thought to be essentially representational, then the faculty of understanding could not be an integral aspect of the faculty of thought—this even if understanding will always accompany thought. This will be so because, while one can of course understand representations, understandings will not of themselves be representations of anything. And, hence, will not of themselves then be thoughts.

    But in either of these two scenarios regarding what thought is taken to essentially be, many if not most will at least at times be able to hold an awareness of some thought p without thinking “I think p” (without either forming a proposition regarding p or else forming a mental representation of p that is thereby other than p).

    As one example: Suppose a person is daydreaming of p, and thereby holds an awareness of thought p. Doing so neither requires that the person forms a proposition regarding p nor that the person forms a representation of the p they are aware of.

    Because of all this, I’ll yet maintain that for “I think” to be interpreted as accompanying all thoughts, the thinking which the “I think” addresses must be other than either propositional or representational.
  • Wayfarer
    23k
    I’m generally in agreement with everything you’ve said in this thread. But one of the thoughts it has triggered in me, is the role of language and, therefore, syntax and grammar, in conscious thought. Being able to think in words. Of course, I say that as a primarily verbal person, who has made a living as a technical writer and spends an inordinate of time writing on this forum. But engaging in this form of thought and activity, requires an understanding of not only the laws of grammar, but (hopefully) also those of correct inference. And that is something only intelligent subjects, or rational agents, properly possess. After all, today’s naturalism never tires of assuring us that the Universe as such does not display such a rational order, that it is something that us humans superimpose on it. And that is something that only a rational, conscious agent can do!
  • RussellA
    1.9k
    Am I able to think of these two entirely unrelated things at the same time? I would think soPatterner

    :100:
  • RussellA
    1.9k
    p and I think p.J

    Let p = the thought that "the oak tree is shedding its leaves".

    When I think, it must be about something, as all thoughts must be about something.

    "I think" necessitates a self that is conscious of thinking. "I" is synonymous with the self.

    Possibility one = p is external to the self, internal to the self but not a part of the self or accompanies the self. If this were the case, the self would have no way of knowing about p.

    Possibility two = p is part of the self. If this were the case, the self is the thoughts it has.

    In other words, I am my thoughts. This solution avoids the infinite regress of the Homunculus problem.
  • Mww
    5k
    I wasn't as clear as I should have been….J

    It ain’t easy, is it. The thing everyone does, what is impossible that they not do….and nobody knows what it is they’re doing.
    ————-

    I hope to explore the question of how objectivity (“p”) relates to subjectivity (“It is I who thinks p”).J

    Disclaimer: none of the following is meant to be taken as truth, none meant to be taken as proven or even provable. It is meant as an aid to your exploration from the satisfaction of my own.

    Why not just a simple cause/effect relation? To think of something presupposes its possibility; to be affected by something, to perceive it, presupposes its necessity.

    Why isn’t the p/“p” dualism backwards? Objectivity is the thing given to sensibility, whatever it is, it is that thing, so should be denominated as p. What I think about is nothing more than the affect that thing has on my senses, the affect cannot possibly be identical to the (p) thing itself, so can justifiably be denominated “p”, which in turn is referred to as representation of p. Shouldn’t it be the case that objectivity is p, subjectivity being how I am affected by p, which would be thought by me, post hoc ergo propter hoc, as “p”.

    How does the p/“p” signification account for my mistakes? Given p objectively, but I think the affect of p as something completely unrelated to p, how can I say I thought “p”? While it must be the case I thought something, it is not the case the something I thought held a relation to the objectively given p, and the “p”/p dualism fails.

    P stands for some undetermined something. What I think, any thought of mine, must necessarily be determined, otherwise I wouldn’t have that thought. There is no such thing as an empty thought, a thought having no object of its own, but that is not sufficient in itself, to posit that all thoughts correspond to given things. Therefore, objectively given p does not necessarily belong to subjectively thought “p”.

    If the p/“p” dualism is invalid by thought, it may still be valid for that which is not thought. For any objectively given p to be represented, such p must undergo that by which representation is possible, yet outside that faculty by which I think, and, it must occur with immediacy, for otherwise there is no justification for having been affected by the objectively given p in the first place.

    For any objectively given p, there is an intuition which represents the affect of p on the sensory apparatuses, such affect called sensation, the mode of which accords with particular intrinsic physiologies, and can be denominated as “p”. Herein the objectively given p is directly related, by intuition, to its representation, called phenomenon, and the p/“p” dualism holds without the possibility of contradiction, and simultaneously without having thought anything.

    The question of how objectivity (“p”) relates to subjectivity (“It is I who thinks p”), is invalid, for two reasons. First, objectivity (“p”) is in fact objectivity p, and secondly, (“it is I who thinks p”) is reducible to (“it is I who thinks”), insofar as there is no necessity whatsoever for the objectively given p to be found in that which I think about, for as it is just as possible that I think of that which can never be objectively given.
    ————-

    What of the notion that the objectivity “p” is just meant to indicate the object of my thinking? Therein is mere redundancy, in that the objectivity “p” is just the same as the thought p, there is no objectivity “p” of my thoughts, unless I think p. Herein the relation between the objectivity “p” and the subjectivity (“it is I who thinks p), is subsumed under the principle of identity, whereas the above, objectivity therein being empirically conditioned, is subsumed under the principle of cause and effect.

    Identity being the legitimate principle, because it is necessarily the case no thought is in error. It is impossible to think something then determine there was not that thought of that very something. Error related to thought, and cognition in general, falls under the auspices of judgement.

    Or not. Either way….Happy exploring!!!
  • Brendan Golledge
    152
    I believe that objective reality exists independently of our cognition. So, if there really is a tree outside shedding its leaves, then I believe that the proposition is true before I become cognizant of its truth. However, it's impossible for me to think that it's true without "I think it's true" being implicit in the thought. So, in principle, I think logical propositions can be written without the "I think", but I cannot actually work through the proof without the "I think" being implicit.

    For instance, "if an oak tree is shedding its leaves, then the ground underneath will be covered with leaves" is a form of P -> Q. I believe that P -> Q even if I'm not aware of the tree. It's not like the leaves materialize in front of me (or at least, that's not how I impinge it to work) when I look out the window. But I'm unable to formulate this idea in my mind without thinking about it.

    There are logic puzzles where you have to have knowledge of what other actors know in order to solve the puzzle. In this case, knowledge of thoughts is necessary in order to solve the puzzle, so I think the "I think" is actually sort of its own entity. I suppose in the case where I am working through an abstract proof on my own, then there really is no functional difference between "P" and "I think P", since there is nothing going on in this proof outside my own mind. But the distinction becomes important if I believe that there are true propositions that I am unaware of.
  • J
    822
    "I think" necessitates a self that is conscious of thinking.RussellA

    This is one of Rödl's key points.

    Possibility one = p is external to the self, internal to the self but not a part of the self or accompanies the self. If this were the case, the self would have no way of knowing about p.RussellA

    I don't follow this. Can you say more? Why couldn't the self have knowledge of something external to it?
  • J
    822
    So with these recent posts, we’re going a bit deeper into the question of “I think p” and its relation to p.

    Let’s start with an important disambiguation, which is going to affect everything from Rödl’s “self-consciousness” to the standard Fregean model of force and content.

    “I think p” can be understood and used in two distinct ways:

    1. “I think ‛p’.”
    2. “I think that p is the case.”

    Filling it in:

    1. “I think, ‛You’ve left your book in my car’.”
    2. “I think that you’ve left your book in my car.”

    1 is about an act or occurrence of thinking. It’s a report about something that has happened “in my mind.” It carries no commitment to the truth or affirmation of the content of the thought in question. Similar constructions would be: “I had the thought that Cindy was tired,” “Right now I’m thinking, ‛The dog is on the log’.” This version of “I think” foregrounds the thought, the act of thinking. The person addressed isn’t being asked to agree with whether Cindy was tired, or the location of the dog. Rather, an appropriate response would be something like, “Oh, so that’s what you’re thinking.”

    2 is an affirmation in the Fregean sense. We can go so far as to say that, taken in this sense, it’s synonymous with “I judge p” or “I affirm p”. By reporting my thought that “Cindy was tired,” I mean to additionally report that I believed this thought to be true. Similar constructions would be: “Q. Did Washington cross the Delaware? A. “I think so.”; “I think you lost this”; “I think that I see a wren.” We can note that, in ordinary usage, “I think so” can be a somewhat diluted form of affirmation, but it’s an affirmation nonetheless; it expresses the speaker’s agreement with p.

    Now we can ask, when philosophers contrast “p” with “I think p”, which usage do they mean, 1 or 2? This will vary case by case. But for idealists/monists like Kimhi and Rödl, I believe that they mean to dissolve the distinction between 1 and 2. They want to say that the very act of thinking always affirms something (though neither likes to use that language). And this is a major reason why they question Frege: There is no such thing, for them, as a thought of p that is only a report of a mental event which in turn contains a “propositional content.”

    This sounds outrageous and wrong. But before I go any further, I invite comment on the above. Is it reasonably clear?
  • J
    822
    There's a lot here. Let me start with this (I italicized p when it stands unquoted, for clarity):

    Why isn’t the p/“p” dualism backwards? Objectivity is the thing given to sensibility, whatever it is, it is that thing, so should be denominated as p. What I think about is nothing more than the affect that thing has on my senses, the affect cannot possibly be identical to the (p) thing itself, so can justifiably be denominated “p”, which in turn is referred to as representation of p. Shouldn’t it be the case that objectivity is p, subjectivity being how I am affected by p, which would be thought by me, post hoc ergo propter hoc, as “p”.Mww

    Are you suggesting we call "the thing given to sensibility" -- that is, the object we encounter -- p? So p doesn't stand for a proposition any more, on this usage, but names an object? And then "p" would be the representation (or thought) of that object p? If I've got this right, it seems reasonable enough except that traditionally p is used to refer to a proposition, not an object. Also, if "p" is any sort of representation, don't we still need a 3rd term to use for actual propositions? When you say, "What I think about is nothing more than the effect that thing has on my senses," you close the door on the idea of propositional content, it seems to me. Which may be what you intended, but it's an unusual construal, unless you're limiting the discussion to objects of perception.
  • javra
    2.6k


    I’m of course on board in upholding that language is extremely important (crucial in this sense) to the uniqueness of human intelligence. But I don’t deem it necessary (essential in this sense). I wasn’t there when it happened, but Einsteins reported epiphany about the speed of light was reputedly non-verbal, instead being strictly imaginative. Another renowned example is that of Archimedes’ eureka moment. I interpret these, and many other, examples to be instances of non-verbal thought - with a great deal of intelligence to boot. For those who uphold the possibility of a perennial philosophy or some such, the same might be said for at least some people’s epiphanies regarding the nature of being: these being non-verbal insights (which might provide profound understandings that are difficult, if at all possible, to put into propositional format in any cogent, or else non-poetic, way). These examples of non-verbal thought then entail the occurrence of non-propositional thought (unless one wants to affirm such a thing as languageless propositions). Hence, while I deem language vastly important to intellect, I don’t deem intellect (or thoughts for that matter) to necessarily be dependent on language use.

    And yes, though a bit off topic, I’m in full agreement with the Cosmos consisting of Heraclitean or else Stoic Logos - which we are embedded in. Unlike Aristotle’s dichotomy of humans as the rational animal versus non-human animals all being non-rational, however, I instead interpret humans as being the current zenith of comprehension regarding the Cosmos, and hence of the Cosmos’s rational order. Such that there is a quite significant partition, or else chasm, between the human intellect and the intellects of all other known life forms. Yet this I appraise as nevertheless being an aspect of a gradated and ever evolving spectrum, or cline, in regard to comprehension-ability (an ability which, again, language tremendously benefits) - this rather than any kind of metaphysical divide between humans and all other life forms. Otherwise expressed, they too are aware subjects that are part and parcel of the Cosmos’s Logos and which likewise behave via its properties, but they lack our human ability to comprehend it (imperfect as our human comprehension nevertheless is).
  • Mww
    5k
    ….it seems reasonable enough except that traditionally p is used to refer to a propositionJ

    I understand that, but I reject that we think in propositions, which makes explicit subjectivity in the form (“it is I who thinks p”), is absurd. If such is the case, then “p” suffers the same end.

    I think about things; I don’t think p.

    Not sure I got any more to contribute.
  • creativesoul
    12k
    the issue is contingent on what one interprets the term “thought” to signify.
    — javra

    I tend to agree, based on the interesting responses to the OP. The key cleavage seems to be whether thought is meant to be essentially sentential or propositional, as opposed to "representational".
    J

    Thought could be any of the three, depending upon the sort/kind/type/species of thought under consideration. So, the 'cleavage' is not so much 'oppositional' in nature so much as comparative. They all consist entirely of correlations drawn between different things. Although, I find notions of thought being essentially 'representational' a bit more muddled than sentential or propositional thought. Thought is not 'essentially' any of those though, and that is the point here. It is 'essentially' correlational. That is, it all consists of correlations drawn between different things. All of it, not just some of it. Some is propositional(propositions are part of the content). Some is sentential(though the difference escapes me - sentences are part of the content). Some, I suppose, may be described well enough as "representational", although I'm not privy to any such notion.



    Sure it is, or could be. If I thought this had a cut-and-dried answer, I wouldn't be bothering y'all with it. All opinions are welcome.J

    Cool.


    So, same question to you as to Banno, earlier: If Pat is correct, does that mean that my #4 is the right response?

    Well, if it is the case than not all human thought can be accurately characterized as being two thoughts, p and "I think p" - whether the "I think" is spoken or unspoken - then yes, it cannot be the case that all human thought is both(or two thoughts) p and I think p. So, #4 is 'right' in some way/sense of being right.

    Pat is right to deny that that is always the case. However, some of the other answers are also correct, depending upon the specific candidate of thought under consideration.

    However, this whole thread just glosses over the underlying issue. Kant did not draw the distinction between thought/thinking and thinking about thought/thinking. Rödi just assumes and further reinforces that error.

    There is more than one relationship between p and I think p. It is rather obvious that the "I think" portion is superfluous in nearly the same sense that "I believe" is. It adds nothing meaningful to stating/asserting "P". I would further question your recent addition that truth is not presupposed in each and every use of "I think". In other words 'p', 'I think p', and "I think 'p'" all presuppose truth. The alternative is to deny one's own utterance. That would be to state "P but P is not true", or 'I think P, but P is not true', or "I think 'p', but I'm not thinking 'p'. Of course, there is also yet another sense of "I think" that expresses a significant amount of uncertainty regarding p. So, there's that as well.
  • creativesoul
    12k
    I think about things; I don’t think p.Mww

    :smile:

    Sometimes we're thinking about propositions, utterances, statements, assertions, etc. Those are things too!

    :wink:

    Hi M!
  • Leontiskos
    3.3k
    Or is there another response that seems better?J

    Pat is correct.

    If Pat is correct, does that mean that my #4 is the right response?J

    Sometimes people make self-conscious judgments and sometimes they make un-self-conscious judgments. If you want to call that a proof, then sure, it has been "proved" wrong. But note well that, unlike every other option, #4 is hypothetical.

    Right. And for Rödl (and I think Kant and Sartre) it isn't even a matter of "prefixed"; the "I think" is supposed to be structural or internal.J

    And what is that supposed to mean? "I think" is a self-conscious, intentional act. Does Rödl think people engage in self-conscious, intentional acts un-self-consciously and unintentionally? Do they think "I think" without realizing that they think "I think"?

    I think developmental considerations often give the lie to these theories. When a child runs up to a puppy to pet it, upon recognizing a puppy they are not saying to themselves excitedly, "I think puppy! I think puppy!" This seems fairly uncontroversial.

    The error that Kimhi and apparently Rödl make is both serious and uncommon, and I don't really see why anyone would fall into this pit. Is there some boogeyman they are trying to avoid that gets them into the pit where all thinking is self-conscious thinking? It seems like you were leaning heavily on Kant's authority saying that thinking is always self-conscious. Now that we know Rödl misled you regarding Kant, the premise of your thread is undercut. The bizarre claim that all thinking is self-conscious is in desperate need of support.

    Or is there another response that seems better?J

    I take it that you are Pat. Maybe you should try writing to Rödl. :grin:
  • Srap Tasmaner
    5k
    Is it reasonably clear?J

    It is, though I wouldn't lean too heavily on the niceties of phrasing. There are just too many possibilities and too many shades of meaning.

    Also, I'm not sure the first-person is all that important to the distinction being drawn. We talk about other people's mental events, just as we talk about other people's affirmations and claims and all that. "Judy thought you had gone home." "Judy thinks you should go home."

    I guess the biggest question is how you intend to handle the mental events side. Space of reasons or space of causes?

    "Judy thought you had left because she heard the front door" as causal: "If Judy had not heard the front door, she wouldn't have thought you had left"; or as not: "If Judy had not heard the front door, she would have had no reason to think you'd left." ― The trouble with the second is that it should really have "and so she didn't" at the end, but it's pretty hard to justify. People think all kinds of stuff, or fail to.

    Does any of that matter for the theory?
  • RussellA
    1.9k
    So with these recent posts, we’re going a bit deeper into the question of “I think p” and its relation to p.J

    p and "I think p"

    An interesting post, but I am getting unclear about the meaning of p.

    Suppose p = "the oak tree is shedding its leaves".

    From page 1, Pat said "I think p and am not aware of thinking "I think p""

    Therefore, the relation must be between "I think p" and "I think "I think p"", not the relation between "I think p" and p.

    The relation between "I think p" and p is the relation between "I think the oak tree is shedding its leaves" and "the oak tree is shedding its leaves", which is not what the OP is about.

    Am I right in thinking that p = "the oak tree is shedding its leaves"?
  • ENOAH
    862

    Am I oversimplifying your conundrum? Is it not because the human processes of reflection and perception are structured and conditioned by language, and therefore grammatic? That is, the thinking cannot be isolated from the subject thinking, without evoking the uneasiness of the bad logic. If there were no grammar conditioning how we think in the first place, we would look at oak tree shedding leaves without separation of oak tree and perceiver. It would just be--without the words or concepts--oak tree shedding. There would be no subject/object distinction, therefore no I superimposed into the event.

    I agree that we cannot think without the I think at the very least subtly implied or lurking in the shadows of thought, but I do not think that reflects the ultimate reality. It is like a virtually permanent glitch we must endure with the advantages of having a Mind beyond our animal consciousness or, the pure untainted aware-ing of our senses and drives within nature.
  • Corvus
    3.5k
    p and "I think p"RussellA

    Isn't it a tautology? When you say P, it already implies you think P.
  • Banno
    25.5k
    When you ask if the Oak is shedding its leaves, are you thinking that the oak is shedding it's leaves?

    If so, why ask the question?
  • Mww
    5k


    Hey you!!! As always, good to read your opinions. Respect, sincerely, and lots.

    I think about things; I don’t think p.
    — Mww

    Sometimes we're thinking about propositions, utterances, statements, assertions, etc. Those are things too!
    creativesoul

    Ahhh, see? We agree on that, among other things. Objective linguistic assemblages are objects as much as dump trucks and phosporus ions. While it’s true enough we do think about propositions, and we do necessarily express ourselves by means of them, it remains they are not the content of our thoughts as such.
    (All I just wrote never did exist in my head as it appears on this page; all I just wrote explaining what didn't happen, didn’t happen)

    For those p’s not mine, but are mere perceptions of mine, those expressions of other subjects, it is the proposition that appears to me, but it is only the relation of the content of that proposition, in juxtaposition to my comprehension, that I call my thinking.

    If I am informed the oak tree is loosing its leaves, my thinking is entirely concerned with whether or not it is comprehensible that this (leaves), can happen (fall off), to that (oak tree).

    Try it: image you’re told the needles are falling off the pine tree.

    What never happens, given this, and any congruent occassion, not once and not even in part, is the manifold of conceptions assembled into the very same proposition, however abstract a form it must have, that appeared to my senses. I never think the leaves are falling from the oak tree, even while I express my agreement with the originating information, with an utterance of my own.
    ————-

    Thought (…) is 'essentially' correlational. That is, it all consists of correlations drawn between different things. All of it, not just some of it.creativesoul

    For years now, since our mutual dialectical Day One, this has been the major point of total agreement, as far as I’m concerned. And while there remains a disparity between what we each think those correlations are, it is very good that we agree on the necessity of them, as the ground of all else which follows.
  • J
    822
    So, the 'cleavage' is not so much 'oppositional' in nature so much as comparative.creativesoul

    Good. It only becomes a cleavage if we find that some philosopher, in putting forward the theory that the "I think" is ubiquitous, is depending on one or the other of these construals of "think."

    So, #4 is 'right' in some way/sense of being right.

    Pat is right to deny that that is always the case. However, some of the other answers are also correct, depending upon the specific candidate of thought under consideration.
    creativesoul

    Say more about that? Can you give an example of a thought-candidate that would make one of the other answers also correct?

    However, this whole thread just glosses over the underlying issue. Kant did not draw the distinction between thought/thinking and thinking about thought/thinking. Rödi just assumes and further reinforces that error.creativesoul

    No, it's the opposite. Here's what I wrote in the OP, with relevant passages bolded:

    The “I think” accompanies all our thoughts, says Kant. Sebastian Rödl, in Self-Consciousness and Objectivity, agrees with this but points out that “this cannot be put by saying that, in every act of thinking, two things are thought: p and I think p.” He calls this a confusion arising from our notation, and suggests, not entirely seriously, that we could devise a more accurate notation “that makes I think internal to p: we may form the letter p by writing, in the shape of a p, the words I think.” He interprets Kant as saying the same thing: for Kant, “the I think is not something thought alongside the thought that it accompanies, but internal to what is thought as such.”J

    Both Rödl and Kant agree with you that these do not represent two thoughts.

    'p', 'I think p', and "I think 'p'" all presuppose truth.creativesoul

    See my attempt to disambiguate these. To report that I have a thought p is not to claim truth for it, at least according to the "standard model."
  • J
    822
    Also, I'm not sure the first-person is all that important to the distinction being drawn. We talk about other people's mental events, just as we talk about other people's affirmations and claims and all that. "Judy thought you had gone home." "Judy thinks you should go home.Srap Tasmaner

    Right. The disambiguation between the senses of "I think" applies equally well to "you think" and "she thinks."

    I guess the biggest question is how you intend to handle the mental events side. Space of reasons or space of causes?

    "Judy thought you had left because she heard the front door" as causal: "If Judy had not heard the front door, she wouldn't have thought you had left"; or as not: "If Judy had not heard the front door, she would have had no reason to think you'd left." ― The trouble with the second is that it should really have "and so she didn't" at the end, but it's pretty hard to justify. People think all kinds of stuff, or fail to.

    Does any of that matter for the theory?
    Srap Tasmaner

    Good question. My allegiance, apart from this particular theory, is usually with reasons rather than causes. I haven't worked it out here yet at all. Put a pin in it!
  • J
    822
    Yeah, the reflexivity gets confusing. How about if we do this:

    p = "The oak tree is shedding its leaves."
    q = "I think, 'The oak tree is shedding its leaves' = "I think p"

    So Pat is saying, "I think p but I am not aware of thinking q."

    Now, you're wanting to add a new relation -- a new reflexivity:

    r = "I think 'I think p'" = "I think q"

    That's the move I don't understand. Can you say why this next level of reflexivity is needed to make the situation clear? When does r arise for Pat?
  • J
    822
    I agree that we cannot think without the I think at the very least subtly implied or lurking in the shadows of thought, but I do not think that reflects the ultimate reality.ENOAH

    Sure. I believe someone who agreed that the "I think" is ubiquitous could go either way on whether there was more to reality than this relation -- whether the "I think" constitutes reality or only reflects or discovers it in some way.
  • J
    822
    I think you're saying that the use of "I think" here is my sense 1, not sense 2. If I already believed or asserted it, why ask? Right, that would be a good example of why the force/content distinction seems necessary. I'm still working my way toward articulating some of the possible Rodelian responses here, but I definitely appreciate the problem.
  • RussellA
    1.9k
    Isn't it a tautology? When you say P, it already implies you think P.Corvus

    Nearly.

    Let "p" = "I think that the Eiffel Tower is 400m tall"

    When I say p, when I say "I think that the Eiffel Tower is 400m tall", this means that "I think that the Eiffel Tower is 400m tall."

    When I think p, when I think "I think that the Eiffel Tower is 400m tall", this has two different meanings.

    Meaning one = "I think that the Eiffel Tower is 400m tall". A tautology, as you say.

    Meaning two = "I think about my thought that the Eiffel Tower is 400m tall."

    In ordinary language, "I think about my thought that the Eiffel Tower is 400m tall" means "I think that the Eiffel Tower is 400m tall, but I am not sure"

    In metaphysics, "I think about my thought leads to an infinite regress, so cannot be valid.

    It becomes difficult to separate metaphysics from ordinary language.
  • Corvus
    3.5k
    It becomes difficult to separate metaphysics from ordinary language.RussellA

    If language is expression of thought, then every statement and proposition you make must be based on "I think" even if you didn't say it out loud.
  • J
    822
    And see my attempt at a similar disambiguation, above.
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Get involved in philosophical discussions about knowledge, truth, language, consciousness, science, politics, religion, logic and mathematics, art, history, and lots more. No ads, no clutter, and very little agreement — just fascinating conversations.