We can't just paper over your invalid objection to my claim that without builders there can be no critics. That is the central and older part of the conversation, and it is the part that an auto-didact will have an easier time with. I focused on it for a reason. — Leontiskos

The critic criticizes themself. They don't have to learn how to build in order to do that. Suppose the builder goes away and the buyer decides to try what they had said they wanted. It falls apart like the builder said, and the buyer becomes a builder.

But there is Pyrrho's option of simply not building. How does that not count to your mind? The very point is to not believe -- so one does not need to know how to make inferences in order to stop making inferences, or even pointing out ways in which they are unsatisfactory. It's not like Pyrrho kept to this stubborn skeptics task, at least in the telling of the story -- he learned how the rationalists spoke and used their arguments against them.

I don't see it as unprincipled when I'm directly telling you why I'm thinking what I'm thinking. I think we really can use different metrics at different times -- different solutions to the Liar's Paradox are valuable to know. There isn't a single way to respond to the Liar's Paradox as evidenced by the philosophical literature on the Liar's Paradox. There are times when dialethia are appropriate and times when the simple logic of objects is appropraite.

If you have to resort to the extremely controversial example of the Liar's Paradox then your answer is going to be highly implausible and controversial. — Leontiskos

Sure, I agree with that.

Surely you've noticed these aren't things I attend to :D

I do in fact think of the implausible and controversial.

I've already given you my thoughts on the Liar's Paradox and I obviously think your analysis is incorrect.

Yeh, a bit of an impasse. But if asked it is what comes to mind.

Yep. I am saying that, "If you claim that something is false, then you must already hold to some truth in order to say so." The counterexample would be, "Here is an example where someone claims that something is false even though they do not hold to any truth in order to say so." — Leontiskos

This may be koan like, but it is at least a concrete example from the opening of the SEP's article on Pyrrho.

With the exception of poetry allegedly written while on Alexander’s expedition (which, as far as we can tell, did not survive that expedition), Pyrrho wrote nothing; we are therefore obliged to try to reconstruct his philosophy from reports by others.

"This sentence is false" seems to fit to me, but I'm not allowed to use it. :D

In a straightforward way if the LNC and LEM holds then there is nothing this sentence is about "in the world", right? It points to itself. Its referent is itself. Is the sentence an object in the world?

I'd say if we maintain the LNC and LEM as the standards for what can be considered, or all that is worthy of consideration, then a straightforward assignment of "False" to "This sentence is false" is an example of a falsehood that needs no truth.

Sorry, I chose it for a reason last time and it's still the one that fits now.

I just don’t give analytic dissection the priority. We need to assert, and then dissect. Whatever is left is truth about the world.

There is very little truth about the world that has survived the dissection. But I see it. — Fire Ologist

Well, yeah. It's right there!

Banno and Count seem to be arguing what wisdom is.

Well it is not error or nonsense, and it is not a ham sandwich. So it is something. And I see it is worth scrutinizing to try to define better.

For sure. I find philosophy pleasurable, so even supposing the skeptic is correct I'm not a Pyrrhonic skeptic. For me I just don't think philosophy is scientific knowledge, strictly speaking. I apply different standards to both disciplines, and tend to think they're better when they stop trying to control one another towards the "right" way to think. (But then can be productive together when both are valued)

"2+2=5" is false.

There's a sense in which we have to know things about "2" and "+" and "5" and "=" and "...is false"

So it seem easy to assert, without much specification on priority, that such an assertion would require some truths.

In just a first-go thought, that one would not qualify.

While they are contrary opposites, on the view of truth as a transcendental property of being, falsity is parasitic on truth for the same reason that evil is parasitic on good—it is an absence. If truth is the adequacy of the intellect to being then its lack is a privation. Likewise, without ends, goods, the entire concept of evil makes no sense, since nothing is sought and so no aims are every frustrated. — Count Timothy von Icarus

How is it you understand the truth without falsity, though? What's this part where you're not thinking about the false, but instead -- prior to falsity -- only the true?

I asked you what a critic is supposed to criticize if there is no builder, and in response you pointed to a critic who criticizes a builder. Do you see how you failed to answer my question?

This began when I said that if there are no builders then there can be no critics, and you responded by saying that in that case the critics would just criticize themselves. So again, your example of a critic who criticizes a house-builder is in no way an example of critics criticizing themselves, sans builders. — Leontiskos

Do you see how it's correct for the critic to still say that they don't know?

That's what I was hoping the example to demonstrate -- they don't have to say "Look, here's a better house" in order to say "I don't know how to build a house"

Their opinions may not be relevant to the construction of the house, sure -- but they'd still be right in claiming ignorance, so there are circumstances where it's better to claim ignorance rather than propose a solution.

I'm just asking you to give me an example of an assertion of falsehood which presupposes no truths. Can you do that?

"John wrote 2+2=5 on his paper. Bill said that his answer was false. But no truth needs to exist in order for Bill to say that the answer is false."

Something like that. Something straightforward. An example. — Leontiskos

Oh, OK. Sure, I can.

Your examples of the kinds of examples helped me get what you were after better.

So you want a circumstance where bill said some statement is false, and there is no truth that needs to exist in order for Bill to say that the answer is false.

Correct?

So it's about the conditions of assertability? When a person can assert they believe something is false?

Still thinking about a good one, just asking for more information

Like “I think, therefore, I am.” Or have I already said too much? — Fire Ologist

I actually wonder if that'd qualify... I'm not sure.

I was more thinking insofar that we weaken our requirements for knowledge so that the skeptical problems become irrelevant then in a very common sense way it seems to me that the mechanic knows cars -- a mixture of know-that/know-how that in some way connects the mechanic to the economic sphere such that they can take care of thems they need to.

I'd be more inclined to say we don't need to know the cogito, but we do need to know enough about some trade to live.

So we know something, surely -- but the devil is in the details.

But it is another thing to say “you are wrong because that doesn’t exist”. That is a positive assertion highlighting something that does in fact exist (namely, the landscape surrounding the hole you just carved where that thing you said doesn’t exist was supposed to be). Skeptics can’t say someone is wrong about what exists, just whether their manner of speaking is coherent or valid. — Fire Ologist

Why not?

Suppose a person who is skeptical about some things existing and not skeptical about other things existing -- so not the Cartesian scenario, but a little less grand.

Once you are talking about what exists, you need a metaphysician.

Maybe.

Though it's hard to believe when lots of people understand their environment well enough to get along in it -- I can't deny that there's a pull to the realist case, especially if we have no need of metaphysics whatsoever.

It's so easy to navigate that it's hard to theorize. Surely we must know something about what exists, even if we don't study philosophy at all.

If nothing is built there is nothing to criticize. Without builders what do you say that the critics criticize? If the critics are to criticize themselves, they will first need to learn how to build. Hence my point. — Leontiskos

That's not true. Suppose you hire someone to build you a house. You don't know how to build the house, but your criticism is important to how the builder proceeds.

Now the builder could tell you "Look, if that's what you want, I'm telling you you aren't going to get a house, it will collapse" -- but the person would still be justified in their claim that they don't know how to build a house.

Then provide a response to my argument. Provide an example where "this is false" presupposes no truth, and where "this is true" presupposes falsehood. — Leontiskos

There's one solution to the liar's paradox which says there is no problem -- "This is false" is straightforwardly read as a false sentence, and not true.

For the other I'd point to our previous discussion on the dialetheist's solution to the liar's paradox where the solution is to recognize that the liar's sentence is both true and false.

Now, that's just co-occurrence to demonstrate a dyad between the two to the standards you laid out. But I think that "...is true" and "...is false" presuppose one another to be made sense of. That is, there is no "...is true" simpliciter, but rather its meaning will depend upon the meaning of "...is false", and vice-versa.

So there is no prioritizing one over the other.

Haha. That's what I'm trying to avoid -- it's worthwhile to note that there are definitely aesethetic differences. And something about Plato is that he doesn't just myth-build, but rather the myths are there for a point: To train the untutored mind to begin to study the forms, which are surely not so literal as the texts say.

At least, that's a charitable way of putting it, while avoiding that question: "What is philosophy?" -- just note "however we justify it, it's philosophy in some way because Plato did it" Now would that fit into the builder side or the critical side, or both? It seems both to me. And which we would want to emphasize in Plato is whatever our preference for reasoning is -- narrative or myth or what-have-you that's greater than human experience, or taking apart how it is we do these things.

I think the greatest philosophers end up doing this -- Kant's a good example there where he manages to sort of fit both categories whichever which way we may want to put the categories.

So for the critical philosopher that doesn't seem to be a problem, to me. It's almost like you'd expect that in some way instead. So it's easier to render these as a sort of aesthetic, and some philosophers manage to express themselves in both . .. modes?

Oh if you're fine with it I am. I mostly didn't want to distract from your main point but if you think it's on topic then it's on topic -- it's your OP.

The NAACP has a bit of writing on the origins of police that is short and provides another perspective other than the law-and-order picture of dutiful citizens protecting their fellows.

Well, categorically speaking, myth-making is part of philosophy though, right?

I'd say there'd have to be some kind of "reasonable", whatever that amounts to, way to include myth-making in philosophy. Not all myth-making, but Plato is the immediate myth-maker that comes to mind there.

When someone is doing the Monty Python thing their telos is a kind of agonstic opposition, and this is not yet philosophy. Of course, there is a very significant difference between these two options:

"After dissecting your claims I have found that you are wrong, and I utterly refuse to try to say what I think is alternatively right."
"After dissecting your claims I have found that you are wrong, and I am open to trying to constructively work out a better option."

"I don't know" could represent the first or the second. The Monty Python thing is a comical instance of the first. — Leontiskos

I think it really could be the case that some questions' correct answer is "I don't know"; why does one need a guess to say "I don't know"?

I'd say that would require some sort of shared assumptions about how to make inferences, and the like.

But I find "I don't know" to be a far more productive realization, because it'll lead me to something else. Keeping in mind our lack of knowledge -- no matter how much we learn -- is how we learn more.

So I'd put in a defense for the skeptics that don't know -- they don't have to in order to say whether or not that they know.

Now, you don't have to teach anyone, either. A more curious student than an obstinant skeptic is a lot more rewarding for the teacher, most of the time.

But I think it's important to maintain the ability to say "I don't know", and reassess our beliefs because of our ability to make errors, or at least miss some things.

Bad arguments are better than nothing at all — Leontiskos

Why?

The builders can exist without the critics. The critics cannot exist without the builders. — Leontiskos

But the critics can criticize themselves!

They have no need of builders -- once you're curious enough to be a philosophical skeptic you will not have any need of a philosophical builder ever again. You'll be busy tearing down your own buildings, finding their flaws, rebuilding, finding their flaws, rebuilding. . . . or just stop building and see where things go. The Pyrrhonic skeptic, at least, has no need of the builders. Beliefs are the thing to be combatted.

Just as the critic lacks parity with the builder, so too does falsehood lack parity with truth. "This is false" presupposes some truth, whereas, "This is true," does not presuppose any falsehood. This is why your fundamental approach to knowledge based on judgments of falsehood is mistaken: — Leontiskos

Well, for the analogy to hold. . .

Though if this be the analogy I'd just say truth and false form a dyad: You don't understand the one without the other.

First, I would point back to the twins. Again, one's activity is parasitic and one is not. Philosophy does not exist without those who construct, but it does exist without those who deconstruct. Therefore deconstruction is not as fundamental to philosophy as construction; falsity not as central to philosophy as truth. — Leontiskos

I'd make the case that the builders need the critics -- else you get backbad arguments.

Yeah, it's messy in-fact. Just presuming some hedonic calculus, and supposing a belief that is false did not harm anyone then that calculus, unless for some other reason that's hedonically relevant, then believing that belief is good.

Not that one ought to do so -- maybe one ought to do something else. Maybe there's a better good out there, like "figuring out the truth" that's more satisfying than believing a false belief.

I think the key recognition that should be made is that philosophy is the love of wisdom, not the love of knowledge or the love of truth. One might believe the pursuit of truth or knowledge is the wisest path of all, but to believe that is a particular philosophy that can be challenged. What this might mean is that the acceptance of beliefs that are untrue might be wiser to hold. — Hanover

I'm intrigued. I spend a lot of time thinking about how to think about these sorts of things -- meaningful beliefs that are false, sometimes to the point that their falsity isn't exactly the point.

In fact, I was going to enter the recent essay contest with a thesis along these lines, but I was given too much time and never got around to it. Yes, too much time results in a lack of urgency and lack of effort ultimately for some.

Knowing that the next challenge is due July 1, 2025.

But my point would be that religion and I'm sure all sorts of beliefs fall into the category of not being valid upon a purely logical analysis, but I wonder what comfort one has upon their death bed for having had a firm committment to miserable truth as opposed to having chosen a more joyous path, filled with magical wonder and profound meaning and purpose in every leaf fluttering in the wind. Which sort of person is more wise is the question.

I'm not sure I'd put it in terms of one's death bed, but I would put it in terms of one's happiness. If believing a false belief, such as "Ice cream is good, and it's so good that anyone who says otherwise probably hasn't figured out the truth of it's goodness" makes a person happy, and it doesn't hurt anyone, including themself, then by the hedonic metric that belief is not only acceptable, but good.

Wondering who "she" is throughout the essay I kept feeling compelled to want to read, which is an interesting choice. I got the sense that "she" is philosophy itself — Moliere

OK, now I'm guessing "she" is Oizys @Bob Ross

I can't give this constructive feedback because it was, and is perfect to me -- both/and, the past and the present and the future and the pluperfect and. . .

I love the wonderful reflection that would be hard to explain in the abstract but which comes across naturally through the dialogue, and I like the playful anthropomorphism with the attendent puns, as well as the childrens' story wonderlike quality to it. I often think people overlook children's capacity for philosophy out of a prejudice -- if you just listen to them and ask questions about the world you'll hear them make all sorts of distinctions and debate about what is what or which rule is better or what is fair, and if you ask them questions about it they are more likely than any adult to answer "I don't know"

For this reason I'd say that this book isn't just a children's story, and is a children's story. It's more or less perfect and I'd buy it as a book to give to my kiddos.

I think I empathize with the ravencrow the most :)

Wondering who "she" is throughout the essay I kept feeling compelled to want to read, which is an interesting choice. I got the sense that "she" is philosophy itself. (Although upon knowing the title I might have to rethink this...I had this typed from before the reveal -- updated the title @Bob Ross).

I'm wondering about the voice of the author, though -- from where does the author see her? I wouldn't be wondering that except for when you say you abandoned her to the dead it: Who is the one who abandoned her, and now sees her from afar with her struggles? Does the voice of the piece ever come into contact with her again, or is it philosophy itself which is eudemon and our speaker who has abandoned her remains afar? Is it that she is abandoned by all of us and yet she pursues the thankless task set before her all the same?

Not that these have to be answered. Part of what makes this work is that there is a lot of mystery throughout the peice. But I'd like to know about the voice, only because "I" is used -- if it hadn't been then I'd have kept reading this as a third-person impersonal essay.

***

I definitely get the feel that this is influenced by existential thoughts just from the bibliography. But then that has a tension throughout because of the third-person narration throughout. It's not philosophy's soul that's like the dead sea, but the speakers, who sets out to no longer abandon her.

But then the story is of philosophy overcoming, while our author continues to simply notate what she struggles through. Or is the speaker speaking in third person about itself, and so this is philosophy reflecting on itself, but to keep a distance she tells her story in the third person?

****

The style draws me into the world. I like that a great deal, but I think that the essay would benefit from something to help readers to grasp where you're going. I like poetics in philosophy, but I -- to speak poetically -- feel that there could be more of the "rational" side in this piece that, if incorporated, would strengthen the writing.

I don't know if the best way to do that is the answer my questions -- especially since that's what drove me to keep reading -- but I can see the desire for more to make it feel more "philosophical". Not necessarily quotes there... it'd be interesting if you could tie Kierkegaard and Nietzsche to Aurelius in your reflection. Then they'd look more like coherent references for your thoughts.

Which is making me realize a fourth way might be seen as naive common sense. Non- analytic, non-metaphysical, immediate like mystical, but the opposite of transcendent. — Fire Ologist

Why limit ourselves to a scheme of four possible ways to philosophize? :D

It's how I see things.

Close to:

There is also philosophy as the study of the history of ideas, not necessarily as a tendentious attempt to find authoritative confirmation for the enquirer's own beliefs, but just for its own sake. — Janus

It is a pleasure unto itself, and this is enough to justify one's activity in doing philosophy.

But then I think when we do that -- read philosophy for its own sake (and here I only mean the sorts of names that frequently come up within a particular culture's practice of philosophy) -- we see there's more than just two ways to do philosophy.

Naturally I want to progress by way of example, so something that comes to mind is Spinoza's Ethics where we have a logic derivation of. . . everything? And on the other hand we have Hume as the nitpicker.

In more modern times I might contrast David Chalmers with Daniel Dennett.

So I don't think the point of the distinction is to be wide-reaching as:

Dissecting vs. comprehensive seems like a false dichotomy. True dichotomies would include things like analytic/synthetic, hedgehog/fox, forest/trees, cased-based*/systematic, or critical/constructive. — Leontiskos

Rather it seems to me best thought of as aesthetic categories. There is a drive in philosophy to build big stories of the world as it is. The Timaeus, for example, which is surely philosophy but not exactly nitpicky or even skeptical. So surely this is a good part of philosophy, and I'd say you can't have one without the other, really.

But I'd focus here:

But this is a philosophy forum, not a Vanity Press. If you present your thoughts here you must expect them to be critiqued. In a very central and important sense, this is what we do. — Banno

While world-building is part of philosophy, so is the skeptics. Pyrrho comes to mind here for me as a kind of arch-nitpick, with a moral cause to justify it even so it fits within that ancient mold of philosophy as a life well lived, even. Picking-nits is very much part of philosophy, and one need not have a replacement answer -- "I don't know" is one of those pretty standardly acceptable answers in philosophy. Aporetic dialogues having been part of philosophy as well.

Alright. Sorry for the delay, work called -- but now the big reveal!

[TPF Essay] Wittgenstein's Hinges and Gödel's Unprovable Statements @Sam26
[TPF Essay] Bubbles and Styx In: Pondering the Past @hypericin
[TPF Essay] Dante and the Deflation of Reason @Count Timothy von Icarus
[TPF Essay] What Does It Mean to Be Human? @Vera Mont
[TPF Essay] Cognitive Experiences are a Part of Material Reality @ucarr
[TPF Essay] The Frame Before the Question @James Dean Conroy
[TPF Essay] Part 1 & Part 2 @PoeticUniverse
[TPF Essay] Technoethics: Freedom, Precarity, and Enzymatic Knowledge Machines @Baden
[TPF Essay] The Authoritarian Liberty Paradox @Benkei
[TPF Essay] An Exploration Between the Balance Between State and Individual Interests @I like sushi
[TPF Essay] My Soul is like the Dead Sea @Bob Ross
[TPF Essay] The Insides and Outsides of 'Reality': Exploring Possibilities @Jack Cummins
[TPF Essay] The importance of the Philosophical Essay within philosophy @RussellA

Now that you've been revealed -- I'll say yours is one of the ones I'm struggling with to come up with a relevant reply. Excellent stuff.

I much appreciate having the opportunity to share these ideas in this format. The event really motivated me to put the work in. — Baden

I appreciated your essay so much because it was more than I expected -- it's a strong thesis that explains itself and causes reflection in me. I suppose now that you've revealed I'll join in the back-and-forth.

(if mostly continental) — Baden

(if mostly the good guys, yes) ;)

It's there. I PM'ed him to point out which one so that I didn't give hints.

Responded by PM to keep hints minimal

Yup, that's the one.

Heh, alright. Glad to hear it. It was mostly for you that I spoke up so much.

I'm just trying to help people understand -- I don't care what they do after that.

Back on track -- sorry for the divergence. Your points have been excellent.

Ok so it is not totally unfounded that anarchists have at some points in time sown discord in society. The mainstream view is not a total fabrication then. :sweat: — unimportant

Yeh, it's not an entire fabrication -- but you know how you grow up with "the time when we had to defeat the British great grandpa Blah did his duty and founded what we have now" then find out what our nation has done for-real-for-realz then you start seeing how propaganda by the deed is smol boi stuff.

I agree with @boethius on the origins of police and while it's related I think it better in another thread?

I think this is now becoming very diffuse, but thanks for the discussion Moliere. — Leontiskos

Same to you, as always. :heart:

It seems to me that you do not understand this. You do not understand that when you contradict Hume's conclusion you must also hold that his argument is unsound. — Leontiskos

Maybe not.

I think Hume is right with respect to the causal relation -- we think that there's a necessary relationship between events but there's not -- and I think he's right with respect to the is/ought divide -- we must have some minor premise which connects an is to an ought, like "if x is true, then i ought y" in order to make an inference, and that minor premise is rightly described as a passion.

But I'd go further there and say there are rational passions -- just not eternally rational passions. They're developed within a particular community that cares about rationality.

But why do you claim that Aristotle did not do something when you have such a lack of familiarity with Aristotle? That's the problem I have with anti-Aristotelians: they ignorantly dismiss Aristotle on all manner of topic. Myles Burnyeat identifies the precise place where Aristotle does what you think he did not do in his article, "Enthymeme: Aristotle on the logic of persuasion." (See also his, "The origins of non-deductive inference.") — Leontiskos

I was thinking of know-how mainly, but yes I know he's fine with inference that's informal.

The part where I think what I've said about essence matters is more about what I'd call his induction from the physics to the metaphysics. At that point, due to my Kantian influence, I feel like you need more than familiarity. It seems to me the reason that Aristotle can climb to the mind of God is because of what I said about essence -- we may be wrong about it, but there is some kind of essence to be right about, and if we assume Aristotle is right about the essence of metaphysics then he's right about his inference up to the mind of God.

Given Kant's insistence on a sort of empirical justification, and noting how such things are beyond experience, demonstrates that such inferences cannot take place. Even if there is an essence of things -- which I believe he probably believed, given his ties to Aristotle -- the Ideas can never be justified, and therefore can never be known.

Kant's cognitivism is empiricist, like Aristotle's, but he cuts off metaphysics as scientific knowledge, unlike Aristotle.

Now I'll gladly admit that I could be putting this wrong in terms of Aristotle. I can be read contra-Aristotle in many circumstances, but it's the sort of love a person who likes philosophy gives to another philosopher.

Well when I said I recommend tutoring, I meant that I recommend that people tutor. But learning is also good. — Leontiskos

Ooooh. Heh. I thought you were saying I ought go get some tutoring.

Again, Hume gives a proof via exhaustive disjunction. The retort, "There is a disjunct you missed," is sort of tangential to the whole spirit of the thing. In this case you seem to be saying that we could have direct empirical knowledge of rational relations, which seems unlikely. — Leontiskos

That would solve it, you're right.

But I'd rather just say I don't know when I don't know: the retort is "What if there is some third thing we missed?" -- supposing empiricism (whatever that is) must be true and induction must not be true then it seems that knowledge must (somehow) be produced by empiricism without induction. I'd say that's an interesting philosophical question.

One way we might retort back is that reality is wider than exhaustive disjunction, yeah?

I'm OK with people taking a non-position when they realize an issue is confusing and say "I don't know, though I know what others would say" -- mostly because that's where I'd say I'm at with most issues. I have thoughts, I indulge, but honestly . . .

Then, as with everything else, he would point you to the place where he already did that. :wink: — Leontiskos

See, this is the bit I think we clash on the most. Soft neo-Aristotelianism makes enough sense to me, but if we start talking about Aristotle Aristotle then I have to say that I don't think he already did that. I think Aristotle made errors like all scholars do.

The tradition after that deals with counter-examples, as traditions do, and builds from them. But in that case it's easy to point to another tradition to say how they "already" took care of that.

I'd say that folks who are making random guesses are not having as much fun as those who know how to achieve their end, and that anyone who thinks they are merely guessing, but has consistent success, already has a method that they just don't understand. But I'm sure you disagree on that. — Leontiskos

Yeah :)

It is quite beautiful, though, when one moves beyond random guesses and begins to understand rationality proper. It is as if they step into a new world. This is why I recommend tutoring.

I'm not opposed to tutorship at any time -- I'll never learn it all. Someone else will always know more than I. And likewise I know more than others on certain things and in the right circumstances I'll tutor them.

I'm a bit bemused again, though, because in terms of philosophy I think that reason, rationality, all that, are the sine qua non of philosophy. I know that the world looks beautiful under rationality. I just started noticing how sometimes truth superseded beauty.

Related, the discussion between Srap and I beginning <here>. — Leontiskos

I had been following that discussion up to https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/992579

At the end of the day, whether garden or forest, I think we need something more robust than a gesturing towards "guesswork." Foresters have their tools just as gardeners do. No one is just running, day after day, with random guesses. — Leontiskos

Sorry, missed this.

I think we'd like such a thing, but it's not always appropriate. Also I think that such a thing takes a great deal of work, and sometimes I see the play in philosophy as undervalued. Further I think that philosophy is generally undervalued by people because they don't understand that it can be fun -- we need good tools and arguments are great, but there really is this erotic side to philosophy that I think would benefit people because if they like philosophy then they'll employ it more widely.

Less of an architectonic and more of a walk through the forest.

If someone were to show that empiricism is the only option and induction is impossible, then they would destroy all knowledge. What troubles me is that you don't seem to recognize this. — Leontiskos

I don't recognize that at all. I would rather make the inference that if empiricism is the only option and induction is impossible then knowledge must not be derived from induction -- there must be some other way of rendering empiricism, since we know that we know some things.

You would apparently just pivot and claim that there is some fundamental divide between philosophy and life, and that knowledge pertains to life (cf. my post <here> about the crucial move of 3).

I don't think there's a fundamental divide between philosophy and life -- I think there's a difference between scientific knowledge and philosophy.

Strawmen, I think. If you found another category Aristotle would say, "Great." — Leontiskos

But what if I called something that was not categorical knowledge? :D

Yeah. I think it's fair to call him a rationalist, though a non-cognitivist -- most people don't worry about the problem of induction because they don't have a passion for rationality, but Hume demonstrates his passion for rationality by writing philosophy and carrying his conclusions to their end even though he finds them hard to believe when not doing philosophy.

So in that vein we'd have to build rationality out of the emotions, in some sense. The passion for truth (or being right) would somehow have to break down into the passions, however we theorize that. He has a schema for the passions but for myself I'm as unconvinced by schemas of the emotions as I am of schemas of the mind: Probably pretty close and reveal something but not a literal representation.

But it doesn't destroy non-empiricist philosophy, that's true. I would have singled that out if I knew you were positing a priori categories or conditions of knowledge. — Leontiskos

I have sympathies, but just like I do with any other philosopher -- there's a with the grain and against the grain, and I think Kant's categories fall to the absurd.

So even here, the story moves on... even with Popper, the story moves on. Eventually I end this story with Feyerabend wherein "anything goes", but if you pay attention that's more a slogan than his whole critique.

But, knowledge-first: We know things. How do we know things? I take it that Feyerabend demonstrated the impossibility of building a science of science from axioms or what-have-you in the vein that Popper was doing. So if we know things, and some of those bits of knowledge are scientific, and we have to learn how to learn scientific knowledge (which I think we do), then there must be some other kind of knowledge other than science. For me I turn to current practice, and history (or, really, just "history" properly understood) to answer that question: So there are at least two kinds of knowledge, science and history.

What I notice there is that there isn't some set number of a priori categories -- there are conditions of knowledge, but they change with time and practice and even practitioner. And I don't think that they construct experience, ala Kant, but I take the underdetermination of theory/overdetermination of evidence as a true description of science -- it's a "real" philosophical problem, but as per rule 1 solving it won't destroy all knowledge.

So the quest for an all-encompassing philosophy which tabulates all the categories of knowledge I take to be impossible to fulfill, given that the a priori categories are more assumptions that block out problems so that research may continue (not get overwhelmed by multiplicity). Rather, we have many philosophies, several categories, and even different ways of organizing thought that's not so obsessed with categorical methodology, or with proving oneself right. Hence the notion that philosophy is like a garden or a forest -- with a garden you've cultivated it, but there's some structure there and we know how it grows, and with the forest it's more "in the wild", waiting to be discovered, cut down, replanted, re-invented and so forth. Of course we're not separate from this forest or garden -- and really I'm still talking about ideas here, I just think they move and have a life of their own -- so we can effect how it looks over time as it effects our thoughts too.

Except I don't think that's anywhere close to true. Aristotle accurately and charitably characterizes his opponents before answering them. You've not done that. Here is an example: — Leontiskos

Eh, fair.

Are you an AI training bot? — Harry Hindu

I'm a time-travelling AI bot -- you'll see my account comes from before ChatGPT, but the AI of the future discovered time travelling before humans did so I've been here all along before their proper invention, a sleeper agent waiting for my time to post.

I've never observed even one person.

You'd do best to not listen to me.