As in, the whole process of definition relies on truth, so trying to define truth will necessarily result in circularity? Or just a general skepticism, given the results so far?

Sorry @Mongrel for the divergence. If you think it's not quite applicable, we could move this to another thread. My thought was that "meanings" could actually serve as one half to the correspondence theory -- meanings could correspond to facts, whether those facts be about English or otherwise.


"associating" differs in meaning from "defining". And, yes, we certainly disagree on word meaning.

Were you to define "tomato" as "used for emphasis", and by "define" I mean "descriptive definition", then that definition would be false. This is because the meaning of a word does not belong "in the head", as you say. We may take a sign and stipulate a meaning with that sign. But "tomato" still means "a round, soft, red fruit that is eaten raw or cooked and that is often used in salads, sandwiches, sauces, etc." -- I can imagine other ways of phrasing this too that would be true -- regardless of your stipulation.

Now, if everyone began to use "tomato" as "used for emphasis", then the meaning of the word has changed. But that, in and of itself, is no reason to think that meanings on "in the head".


Consider, for instance, the following:

Heber brewed a of gone huber of a draken fitch-witch wherever why to run gone mad

I can tell you what I mean by this, but clearly it doesn't mean anything in English -- because there is a fact to the matter of English(just because we are "in L" does not mean there is no fact to the matter). Also, the word "mean" here has two different meanings -- my first usage means "intend" and my latter use means "extension of a word".

Hence why I'd say there is more to definitions than stipulations. There are stipulative definitions, but there's a reason one must stipulate -- because the meanings of words are often more diffuse than some given speaker might wish to express.

Now, intentions are mental and we can intend this or that meaning with a word. But meanings differ from intent.


All that being said, you are of course free to postulate and even stick to a strictly stipulative theory of meaning. But it is at the very least idiosyncratic. What reason would you have for believing it, given that we have to learn a language, after all, and that there are at least purported facts about language. How would you deal with, say, the existence of an English class? What is it they are learning? The mathematical average of the contents of a culture's mind?

What would motivate such a belief?

Sorry I missed that. Off to work atm, but your reliance on "the meanings themselves" looks suspect to me. Will post more later, but that's likely what I would respond to when I have time to think more.

However I would say that we always want to avoid harm, while we don't always want to obtain pleasure because the costs (pain) may be too high. — darthbarracuda

Why would you say say that?

I mean, if people were rational, then perhaps that'd be the case.

But there are people who desire harm, and not just as a form of pleasure. An act can be both painful and harmful, and people will still desire it. I don't know if you know people like this -- but one example that sticks out to me is a series of bad relationships I've witnessed. They desire the person, even though that person is harmful for them, and results in pain. But they want that person, in spite of the evidence that that person is neither healthy or pleasurable for them.

Well I suppose this is where cosmic metaphysics might start to come into play. If we can't actually conceive of someone as not being a slave to their will, then perhaps it is actually the case that the will is metaphysically superior than the do. — darthbarracuda

I think we can conceive it. Most certainly it is conceivable. I'm stating that even though we may conceive of god-like features, and even desire ourselves to be god-like, and pursue this status, that in spite of desire we just aren't the sort of creature who can be without desires. If we were to succeed in making a one who acted out of something other than desire, then I don't think we'd be able to reasonably say that that one is human.

Deflation isn't so bad. You know what truth means in the sense that you know how to use the word. There probably isn't any definition that would be useful for teaching people what truth is. Since a definition is an assertion, the learner has to know what truth is in order to understand what a definition is. So the learner knows what truth is prior to hearing any particular definition. — Mongrel

That argument makes sense to me. But it doesn't seem to answer the question, ya'know? It seems more like an argument for the possibility of answering the question, "What is truth?"

That depends on your definition. :D

Stipulative definitions are stipulative. But definitions in the dictionary, at least if we follow the Oxford model, are descriptive. So if one gave a descriptive definition of "tomato" as "to move with rapid jerky motions" that would be a false assertion.

There are also prescriptive definitions -- you may say "Irregardless" to mean "we can ignore that point because what's salient is...", but some may say that you should just say "regardless"

There's a cool article on definitions in the SEP: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/definitions/

http://hinterlandgames.com/

That's been the game I've played most recently. I have a thing for trying out survival games -- some of them aren't that great, but the genre isn't exactly established yet either so I like to see how different people do them. At a minimum I always figure they'd make great engines for other folks to make a story with.

One survival game that has created something really cool:

http://store.steampowered.com/app/282070/

Just prior to that game:

http://stoicstudio.com/

There's only 2 in the series, and they plan on making a third. It's a story-driven turn-based strategy game, with a kind of Oregon Trail element thrown in. The reason I thought it was cool is that the whole game is animated in the old-style of animation, where they drew the characters and colored them. I've also found the story compelling.


And just prior to that, though very different in tone from the previous ones: http://stardewvalley.net/

Playing that game just made me feel happy every time I'd play it.




Everything I've read on that game is that the hype did not live up to reality. And not in some sense where they didn't quite reach their goals but still made something worthwhile, but starkly so.

I would say that fear is an negative emotion that motivates a desire-creation that further motivates action. Fear makes us uncomfortable. So basically all desires are spawned from the instantiation of a negative experience. The insidious part about all this is that positive experiences, although being positive, will always promote a negative experience. — darthbarracuda

I suppose this is what I'm trying to get at -- your account seems to focus on what we would term are pleasures derived by satisfying needs and wants. But desire is not all about pleasure, or even concern (which seems to enter your account in the same way as desire -- at the beginning, but isn't mentioned again). It's not even all about wants or needs, or the combination of these four. Desire is not separate from emotion, as you seem to indicate in your treatment of fear. Emotions don't make desires, but emotions motivate us -- just as desires motivate us. They do similar things, and are often concurrently with one another, and may even be synonymous (though I'm not willing to state that). It would be better, at least from my standpoint, to just use the terms "pleasure", "wants", and "needs" rather than "desire" -- especially as your account of desire seems to somehow exclude emotion.

Further, I thoroughly disagree that desire is spawned from negative experiences only. Smoking cigarettes, for instance, is a positive experience which reinforces the desire for cigarettes. (or, at least, is that way for many people -- obviously not everyone has a positive experience smoking cigarettes. But you get the point).

The point I was getting at was that the requirement to fulfill desires, however illusory this satisfaction is, manipulates us into harming ourselves. — darthbarracuda

I would say that pursuing our desires can lead to self-harm. I may desire to maintain a healthy diet, for instance, and pursuing that desire wouldn't harm me. I may desire the best tasting food all the time, and pursuing that desire could (insofar that "best tasting" is, as is often the case, unhealthy)

Further, "harm" is already a word bound up in the logic of desire, no? It's not like I have my desires over here which manipulate me in the middle to go to the harms over there. I want to avoid harms. And these are the things which I need to avoid.

Yeah, it seems related to the paradox of desire. The point being, however, is that a happy slave is still a slave. — darthbarracuda

But your terminology of "slave" is only relative to some sort of demi-god-like character, because it is based on a freedom that is not only unattainable, but could reasonably be interpreted as some kind of super- or post-human freedom. You seem to believe that we could only be free and not a slave if we were to act out of something other from desire.

What, literally speaking here, on earth would that be?

As such I would submit to you that there is such a thing as freedom even if we have desires. It is not the freedom of ex nihilo, but it's certainly different from being a slave. (or even a slave to our passions, which can, of course, lead to harm -- I think I'm more disagreeing with the scope of your claims than anything. Desire can certainly lead to harm as well as a deprivation of freedom, even human freedom. It's just not universal of desire)

That makes a good deal of sense to me.

Heh. I'm even anti-representaitonal in my thinking on knowledge, it's just that all the alternatives I've read on truth are either 1) obviously not what truth means (coherency, pragmatic), 2) flabbergasting (anything somewhat related to deflationary approaches)

Then there's this other side to me that wonders about other uses of "truth" which don't seem to be addressed by any of the theories. Not that these would be what truth is, per se, but then what is it people mean by "truth" if they are not meaning truth?

So I can see the motivation for wanting another theory of truth aside from correspondence. I just haven't found that bridge into the topic which makes it easy for me to make heads or tails of.

Eh.. anyway. The way you have framed the issue makes it sound like you accept Correspondence theory. Is this the case? — Mongrel

It's more or less how I think about truth, yes.

But I think I've mentioned elsewhere I find most of the stuff I've read on truth confusing. So I just default to the theory that at least makes sense to me. It does, at least, seem to encapsulate what truth means, at least, if not what truth is.

I'd hazard to say that desire is more complicated than needs/wants, especially when needs and wants are imagined along a scale of intensity more than some kind of difference between them.

Think of fear. Where would that fit in your schema? I imagine that we'd posit that it is a pain, and to relieve pain is a kind of pleasure. But I would say this is to misunderstand fear. Fear is neither a need nor a want, and it can vary in intensity so that it is more pressing than either needs or wants. Yet I would classify it as a desire, though it is unrelated to pleasure per se (though I do believe there is a pleasure in a continued state of non-pain -- that is a specific kind of pleasure, but I wouldn't define fear along the lines of this pleasure-pain)

But this is somewhat grammatical. I tend to think of desire in fairly wide terms -- and I also tend to believe that the satisfaction of desire is somewhat illusory, that there is no lack which is being filled in the pursuit of desire. I would say that 'filling a lack' is more characteristic of our needs than desires, as a whole. (food, shelter, sex -- the craving returns, but they are satisfiable too, unlike many of our desires)


Also, I'd posit to you that desires don't force us to do things, but rather as you note near the end that desires are "woven into" our being. Not sure if I'd go so far as to say all sentient creatures are like this, but I think it's safe to say humans are. But if that be the case, then desires don't force us to do things, but rather that desires are a necessary condition for our being -- without them we wouldn't be. An analogue to desire would be the body; we are not our bodies, at least as we usually understand what a person is (whatever the factual scientific picture might paint in the end), but we certainly wouldn't be without a body.

As such, a concept of freedom which denies desire is literally a super-human concept. It may in some sense be coherent and even make sense for super-human beings. But not human beings. (and, I'd hazard, that we posit it as we, as human beings, often have the desire to be more than what we are)

A truthmaker is an entity which makes utterances true (or sentences, if you like).

A justification is a reason to believe.

Justification has precious little to do with truth, on my view. Sure, insofar that we want to know we want to believe what is true. But justification has to do with belief and persuasion more than truth.

EDIT: By 'entity' I mostly mean to denote individuated existence -- events, objects, persons would all qualify.

Well, one paper seems to lead to another:

http://tedsider.org/papers/temporal_parts.pdf



I suppose my initial guess is that I am not my body, but my body is a part of who I am. I am Moliere, and I have a body, rather than am my body.

I started reading this paper last night in response to your inquiry, BC:

Quine's Identity, Ostention, and Hypostasis

But what if you thought neither?

I think that's where the disconnect is. The skeptic doesn't believe either that we are in a dream or that there are independently existing entities. Rather, the skeptic points out that as we have been wrong, entirely, before, we could be wrong again -- and this is just in reference to common uses of the terms, so "being wrong" does not contain an ontological commitment. Hence, due to the possibility of error, we have a reason to doubt.

Granted Aaron R's rendition does say "if I were now dreaming"

I've been making a weaker claim, though. A genuine ground for doubting comes about merely because we choose what we count as real and what we count as not-real, first (how to use the words "dream" and "reality"), and then we have experienced being completely wrong about everything we experience (in what we term "dream" we have believed everything we experience is what we term "reality"), in accordance with how we choose to use those words. If that be the case then we could be completely wrong, once again. Therefore it is possible that I am in dream. That doesn't mean that I am in a dream, only that the possibility is there. The possibility, as I understand the argument at least, is enough to give "genuine grounds for doubting" -- at least as the skeptic has it.

Since the skeptic -- as I am rendering the argument -- is not making a claim about whether or not she is in a dream, much less what that dream is (solipsistic), it's just not the case that you can reduce her position to solipsism, as that is making a claim about reality.

But then I would say you haven't responded to the skeptical argument. The skeptic isn't saying "for all I know I am the only existing entity", even -- but rather using the dream scenario as the "U" in the syllogism, rather than making a claim about reality at all.

And if that's the case, then your reductio ad solipsism wouldn't apply to the argument.

I don't think the argument from the OP leads to solipsism. Looking at it again:

Klein, in his SEP article on skepticism, contends that the Dream argument conforms to the following schema:

1. If I know that p, then there are no genuine grounds for doubting that p.
2. U is a genuine ground for doubting that p.
3. Therefore, I do not know that p. — Aaron R

1. If I know that the object I am holding in my hand exists independently of my mind, then there are no genuine grounds for doubting it.
2. If I were now dreaming, then there would be ground for doubting that the object in my hand exists independently of my mind.
3. Therefore, I don't know that the ball in my hand exists independently of my mind. — Aaron R

Support for P2 being that a dream is not distinguishable from existence, in that we attribute reality to the dream while in a dream, but not when out of the dream.

The power of the dream scenario has more to do with how total it is, I think. When you are in a dream and you do not realize that it is a dream, then literally everything you experience is what, on this side of the dream, we would term not real. And, as @mcdoodle pointed out, we don't even have to term that side of the dream as not real -- we can actually term either side as "real" or "not real". There is a sense in which we've made a decision about reality in order to separate the real from the not real prior to the dream argument. And since what is in a dream seems total, and we've certainly thought that a dream was real before (and hence everything we experience, which we believe to be not real, is believed to be real) -- and so "U" -- we have a genuine ground for doubting p, and hence do not know that everything I experience is real.

But just because I do not know this that does not then imply, because of the character of "U", that I am a solipsist. If I am a skeptic, I would not be a solipsist in the sense that I would not claim to know that I am the only existing entity.

Following the appropriation, only if a person were unable to distinguish between dreaming and non-dreaming would they have grounds to doubt. But, not being able to know when they were in a dream state, they would not have reason to believe that they were ever in a dream! In fact, they would not even know what a dream was - even if you tried to explain it to them (like trying to explain blue to a blind man).

EDIT : After re-reading this, I realized that it might not be clear as to what I was trying to say.

Conclusion : The act of dreaming can never be used as grounds for doubting existence-sans-minds. Either we know the difference between dreaming and non-dreaming and could not logically use dreaming to disprove something about non-dreaming or, we do not know what a dream is and cannot hold it up as evidence for doubt. — Real Gone Cat

I suppose that would depend on how we cash out the terms "grounds for doubt" -- it would seem strange, I think, if a skeptic claimed to know, and on the basis of that knowledge then claimed to have grounds for doubt. The skeptic would claim that they do not know what a dream is -- but we have examples of being wrong about knowing when to appropriately use the word "reality" or "existence". Surely I know how to speak, hence our speaking. But that knowledge does not grant me reality, at least as far as we usually understand reality to not be defined by our speaking.

One problem with the argument is that dreams are epistemically distinguishable from waking experience, in that they do differ quite a bit from waking experience. It's just that usually our ability to judge is suspended while dreaming, although not always. In lucid dreaming, we do realize we're having a dream, and can take control of it to some extent. It's not like we go to sleep and experience another life just like the one we're having, such that we can't tell which is the real life upon waking. Dreams often don't make sense, they're jumbled up and weird. They don't follow the rules of waking perception. — Marchesk

I used to argue exactly this, but I think it's a mistake in reasoning. We can distinguish between dream and reality, but what this does not do is provide justification for concluding that I know the ball I'm holding exists independently of my mind. Rather, all we are doing when we distinguish between dream and reality is setting how we use the terms "dream" and "reality" -- and applying a lack of coherence to the former and more coherence and rules to the latter. But could it not be the case that there are two types of dreams?

All the dream argument does is show that we are, in some cases, mistaken about how we use "reality" -- in what we term dreams we mistakenly believe they are real. So it is possible to believe something is real when it is not real, even by the mere definition of the terms set forth above. Hence, we have a reason to doubt, and therefore do not know. (via the argument, at least).

3. Mind and world are ontologically dichotomous, with experience being entirely "internal" to the mind (e.g. qualia, ideas, representations, etc.) and the world being entirely "external" to it. — Aaron R

I wonder if this is something the dream argument needs to work. On the surface I would say no. Supposing there is no ontological dichotomy between mind and world, the mere possibility that we are in a dream seems to be enough to make the argument get off the ground. In fact, if we conclude skepticism on these grounds, it would seem to be consistent to simply not have an opinion on the matter.

1. Is it ever ok to remain skeptical of an "absurd" conclusion to a clever argument even when one can't pin-point the exact flaw in the reasoning? — Aaron R

Not only is it ok, it's what I'd expect of a rational person. :D Indeed, wouldn't it actually be kind of irrational (just in the common use of the word) if we knew someone who, upon coming across an argument they hadn't considered before, suddenly abandoned their belief just because they hadn't considered the argument before? But that's at the extreme end, which your following question seems to allude to: (since, given time, it might be irrational to hold onto belief)

2. How long can one hold out in search of a rebuttal before they are transgressing the norms of rational discourse?

This one's harder to answer for me. It's just such a big question, from my perspective.

If we're allowing a general sort of rational discourse, then I'd say that rationality is not about which propositions someone believes, but is rather defined by the process by which they got to those beliefs. As such, I don't think it would make sense to put a time limit on propositional content. It would very much depend on whether or not the person is adhering to some kind of process of thinking which is rational -- it's certainly not the case that wide agreement on a proposition is what makes a belief rational, so a person could, theoretically at least, even hold onto the belief after society has changed until they die and, as long as they are doing so by way of a rational process, the belief could still be considered rational (even if it is, in fact, false! :D )

((Also, because I'm remaining general, I'm putting to one side what that process would be. I'm just drawing the line of rationality away from believing in true propositions, and focusing on the process by which belief is arrived at))

I think it depends on whether said meta-physician admits to having argued this or that based on, in some way, taste. There is nothing wrong with utilizing taste in making choices between beliefs.

But I'd also hastily qualify this and note that taste is not the same as whether or not I prefer vanilla ice cream to chocolate ice cream. In epistemology we differentiate between knowledge and opinion. I would hazard to say that as knowledge is to opinion in epistemology, taste is to preference in aesthetics (just to coin a term to refer to the ice cream example -- not sure if its the best word). And the diversity of beliefs with respect to aesthetics does not, in and of itself, make dispute somehow non-negotiable in the same way that arguing over whether vanilla ice cream is better than chocolate ice cream is non-negotiable.

People argue about aesthetics very frequently, in fact. And it's a really interesting branch of philosophy.

I don't know if I'd say that all metaphysics comes down to aesthetics -- that seems a bit of a stretch. But in many cases we are probably drawn to this or that position on the basis of some sense of taste which we gravitate towards. (and explicating that sense of taste -- or, what we might consider good taste -- would be really quite worthwhile).


If a person is just asserting they belief this or that without having any kind of an explanation, I'd think that that is dogmatism -- but not quite philosophy.

What justifies the legitimacy of these rules? Considering that raw experience consists in a continuous field of relatively-positioned, free standing incongruities, why assume that reality contains anything more than that? — aporiap

I suppose I would question your "considering that raw experience" line, first and foremost. But under the presumption -- I would say that epistemology differs from what I experience. Do we assume reality contains anything more than raw experience, or do we conclude that this is so? I'd gather the latter. And as knowledge is a social-product, it is neither dependent upon my mind or my experience, but rather is an entity produced through social organization.

The second being 'semantically'. Clearly the rules ascribe meaningfulness to certain arrangements of features? But is that 'meaningfulness' intrinsic to reality itself? Or is it just something that carries meaning only in reference to minds?

I don't think meaning is either intrinsic to reality, nor strictly mind-dependent. First, 'meaning' is a slippery word in that it means several things. This only makes 'meaningfulness' just as difficult as 'meaning'. In some sense I gather you mean -- as in intend -- that collections of experience mean -- as in indicate -- objects. But when you say 'meaningfulness' I wonder what it is you mean -- as in what is the use said word is being put to, and what is the meaning of the term with respect to your questions and thinking process.

Second, 'intrinsic to reality' is a problematic phrase. What would it mean, for instance, for color (as one of your granted parts of reality) to be extrinsic to reality? And if that isn't well defined, then how can anything be intrinsic to reality? Or perhaps a better line of questioning -- what is the difference between something being real and something being intrinsically real (mind-dependent and mind-independent are my best guesses here)?

Third, and this is just a bit of a guess given your use of 'raw experience' and 'only in reference to minds' -- but if we only come to know something through the mind, then there would be no way of knowing whether this or that phenomena is mind-dependent or mind-independent. At which point you could either conclude that agnosticism on the topic of meaning being a part of external reality or internal reality is the most rational position, or you could posit that there is something other than knowledge that you're making this determination on (but one which is somehow better than opinion, since clearly we can all have an opinion, but there is no sorting between opinions).

Third question. It looks like there can be two different varieties of realism.. One that is with respect to objects and the other that is with respect to just raw experience. On a realist view of objects, these gestalt principles allow us to recognize objects 'out there'. In other words, undifferentiated, shapes are actually 'there', in reality. And they correspond to physical objects. On a realist view of 'raw experience', that uncharacterized, continuous field of sensation is what's 'actually there' and objects would be derivative and the product of mental process. Which do you take to be legitimate? — aporiap

Between the two I take the former to be more legitimate, in the usual way of disproving the opposing view -- which isn't exactly satisfactory, but I'm trying to stay within your lines of questioning, rather than introducing something new or oppositional. "Raw experience", 'uncharacterized, continuous field of sensation', and 'continuous field of incongruous color. Each discernible intensity of color is spatially positioned with respect to other color-intensities' all strike me as the products of analysis. First there's the reification of experience and then there follows the breaking experience apart into component parts. But to name 'experience' and subsequently name its component parts is to already categorize the world into objects -- perhaps not objects as we think of them, but objects in the way you're using the word 'object' -- i.e. any 'thing'. As such it seems more consistent to me to say that both views of realism believe there are objects which compose the world, they merely disagree upon which objects populate the world, and therefore the first position is more legitimate because both positions of realism are the same in that they ascribe reality to nominations.

So there is a perception of anger that is not separate from being angry, and yet is not itself angry. Does this make any sense? That there is always a calm at the centre of the storm of feeling. Now if one can start to notice that, perhaps it will grow. Perhaps one can live from that, and not from one's periphery. — unenlightened

Yes, that makes sense to me. From the brief description I don't find myself able to really grasp what he means by love-anger, myself -- but the other three seemed to make sense to me (at least, in a concrete sense -- abstractly it makes sense, but I don't think I know what it is like). I don't think I would even classify anger solely along his lines, but there was some sense to it too.

To perceive anger we must be angry -- that makes sense too. At least, to perceive ourselves as angry.

I like the notion you put forward of "growing", because that fits in with my experience of anger. Starting with just noticing that you're angry and accepting you're angry is a starting point from which you begin to notice another place, another way to accepting -- or perhaps even "expressing" anger, even though the end steps are in a sense a redirection of anger, and not expressing in the traditional sense.

I hate work. It's something I must do. And I've had a lot of jobs of various degrees of cool and suck, but at the end of the day it doesn't matter what I'm doing -- whether I love it or find it boring. It's the fact that I have to be there that I dislike. In the grand scheme I have made peace with the fact. But if you gave me the option I wouldn't do it.

When I've been unemployed I have always had more energy and been more involved with projects and people. I read, I write, I visit people, I volunteer, I exercise. I do all those things still, but in a limited way, and I don't always get to them all because I'm just tired at the end of the day.

I tend towards the view that desire is primary and is productive, and lack is secondary. Lack comes about because the object of desire has been produced, individuated, or somehow become attached to. We feel a lack upon losing said object of desire, but it is possible to abnegate the lack by abnegating the desire. This would include even very basic things, such as food or water. In the most extreme circumstances we are able to adjust because of this, and in the most pampered circumstances we are able to fret and worry because of this.

Given the function of desire I tend to think that the latter is easier than the former, at least in terms of scaling back from forward. it's easy to "give in" to desire because it produces itself, in many ways. The desire for some thing is often followed by the desire for novelty, or the confusion between the desire for the thing and the desire for novelty or the desire for extremity. In this manner desire is also productive in that it reproduces itself and feeds back into itself to hunger for more, at least if we are not attentive to these tendencies within ourselves and actively work against them (out of a desire for, say, peace and tranquility).


I say desire simply is the self because of a hypothetical, more than anything. What would a self be if it does not desire? What would it do? What characteristics could we attribute to it? A rock is the characteristic object used to contrast with persons -- and it seems to fit said hypothetical. And clearly a rock doesn't have a self. (even abnormally, because 'the self' is largely a normative concept of both ourselves and others and who or what we include in it)

Now, I will say there are difficulties in differentiating other parts of nature from this self if desire is both necessary and sufficient. Perhaps this overreaches a bit. (plants, in some respects, as Aristotle notes, follow appetitive desires, for instance). I think these difficulties could be overcome by understanding how it is that people are able to place other desires above appetitive desires (as in the case of fasting, or hunger strikes, or simply wanting to find happiness when you don't have enough to satisfy these desires).

Seems to me to begin with desire.

We don't even need continuity of self. Wanting something now is enough.

Granted he may not state it, but I think the presumption is implicit in his view. — John

I would put it like this -- the view of materialism is one view which is compatible with absurdism, given certain perimeters to that materialism (such as being a non-realist on moral truths, for instance, which isn't a necessary given), but I wouldn't assent to say that it is the only metaphysical view consistent with absurdism.

Anti-realism, as a whole, seems to fit. Really any metaphysical picture which does not believe eternal values can give aid to humanity would probably fit (so, perhaps they could exist, but be beyond knowing, for instance).

The declaration that it is legitimate to wonder whether life has a meaning is precisely the declaration that the question should be asked and answered by the discursive rational intellect, rather than by intuition and the leap of faith. — John

Heh. This is responded to as well. The leap of faith, from Camus' perspective, is no better or worse off than hoping or having a nostalgia -- it's guaranteed to kill the absurd by simply accepting it. It eliminates one of the terms which grants the absurd. The absurd man clings to reason because he has no such intuitive faculty, that you mention later. Just to make that clear, that isn't to say that there is no such faculty. Perhaps others are different. After all, people get by in there own ways. But this is what the absurd man does.

I don't find this convincing. I think there is a metaphysical presumption of the indifference of the universe or the Real, that is based on the demand that if it were not indifferent that it then should be obvious to the rational intellect that it is not indifferent, and that since such a situation is not obvious at all, that it must be concluded that the Real is indifferent and that we should henceforth live our lives in a kind of radical rebellion against this absurdity, in the light (or darkness) of the nihilism produced by that purported 'insight', rather than capitulating to believing what we are understood to have no evidence for; a capitulation that is seen as 'giving in to wishful thinking'. — John

I would say that the absurd man uses rational intellect not on the basis that this is some kind of criteria of reality, but because it is all the absurd man has. Further, I would caution against attributing nihilism. The whole book is against nihilism, or overcoming nihilism even in the face of nihilism. You may believe that this preconditions the conclusion that reality has no meaning for people. But the absurd man has no other means for grasping the problem.

The absurd man just sees no solution to the absurd in faith. All it does is eliminate the absurd rather than confront the absurd -- and the absurd man is convinced of this alone, that there is an absurd reality born from human desire and the knowledge that reality will never fulfill that desire.

For me it is ultimately an adolescent and facile conclusion, and an utterly artificial 'solution' to a pseudo-problem that has come about due the modern obsessive embrace of objectified rational conceptualization and the abnegation of our intuitive and mytho-poetic faculties.

I think you're holding back. Come on. this is a friendly space. Tell us how you really feel. ;)

I tend to think of Nietzsche as a pragmatist on truth (if we had to place him in a category, at least). That which is true is that which is useful, more or less -- and perspective as well as context changes with what is useful. (Though take it with a grain of sand -- I've just read a few of his books, and that was some time ago too.)

Which is why I believe conviction is something he would castigate sincerely (as not all of his verses cohere together). Conviction would stop one from questioning, stop one from considering alternatives or different or new ways of looking at a question and answer. It is something which keeps one sticking to an answer in spite of what may come.

I agree with @Wosret with respect to the second quote.

Not necessarily, of course. There are things one let's go. But belittling someone or some condition strikes me as the sort of thing which people shouldn't do. Especially if it is a serious condition.

How does that square away with this:

But I'm not contending Camus and others shouldn't philosophically contemplate suicide. — Ciceronianus the White

if it's any consolation, I'm still an American, even if I might contribute to the sentiments so referenced.

Something I've always struggled in being able to clearly differentiate is between the empirical ego and the transcendental ego. As I'm reading the introduction it seems that this distinction is being brought up once again.

I have guesses, but they feel very much like guesses and are vague. In Kant I know why I have these guesses, but I also know that these are very far from central to his philosophy. They're important but not the "meat", so to speak.

I'd be very appreciative of anyone still following the thread if they could give their take on this distinction between psychology and transcendental consciousness or ego. (and if there's even a distinction there, too)

CI as people currently use it seems more 3 than 1 these days. — apokrisis

Perhaps I fell into an odd camp, then. Though I learned it more from the Chem side than the physics side, though physics was part of it, so that might be why.

We went along with collapse was real, and it was the "observation" which made it real. But we didn't attach much significance to "observation", hence why I tend to go back to both H and B -- they both had different takes on it.

I never really saw CI as instrumentalist. Though I mostly take it along the lines of Heisenberg and Bohr -- who never saw eye to eye. Heisenberg was something of a mathematical literalist and a formalist at the same time, from my reading. He didn't particularly seem to care that the findings of QM ran in contradiction to other physical sciences -- he seemed to believe that this was just another question to ask and answer. Whereas Bohr definitely took CI in a more idealist direction, with complementarity forming the core of his interpretation (of, after that, not just QM but everything)

These are just my impressions though, and impressions from memory at that. We always differentiated between instrumental interp from CI, though.

(EDIT: Not really challenging you, just asking for a comment)

You were, however, contending that to do so is to belittle suicide, no?

Without some shared agreement on what is useful I don't know if we could actually productively argue over whether this or that is useful. What, after all, would you say philosophy is useful for at all?

There are suicides, each of them different as they involve different individuals and circumstances. Perhaps a scientific investigation into suicides may provide some insight. But I personally feel that very few of them result from philosophical contemplation, as it seems Camus himself realized, so I wonder just how philosophical contemplation would be useful in that case.

I would say that your wondering how is still not an argument against. There are clearly things we all don't understand -- but that's not a reason to exclude someone from a topic using a particular style of writing.

I doubt those who seriously consider suicide would benefit at all from the philosophical contemplation of suicide. — Ciceronianus the White

How would you measure such benefit or lack thereof, considering that you propose science as the path to possible usefulness, and that each suicide is actually terribly specific?

You doubt -- but what is your reason for doubt?

They would more likely benefit from medical/psychological contemplation and action than being told by some philosopher that they want to kill themselves because life is absurd.

I don't think you'd find anyone here who would disagree with that.

The above is also why I don't think ennui is exactly an appropriate description of the emotion from which the essay is written, either. Camus was a part of the resistance. The unsatisfied desire is the desire for justice, and the realization that what we might consider evil, what we would consider unjust was winning the day.

In our own day we have a war fought on an invented casus belli, and we know that the perpetrators of said lies will never be brought to justice, as well as a financial crisis for whom the same can be said, and a right-wing populist who -- even if his campaign was all bluster -- certainly helped to organize hate-groups.

I wouldn't say that the topic of suicide is exactly the result of listlesness, but the genuine wondering at whether all the pain of life is worth going through when you know what you consider to be evil will dominate and win.

But where does Camus state that the universe is brutely material in essence and origin?

I would say that the context in which the essay is written explains more how the universe appears indifferent. 1940 France is when Paris was taken by the Fascists. In 1955 Camus states:

For me "The Myth of Sisyphus" marks the beginning of an idea which I was to pursue in The Rebel. It attempts to resolve the problem of suicide, as The Rebel attempts to resolve that of murder, in both cases without the aid of eternal values which, temporarily perhaps, are absent or distorted in contemporary Europe. The fundamental subject of "The Myth of Sisyphus" is this: it is legitimate and necessary to wonder whether life has a meaning; therefore it is legitimate to meet the problem of suicide face teo face. The answer, underlying and appearing through the paradoxes which cover it, is this: even if one does not believe in God, suicide is not legitimate. Written fifteen years ago, in 1940, amid the French and European disaster, this book declares that even within the limits of nihilism it is possible to find the means to proceed beyond nihilism

In the opening paragraph to the essay, so written around 1940 he writes:

But it is useful to note at the same time that the absurd, hitherto taken as a conclusion, is considered in this essay as a starting-point. In this sense it may be said that there is something provisional in my commentary: one cannot prejudge the position it entails. There will be found here merely the description, in the pure state, of an intellectual malady. No metaphysic, no belief is involved in it for the moment. These are the limits and the only bias of this book.

So I would say there's even reason to believe that the indifference of the universe is posited not on the basis of a metaphysical outlook, since he eschews metaphysics in the opening -- and that, given the events in which the essay was written in, there's also reason to believe that the indifference of the universe is acutely felt due to said events. (And it is even admitted that eternal values may only be temporarily absent or distorted).