…we cannot appeal to social regularities or collectively presupposed norms within a practice: there are no such things, I have argued, but more important, if there were they would not thereby legitimately bind us. — Joshs

In my view, this supports what might be called the primacy of the space of reasons or of the philosophical situation itself. He invokes the concepts of argument and legitimacy against the same norms that make such concepts intelligible or relevant.

Thus, 14th century humans had cells despite not having "cells". — creativesoul

This practical reminder, while maybe not the last word, deserves respect.

Yes, idealism is prone to collapse, as you mention. The problem is maybe a hidden tautology, a language trap. In order for a statement to be true it must stand in some relation to mind .... stand in relation to language ... be a statement.

'Tell me about the world that no one can tell me about. See, it's impossible ! Henceforth idealism...'

Using a word changes us at the same time that it changes something in our environment. Words only exist in their use , and their use reveals new aspects of things. — Joshs

:up:

So what's a skeptical atheist to do? I agree with Agent Smith that solipsism is impossible to disprove, but I notice it gets short shrift in philosophical circles. It seems like the "dead end" everyone is trying to avoid (Descartes only proved one mind / thinking thing....then ran to God for the rest.).

My point is - Solipsism is never treated as a legitimate theory compared to Empiricism or Idealism... — GLEN willows

It's an absurd position. The concepts of reason and truth are entangled with the concepts of self and other. The rationalists are right to the degree that they foreshadow the idea of a space of reasons as irreducible, but Descartes (for instance) was wrong to think he could have the concept of the self as something primary, something that makes sense apart from the concept of others. What is this 'I' ? Why is it automatically understood as a unity ? How does meaning work ? What counts as rational ? Does private rationality makes sense? Descartes is in one important sense not skeptical enough. But maybe the point was the math and the physics...

In any case, philosophers do make definitions when they offer persuasive definitions that deviate from actual use in order to clarify or delineate an idea. This is usually the whole point of the question "what is...?" — Benkei

Perhaps we can agree that good philosophers realize that they are clarifying or adjusting a concept as such, while not-so-good philosophers assume from the mere grammar of the question that a yes-or-no one-bit answer already exists and needs only be 'computed' metalogiphysically.

I speculate that @NOS4A2 embraces some kind of Randian ideology, conveniently ignoring the capture of the government by the rich. When bombs to drop on strangers are needed, tax money is easy to find or just print. When health care or housing or education is needed, how are we supposed to pay for it?

I think you might want to look into Kant's CPR and Hegel's Logic.

This seems useful as a response the OP's questionable question. It'd be great to get reactions.

Let us consider as an example the simplest kind of entities dealt with in the everyday language: the spatio-temporally ordered system of observable things and events. Once we have accepted the thing language with its framework for things, we can raise and answer internal questions, e.g., "Is there a white piece of paper on my desk?" "Did King Arthur actually live?", "Are unicorns and centaurs real or merely imaginary?" and the like. These questions are to be answered by empirical investigations. Results of observations are evaluated according to certain rules as confirming or disconfirming evidence for possible answers. (This evaluation is usually carried out, of course, as a matter of habit rather than a deliberate, rational procedure. But it is possible, in a rational reconstruction, to lay down explicit rules for the evaluation. This is one of the main tasks of a pure, as distinguished from a psychological, epistemology.) The concept of reality occurring in these internal questions is an empirical scientific non-metaphysical concept. To recognize something as a real thing or event means to succeed in incorporating it into the system of things at a particular space-time position so that it fits together with the other things as real, according to the rules of the framework.

From these questions we must distinguish the external question of the reality of the thing world itself. In contrast to the former questions, this question is raised neither by the man in the street nor by scientists, but only by philosophers. Realists give an affirmative answer, subjective idealists a negative one, and the controversy goes on for centuries without ever being solved. And it cannot be solved because it is framed in a wrong way. To be real in the scientific sense means to be an element of the system; hence this concept cannot be meaningfully applied to the system itself. Those who raise the question of the reality of the thing world itself have perhaps in mind not a theoretical question as their formulation seems to suggest, but rather a practical question, a matter of a practical decision concerning the structure of our language. We have to make the choice whether or not to accept and use the forms of expression in the framework in question.

In the case of this particular example, there is usually no deliberate choice because we all have accepted the thing language early in our lives as a matter of course. Nevertheless, we may regard it as a matter of decision in this sense: we are free to choose to continue using the thing language or not; in the latter case we could restrict ourselves to a language of sense data and other "phenomenal" entities, or construct an alternative to the customary thing language with another structure, or, finally, we could refrain from speaking. If someone decides to accept the thing language, there is no objection against saying that he has accepted the world of things. But this must not be interpreted as if it meant his acceptance of a belief in the reality of the thing world; there is no such belief or assertion or assumption, because it is not a theoretical question. To accept the thing world means nothing more than to accept a certain form of language, in other words, to accept rules for forming statements and for testing accepting or rejecting them. The acceptance of the thing language leads on the basis of observations made, also to the acceptance, belief, and assertion of certain statements. But the thesis of the reality of the thing world cannot be among these statements, because it cannot be formulated in the thing language or, it seems, in any other theoretical language.
...
From the internal questions we must clearly distinguish external questions, i.e., philosophical questions concerning the existence or reality of the total system of the new entities. Many philosophers regard a question of this kind as an ontological question which must be raised and answered before the introduction of the new language forms. The latter introduction, they believe, is legitimate only if it can be justified by an ontological insight supplying an affirmative answer to the question of reality. In contrast to this view, we take the position that the introduction of the new ways of speaking does not need any theoretical justification because it does not imply any assertion of reality. We may still speak (and have done so) of the "acceptance of the new entities" since this form of speech is customary; but one must keep in mind that this phrase does not mean for us anything more than acceptance of the new framework, i.e., of the new linguistic forms. Above all, it must not be interpreted as referring to an assumption, belief, or assertion of "the reality of the entities." There is no such assertion. An alleged statement of the reality of the system of entities is a pseudo-statement without cognitive content. To be sure, we have to face at this point an important question; but it is a practical, not a theoretical question; it is the question of whether or not to accept the new linguistic forms. The acceptance cannot be judged as being either true or false because it is not an assertion. It can only be judged as being more or less expedient, fruitful, conducive to the aim for which the language is intended.
...
Thus it is clear that the acceptance of a linguistic framework must not be regarded as implying a metaphysical doctrine concerning the reality of the entities in question.
...
A brief historical remark may here be inserted.The non-cognitive character of the questions which we have called here external questions was recognized and emphasized already by the Vienna Circle under the leadership of Moritz Schlick, the group from which the movement of logical empiricism originated. Influenced by ideas of Ludwig Wittgenstein, the Circle rejected both the thesis of the reality of the external world and the thesis of its irreality as pseudo-statements; the same was the case for both the thesis of the reality of universals (abstract entities, in our present terminology) and the nominalistic thesis that they are not real and that their alleged names are not names of anything but merely flatus vocis. (It is obvious that the apparent negation of a pseudo-statement must also be a pseudo-statement.) It is therefore not correct to classify the members of the Vienna Circle as nominalists, as is sometimes done. However, if we look at the basic anti-metaphysical and pro-scientific attitude of most nominalists (and the same holds for many materialists and realists in the modern sense), disregarding their occasional pseudo-theoretical formulations, then it is, of course, true to say that the Vienna Circle was much closer to those philosophers than to their opponents. — Carnap

http://www.ditext.com/carnap/carnap.html

I don't think there's any substantial disagreement between us on this issue. I try not to be too attached to any particular jargon, so to me we can talk of rules or norms or habits. What I have in mind is the kind of fragile, constantly-updated 'structure' that makes us intelligible and more or less plausible to one another. I think we agree that it's raging white water. I very much understand wanting to emphasize how malleable or response the 'medium' is, even to the degree of insisting that we can only ever lie about it, because it's an unchartable self-drinking river.

A characteristic distinguishing feature of linguistic practices is their protean character, their plasticity and malleability, the way in which language constantly overflows itself, so that any established pattern of usage is immediately built on, developed, and transformed. The very act of using linguistic expressions or applying concepts transforms the content of those expressions or concepts. The way in which discursive norms incorporate and are transformed by novel contingencies arising from their usage is not itself a contingent, but a necessary feature of the practices in which they are implicit. It is easy to see why one would see the whole enterprise of semantic theorizing as wrong–headed if one thinks that, insofar as language has an essence, that essence consists in its restless self–transformation (not coincidentally reminiscent of Nietzsche’s “self–overcoming”). Any theoretical postulation of common meanings associated with expression types that has the goal of systematically deriving all the various proprieties of the use of those expressions according to uniform principles will be seen as itself inevitably doomed to immediate obsolescence as the elusive target practices overflow and evolve beyond those captured by what can only be a still, dead snapshot of a living, growing, moving process. It is an appreciation of this distinctive feature of discursive practice that should be seen as standing behind Wittgenstein’s pessimism about the feasibility and advisability of philosophers engaging in semantic theorizing…

…
[T]he idea that the most basic linguistic know–how is not mastery of proprieties of use that can be expressed once and for all in a fixed set of rules, but the capacity to stay afloat and find and make one’s way on the surface of the raging white–water river of discursive communal practice that we always find ourselves having been thrown into (Wittgensteinian Geworfenheit) is itself a pragmatist insight. It is one that Dewey endorses and applauds. And it is a pragmatist thought that owes more to Hegel than it does to Kant. For Hegel builds his metaphysics and logic around the notion of determinate negation because he takes the normative obligation to do something to resolve the conflict that occurs when the result of our properly applying the concepts we have to new situations is that we (he thinks, inevitably) find ourselves with materially incompatible commitments to be the motor that drives the unceasing further determination and evolution of our concepts and their contents. The process of applying conceptual norms in judgment and intentional action is the very same process that institutes, determines, and transforms those conceptual norms. — Brandom

The problem with the class war idea is that it isn’t true, and worse, pegs as good or evil one who may be the opposite—it’s unjust. — NOS4A2

The idea of class war need not demonize the rich but only describe a tendency of the rich to maintain their luxuries and privileges at the expense of outsiders. Indeed, the poor are often encouraged to emulate the class consciousness of the rich. One way to clean my own room as a shrewd prole is to form free associations with other such proles and do what the rich do, team up explicitly in order to better squeeze politicians for tax money, protections, and privileges.

Whenever a "what is" question is asked, I am always worried by the thought "Is this a hotdog question?". — hypericin

I remember when I used to take hotdog questions too seriously. The pragmatists and others help me see the game in the new light.

You've discovered a perfect parody of bad philosophy, I think.

he problem is that the argument consults usage to arrive at a definition, then uses the definition to arrive at a conclusion contrary to usage. This cannot be legitimately done, because usage is the only source which informs you what a sandwich is. There is no trans-linguistic reality, no platonic essence of sandwiches which you can consult. Definitions can only describe, not prescribe, and you can't get more out of them than the usage they arise from. If your definition of sandwich is contrary to usage, then it is, by definition, wrong. — hypericin

:clap:

Excellent OP !

This is why I said in either this or the other topic that too many people are getting lost in irrelevant arguments over grammar and vocabulary. It's like arguing over whether we read words or read about history. This isn't a dichotomy. We do both.
...
Do we smell the pie or do we smell the chemicals that are floating in the air? Do I hear the radio or do I hear the music that it plays? And even with vision: do I see myself in the mirror or do I see my reflection? These are all equally correct.

This is why I think the issue of perception needs to be addressed in such a way as to address the epistemological problem; is the world independently as it appears, and if so can we trust that our experiences are accurate? — Michael

I think the final question in the quote above is subject to the same strong points you make at the beginning. Various uses of various words are approximately equally acceptable, and this can be read as the rules for using such concepts being insufficiently determinate in the first place for metaphysical 'theorems.' What in fact do we already tend to trust enough to act upon?

One possible test for whether we are stuck in a mere language trap is to look at the practical ramifications of this or that position (a pragmatist insight.)

This includes concepts like subjectivity, which only makes sense in relation to worldly intersubjective engagement, whose reciprocally created constraints and affordances serve to empirically determine the intelligibility of concepts like ‘inner’ and ‘subjective’. — Joshs

Yes, exactly. I like cashing out 'worldly intersubjective engagement' in terms of mostly tacit rules for applying concepts. The traditional metaphysician, our traditional foil, talks as if these contingent and blurry rules/habits were the deepest laws of reality, meanwhile oversimplyfing them until they are more plausibly handled in a quasimathematical way, so that what appear to be profound theorems can be cranked out from the comfort of an armchair.

It seems instead to me that materialism is an idea which can never be verified, as for it to be verified, it would require proving that there is something existing independently of conscious beings. But do do so, one must step outside of subjective experience. But obviously, that is not possible. — Hello Human

As I see it, this is a language trap. That it is impossible for one to step out of subjective experience is not an empirical hypothesis. It's just a lesson in metaphysical English, an articulation of how concepts tend to be used together by a particular, eccentric community (us), often mistaken for facts about immaterial entities like consciousness and knowledge and sensations.

As others have noted, one of the most readable paths into Hegel is his writing on history.

Two things must be distinguished in consciousness, first, that I know and, secondly, what I know. In self-consciousness the two coincide, for Spirit knows itself. It is the judgment of its own nature and, at the same time, the operation of coming to itself, to produce itself, to make itself (actually) into that, which it is in itself (potentially). Following this abstract definition it may be said that world history is the exhibition of spirit striving to attain knowledge of its own nature. As the germ bears in itself the whole nature of the tree, the taste and shape of its fruit, so also the first traces of Spirit virtually contain the whole of history. Orientals do not yet know that Spirit – Man as such – is free. And because they do not know it, they are not free. They only know that one is free; but for this very reason such freedom is mere caprice, ferocity, dullness of passion, or, perhaps, softness and tameness of desire – which again is nothing but an accident of nature and thus, again, caprice. This one is therefore only a despot, not a free man. The consciousness of freedom first arose among the Greeks, and therefore they were free. But they, and the Romans likewise, only knew that some are free not man as such. This not even Plato and Aristotle knew. For this reason the Greeks not only had slavery, upon which was based their whole life and the maintenance of their splendid liberty, but their freedom itself was partly an accidental, transient, and limited flowering and partly a severe thralldom of human nature. Only the Germanic peoples came, through Christianity, to realize that man as man is free and that freedom of Spirit is the very essence of man’s nature. This realization first arose in religion, in the innermost region of spirit; but to introduce it in the secular world was a further task which could only be solved and fulfilled by a long and severe effort of civilization. Thus slavery did not cease immediately with the acceptance of the Christian religion. Liberty did not suddenly predominate in states nor reason in governments and constitutions. The application of the principle to secular conditions, the thorough molding and interpenetration of the secular world by it, is precisely the long process of history. I have already drawn attention to this distinction between a principle as such and its application, its introduction and execution in the actuality of life and spirit. This is a fundamental fact in our science and must be kept constantly in mind. Just as we noted it in the Christian principle of self-consciousness and freedom, so it shows itself in the principle of freedom in general. World history is the progress of the consciousness of freedom – a progress whose necessity we have to investigate.


We have established Spirit’s consciousness of its freedom, and thereby the actualization of this Freedom as the final purpose of the world. For the spiritual world is the substance of reality, and the physical world remains subordinate to it, or, in terms of speculative philosophy, has no truth compared with the former. But the term “freedom,” without further qualification, is indefinite and infinitely ambiguous. Being the highest concept, it is liable to an infinity of misunderstandings, confusions, and errors and may give rise to all possible kinds of extravagances. All this has never been more clearly known and experienced than today. Yet for the time being we must content ourselves with this general, as yet undefined term. Attention was also drawn to the importance of the infinite difference between the principle, as that which so far is only in itself, and that which is real. At the same time, it is Freedom in itself that comprises within itself the infinite necessity of bringing itself to consciousness and thereby, since knowledge about itself is its very nature, to reality. Freedom is itself its own object of attainment and the sole purpose of Spirit. It is the ultimate purpose toward which all world history has continually aimed. To this end all the sacrifices have been offered on the vast altar of the earth throughout the long lapse of ages. Freedom alone is the purpose which realizes and fulfills itself, the only enduring pole in the change of events and conditions, the only truly efficient principle that pervades the whole. This final aim is God’s purpose with the world. But God is the absolutely perfect Being and can, therefore, will nothing but Himself, His own will. The nature of His own will, His own nature, is what we here call the Idea of freedom. Thus we translate the language of religion into that of philosophy. Our next question then is: what are the means the Idea uses for its realization? This is the second point that we have to consider.
...
Although Freedom as such is primarily an internal idea, the means it uses are the external phenomena which in history present themselves directly before our eyes. The first glance at history convinces us that the actions of men spring from their needs, their passions, their interests, their characters, and their talents. Indeed, it appears as if in this drama of activities these needs, passions, and interests are the sole springs of action and the main efficient cause. It is true that this drama involves also universal purposes, benevolence, or noble patriotism But such virtues and aims are insignificant on the broad canvas of history. We may, perhaps, see the ideal of Reason actualized in those who adopt such aims and in the spheres of their influence; but their number is small in proportion to the mass of the human race and their influence accordingly limited. Passions, private aims, and the satisfaction of selfish desires are, on the contrary, tremendous springs of action. Their power lies in the fact that they respect none of the limitations which law and morality would impose on them; and that these natural impulses are closer to the core of human nature than the artificial and troublesome discipline that tends toward order, self-restraint, law, and morality.

When we contemplate this display of passions and the consequences of their violence, the unreason which is associated not only with them, but even – rather we might say specially – with good designs and righteous aims; when we see arising therefrom the evil, the vice, the ruin that has befallen the most flourishing kingdoms which the mind of man ever created, we can hardly avoid being filled with sorrow this universal taint of corruption. And since this decay is not the work of mere nature, but of human will, our reflections may well lead us to a moral sadness, a revolt of the good will (spirit) – if indeed it has a place within us. Without rhetorical exaggeration, a simple, truthful account of the miseries that have overwhelmed the noblest of nations and polities and the finest exemplars of private virtue forms a most fearful picture and excites emotions of the profoundest and most hopeless sadness, counter-balanced by no consoling result. We can endure it and strengthen ourselves against it only by thinking that this is the way it had to be – it is fate; nothing can be done. And at last, out of the boredom with which this sorrowful reflection threatens us, we draw back into the vitality of the present, into our aims and interests of the moment; we retreat, in short, into the selfishness that stands on the quiet shore and thence enjoys in safety the distant spectacle of wreckage and confusion.

But in contemplating history as the slaughter-bench at which the happiness of peoples, the wisdom of states, and the virtue of individuals have been sacrificed, a question necessarily arises: To what principle, to what final purpose, have these monstrous sacrifices been offered?

...

From this comment on the second essential element in the historical embodiment of an aim, we infer – considering for a moment the institution of the state – that a state is then well constituted and internally vigorous when the private interest of its citizens is one with the common interest of the state, and the one finds gratification and realization in the other – a most important proposition. But in a state many institutions are necessary – inventions, appropriate arrangements, accompanied by long intellectual struggles in order to find out what is really appropriate, as well as struggles with private interests and passions, which must be harmonized in difficult and tedious discipline. When a state reaches this harmony, it has reached the period of its bloom, its excellence, its power and prosperity. But world history does not begin with any conscious aim, as do the particular circles of men. Already the simple instinct of living together contains the conscious purpose of securing life and property; once this primal society has been established, the purpose expands. But world history begins its general aim – to realize the idea of Spirit – only in an implicit form (an sich), namely, as Nature – as an innermost, unconscious instinct. And the whole business of history, as already observed, is to bring it into consciousness. Thus, appearing in the form of nature, of natural will, what we have called the subjective side is immediate, – actual existence (für sich): need, instinct, passion, private interest, even opinion and subjective representation. These vast congeries of volitions, interests, and activities constitute the tools and means of the World Spirit for attaining its purpose, bringing it to consciousness, and realizing it. And this purpose is none other than finding itself – coming to itself – and contemplating itself in concrete actuality. But one may indeed question whether those manifestations of vitality on the part of individuals and peoples in which they seek and satisfy their own purposes are, at the same time, the means and tools of a higher and broader purpose of which they know nothing, which they realize unconsciously. This purpose has been questioned, and in every variety of form denied, decried, and denounced as mere dreaming and “philosophy.” On this point, however, I announced my view at the very outset, and asserted our hypothesis – which eventually will appear as the result of our investigation – namely, that Reason governs the world and has consequently governed its history. In relation to this Reason, which is universal and substantial, in and for itself, all else is subordinate, subservient, and the means for its actualization. Moreover, this Reason is immanent in historical existence and reaches its own perfection in and through this existence.
...
As was said earlier, nothing is now more common than the complaint that the ideals which imagination sets up are not actualized, that these glorious dreams are destroyed by cold actuality. These ideals, which in the voyage of life founder on the rocks of hard reality, may be merely subjective to begin with and belong to the peculiarity of an individual who regards himself as supremely wise. Such ideals do not belong here. For what an individual fancies for himself in his isolation cannot be the norm for universal reality. The universal law is not designed for individuals, as such, who indeed may find themselves very much the losers. But by the term “ideal” we also understand the ideal of Reason, of the good and true. Poets, like Schiller, have painted such ideals touchingly and with strong emotion, and with the deeply melancholy conviction that they could never be actualized. In affirming, on the contrary, that the universal Reason does actualize itself, we have nothing to do with the empirical detail. For this can be better or worse; here chance and particularity have received authority to exercise their tremendous power. Much fault, therefore, might be found in phenomenal details. This subjective fault-finding is easy, particularly since it keeps in view only the detail and its deficiency, without understanding the universal Reason in it. In asserting good intentions for the welfare of the whole and exhibiting a semblance of goodheartedness, it can swagger about with great airs. It is easier to discover the deficiency in individuals, in states, and in Providence, than to see their real meaning. For in negative fault-finding one stands nobly and with proud mien above the matter, without penetrating into it and without comprehending its positive aspects. Age generally makes people more tolerant; youth is always discontented. For older people have a more mature judgment, which accepts even the bad, not out of mere indifference but because it has been more deeply taught by the grave experience of life. It has thus been led to the essence, the intrinsic value of the matter in question.

The insight then to which – in opposition to these ideals philosophy should lead us is that the actual world is as it ought to be, that the truly good, the universal divine Reason is the power capable of actualizing itself. This good, this Reason, in its most concrete representation, is God. God governs the world. The actual working of His government, the carrying out of His plan is the history of the world. Philosophy strives to comprehend this plan, for only that which has been carried out according to it has reality; whatever does not accord with it is but worthless existence. Before the pure light of this divine Idea, which is no mere ideal, the illusion disappears as though the world were a crazy, inane process. Philosophy wishes to recognize the content, the reality of the divine Idea, and to justify the spurned actuality; for Reason is the comprehension of the divine work. — Hegel

https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/13290/historical-examples-of-hegels-dialectic

Someone made this inquiry from the US and the results absolutely horrible. What the voters wanted didn't matter much if anything in the actual implemented policies! — ssu

Yes, that's what I had in mind. Our electoral system and gerrymandering also makes many votes seem worthless.

As you are already aware, philosophers are, how would you say it?, frontline personnel - I compare them to explorers and as we all know, explorers are the ones who take all the risk - losing an eye, even dying are part of the job description - operating as they are in what in the game universe is known as the fog of war. Hic sunt dracones comrades, hic sunt dracones. Careful now, careful! :snicker: — Agent Smith

Nice ! This squares with Nietzsche in the sense a 'moral pioneer' (this is the stuff that scares people and gets Spinoza in trouble) and with Popper in the sense that metaphysical theories sometimes ripen into science...so it's a bad idea to hide from everything that's ambiguous (like a stereotypical positivist who thinks anything fancy is nonsense.*)

*A healthy dose of positivistic skepticism is not so bad though.

Thanks, though I suspect the far greater parody is being played on us by Bartricks himself, who'll reveal, on his 6,000th post, that his contributions were all a work of performance art lampooning the self-assurance of cult religion... It's very deep. — Isaac

Nice theory!

He also tempts me to think he's a bot in his apparent failure to assimilate and respond to criticism. I imagine a bot that looks for a few keywords to choose between a small set of responses. I enjoy the insult responses most, because these are occasionally creative and surprising.

Personally, I don't understand the hype around Wittgenstein. — Agent Smith

I think he's great, but his later work is fuzzy. As I said in another thread, Ryle's The Concept of Mind is close in concept and insight while being the opposite of fuzzy.

The 'problem' is that many philosophical superstitions are mostly harmless. Our tacit skill in applying concepts in ordinary life is insulated against bad theories of meaning. How do our errors get corrected then? Only by talking to others in the minority of people who take a genuine interest in 'dry' issues like the foundation of meaning or the best way to define science, etc.

the efforts are laudable and there maybe a grain or two of truth — Agent Smith

Influenced by the pragmatists, I look to our practical/technological power as a species and think that we have more than a grain or two of truth or knowledge or whatever you want to call it. Various neo-Kantians accepted the existence of a science as a fact and went on from there. I think they were correct to do so. That doesn't mean we can't articulate what's going on better and better, etc. And it doesn't mean we aren't in the dark or talking nonsense as we get farther away from practical life in our talking (so I sympathize with the idea that lots of metaphysics is pointless, not even wrong.)

the reason philosophers tend to grab at anything within reach, the closest object as it were, when doing philosophy (of mind) is due to the fact that they (we) are by and large ignorant, we're in the dark and it shows. — Agent Smith

Well said !

I try to know when I don't know, and this is largely a matter of discipline, because

With a hot pad under my ass I can play the braggart or the buffoon as good as any man, no matter what sign he be born under. — H. Miller

I view what Brandom is doing as something like fixing Descartes' starting point. I don't start as a ghost in the machine, but I do start after Socrates, which is to say as a philosopher among philosophers, all of us subject (ideally anyway) to 'the force of reason', and only to that force (not [directly] to gods or states, etc.) If you ask me to prove this, because you refuse to take it on faith, then you support my point by challenging it.

This "equalness" is some kind of ratio between sentence content/references and things themselves. — Josh Alfred

The correspondence theory of truth has some serious problems. How are concepts/words 'equal' to or 'representative of' some kind of non-word stuff ? I prefer thinking of the truth as what an ideal observer would say about the situation. That way we are comparing words to words, what was said to what should have been said. This is a tricky issue, so I'm just offering one of the more plausible approaches I'm aware of.

What makes an observation true? — Josh Alfred

I take you to mean a 'basic' observation statement (such as a measurement), as opposed to a theory? This is a deep question. My general advice is to read Karl Popper. Here's a sample.

The acceptance of basic statements is compared by Popper to trial by jury: the verdict of the jury will be an agreement in accordance with the prevailing legal code and on the basis of the evidence presented, and is analogous to the acceptance of a basic statement by the research community:

By its decision, the jury accepts, by agreement, a statement about a factual occurrence—a basic statement, as it were. (2002: 92)

The jury’s verdict is conventional in arising out of a procedure governed by clear rules, and is an application of the legal system as a whole as it applies to the case in question. The verdict is accordingly represented as a true statement of fact, but, as miscarriages of justice demonstrate all too clearly,

the statement need not be true merely because the jury has accepted it. This … is acknowledged in the rule allowing a verdict to be quashed or revised. (2002: 92)

This is comparable, he argues, to the case of basic statements: their acceptance-as-true is also by agreement and, as such, it also constitutes an application of a theoretical system, and

it is only this application which makes any further applications of the theoretical system possible. (2002: 93)

However, the agreed acceptance of basic statements, like that of judicial verdicts, remain perennially susceptible to the requirement for further interrogation. Popper terms this “the relativity of basic statements” (2002: 86), which is reflective of the provisional nature of the entire corpus of scientific knowledge itself. Science does not, he maintains, rest upon any foundational bedrock. Rather, the theoretical systems of science are akin to buildings in swampy ground constructed with the support of piles:

The piles are driven down from above into the swamp, but not down to any natural or “given” base; and if we stop driving the piles deeper, it is not because we have reached firm ground. We simply stop when we are satisfied that the piles are firm enough to carry the structure, at least for the time being. (2002: 94)

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/popper/#BasiStatFalsConv

Roughly speaking, a basic statement is relatively noncontroversial. We can reason 'from' such statements and check that the implications of our theories 'against' them.

The point is that we are using sloppy intuition to justify the rules of negatives, intuition that clearly didn't convince mathematicians of the past, and perhaps there's some value in recognizing that. — Jerry

I think it's better to talk about synthesizing otherwise incompatible intuitions as we (naturally) want to be able to find products and not only sums involving negatives. We use different metaphors, each effective in its space.

More general point: I think even the counting numbers require a context. We just learn them so well and use them so much that we no longer feel their strangeness or notice the context.

it's not that I think negative numbers can't refer to things in nature, it just seems like extra steps are needed to make them make sense, which makes them somewhat different from positive numbers. — Jerry

I get it, and I agree that negative numbers are something like one metaphor away from the counting numbers.

This thread has become the 'comedy relief sandbox'. — Janus

:up:

That's how I'm taking it. It's fascinating, such complete incorrigibility.

Well, I will wait until you can provide an actual refutation of the self evident truth of reason that any extended thing will be capable of division. — Bartricks

Perhaps without realizing it, you are coming off somewhat like the theist who knows God 'directly.' It also makes no sense to refute a self-evident truth, since no inference is involved, just glowing and divine intuition.

Wittgenstein claimed (there's an active thread on the topic, go look it up + there's a download link for the book Philosophical Investigations penned by Wittgenstein himself) that philosophy doesn't explain. I'm at a loss as to what he meant by it. — Agent Smith

I take him to be talking about his vision of what philosophy ought be. One non-explaining activity of the philosopher is just that of calling attention to this or that aspect of world. It's way too easy for humans to talk nonsense, as long as they are all talking the same nonsense. For instance, there is a 'default' understanding of meaning that easily goes unquestioned, which is easily revealed to be silly if it's articulated (foregrounded, put under the lamp, pointed out.)

If the meaning of the sign (roughly, that which is of importance about the sign) is an image built up in our minds when we see or hear the sign, then first let us adopt the method we just described of replacing this mental image by some outward object seen, e.g. a painted or modeled image. Then why should the written sign plus this painted image be alive if the written sign alone was dead? -- In fact, as soon as you think of replacing the mental image by, say, a painted one, and as soon as the image thereby loses its occult character, it ceased to seem to impart any life to the sentence at all. — W's excellent little Blue Book

Why doesn't it make sense? — Tate

I just mean that a brute fact is true for no reason. We can't deduce it from and therefore explain it with a theory.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brute_fact

But how much fun would we have if everything was absolute and we had no reason to argue from our different perspectives? — Athena

Excellent point. We need space to wiggle around in, within which we enjoy the drama of self-realization. There's no light without darkness.

But reality does contain extended things. It's a self-evident fact my reason presents to me, so the burden is on you to disprove it.

I have two self-evident facts of reason. The world contains extended things, and you can't divide things forever. Therefore you can't divide extended things infinitely.

It's on you to prove that wrong, and you can't just say "it isn't" to either of my premises, because they're self-evident facts of reason. — Isaac

Excellent and succinct parody, which'll probably leave no scratch (I speak from recent experience.)

It also gives me the feeling of someone backed up against a wall rather than someone in control of the situation so to speak. — Agent Smith

As I see it, scientists and philosophers are both constrained by facts and the way their beliefs and hypotheses are expected to fit together. An exalted submission is perhaps involved in the pursuit of objective knowledge. As someone put it once, freedom is just living by norms that make sense to you (the right kind of prison).

There being oligarchs means that a small group not only has wealth, which has been acquired through illegal means, but also has power over others. In a functioning democracy there can be rich individuals, but that doesn't mean they would control the legislative and political branch of the government. — ssu

:up:

One way to check the health of a democracy would be to see whether the will of the people is manifest in the laws. Along these lines, we'd want to see if the laws favored the rich minority or a non-rich majority.

What do you call this kinda perspective/point of view on philosophical topics? — Agent Smith

As I understand it, lots of philosophers simply make what is already going on explicit. They foreground what in retrospect was haunting the background.

Another way to approach this is to ask what makes philosophy philosophy ? Or a philosopher a philosopher, as opposed to a mystic or a confidence man? What already counts as intellectual virtue or hygiene ? What qualities or behaviors already disqualify them from being trusted or honored? We want people to keep their story straight, to not call something black and white or round and square at the same time. We are also responsible for either adopting the implications of our beliefs or dropping those beliefs as such troublesome implications become manifest (which takes time and discussion.) (And so on.)

To me the following is good approach to the unity or continuity of the mind/self.

“The practical activity one is obliging oneself to engage in by judging and acting is integrating those new commitments into a unified whole comprising all the other commitments one acknowledges…. Engaging in those integrative activities is synthesizing a self or subject, which shows up as what is responsible for the component commitments” (ibid).

A self or subject in this usage is not something that just exists. It is a guiding aim that is itself subject to development. “[T]he synthetic-integrative process, with its aspects of critical and ampliative activity [rejecting incompatibilities and developing consequences] provides the basis for understanding both the subjective and the objective poles of the intentional nexus. Subjects are what repel incompatible commitments in that they ought not to endorse them, and objects are what repel incompatible properties in that they cannot exhibit them” (p. 53).
...
Upstream from all of this, according to Brandom, is “Kant’s normative understanding of mental activity” (ibid). This is closely bound up with what he calls Kant’s “radically original conception of freedom” (ibid). In the Latin medieval and early modern traditions, questions about freedom were considered to be in a broad sense questions of fact about our power. For Kant, all such questions of fact apply only to the domain of represented objects. On the other hand, “Practical freedom is an aspect of the spontaneity of discursive activity on the subjective side” (pp. 58-59).

“The positive freedom exhibited by exercises of our spontaneity is just this normative ability: the ability to commit ourselves, to become responsible. It can be thought of as a kind of authority: the authority to bind oneself by conceptual norms” (p. 59). Brandom recalls Kant’s example of a young person reaching legal adulthood. “Suddenly, she has the authority to bind herself legally, for instance by entering into contracts. That gives her a host of new abilities: to borrow money, take out a mortgage, start a business. The new authority to bind oneself normatively… involves a huge increase in positive freedom” (ibid).

Rationality for Kant does not consist in having good reasons. “It consists rather just in being in the space of reasons” (p. 60), in being liable to specific kinds of normative assessment.

https://brinkley.blog/2020/10/19/autonomy-normativity/

This might be helpful.

The fact that cognitions acquired receptively through sensation are noninferential in the sense that they are not the result of exercising inferential capacities does not mean that they are nonconceptual in the sense that they are intelligible as determinately contentful apart from the situation of those contents in a “space of implications” of the sort exploited by inferential capacities. — Robert Brandom

In other words, I might be caused to report seeing red by radiation of a certain frequency hitting my retina, but this does not mean that redness is intelligible as a kind of semantic atom, anchored in some private experience. As Brandom interprets Sellars, to wield one concept with skill always involves skill wielding other concepts at the same time.

Lol. Let me take up the mantle and argue on behalf of an indivisible mind. — Merkwurdichliebe

I should add that I even leaned in earlier in the thread and suggested that the minds are indivisible in the sense that persons are unified targets for praise and blame. It's also a norm of rationality that our beliefs are consistent. A good trained body no talky talky doublethink, in other words. In fact, we sometimes contradict ourselves, but (ideally) we adjust our beliefs when we are made aware of such contradictions. It's also our duty to adjust our beliefs if their logical consequences conflict with other, prior beliefs. In practical terms, we want to know who is making a claim in order to weight that claim properly. This is Brandom's 'scorekeeping' notion of rationality. There are fouls in the game of rationality that reduce credibility, etc. The big picture is that minds/persons strive toward cohesion and unity. From the outside they are already unified by a proper name and a reputation for sense or nonsense.

You seem like a very nice interlocutor, would you be so kind as to recapitulate the debate for us late comers? Pretty please. — Merkwurdichliebe

Sure. Since I've been here, it's pretty much @Bartricks insisting the mind is indivisible and ignoring all criticisms of his arguments, all the while insisting that others don't actually read books, etc. It's a sit-com where watching any episode prepares you for all the others. Variations on a theme.