I wonder. Consider Newtonian mechanics, as employed in space flight. It's good enough to get the job done. But it's no special relativity! Isn't sometimes a rule of thumb - or a lower resolution argument sufficient to get us from a to b? — karl stone

If someone understands Newtonian mechanics as accurate within a (comparatively large) margin of error, and they wield the theory according to that understanding, then they have done nothing wrong. It only becomes a problem when they erect a double standard by wielding the theory against others in a different way than they understand it themselves. So for example, if they wield it against others as if it has a small margin of error, and they wield it against their own thought as it if has a large margin of error, then they are involved in the rational error I am highlighting.

We can just say "Rule 1 of this discussion: We know things" — Moliere

You can say that, but then you have to accept 1, 2, 3, and 4.

Upon thinking that we can see that [...] though there's the philosophical puzzle of the problem of induction we still know stuff. — Moliere

You can't do that without accepting 3. Your error is 5. You think the "problem of induction" is a problem for Aristotle, but not for your lackadaisical positions (like, "I've been told, therefore I know"). That's nuts. If Hume's argument doesn't count against you, then obviously it doesn't count against Aristotle or anyone else. Let's be done with these double standards.

I imagine it'd be easy to get him to see that knowledge is generated by human being, and that the conclusions of his argument are at least consistent with that. Rather than making appeals to the logical structure between events, which he demonstrates is invalid, we make appeals to people's emotions and habits of thought. — Moliere

An appeal to emotion or habits of thought will not justify the claim that the offspring of two tigers will be a tiger, for Hume. But yes, part of the problem here is that Hume himself is not a serious thinker. He himself vacillates on whether his argument is sound.

I don't think that when I make a guess about something that I'm making a valid inference, so I'm being self-consistent. — Moliere

"I just make guesses," is not a serious answer. You can't just say, "Oh, Aristotle's approach was flawed, but I just make guesses, and that's a much better approach."

Either we have rational grounds to claim that the offspring of two tigers will be a tiger, or else we don't. This is what most people would do:

1. If Hume's argument is sound, then we do not have rational grounds to claim that the offspring of two tigers will be a tiger.
2. But we do have rational grounds to claim that the offspring of two tigers will be a tiger.
3. Therefore, Hume's argument is unsound.
4. Therefore, I can't go around wielding Hume's argument as if it were sound.

This is what you do:

1. If Hume's argument is sound, then we do not have rational grounds to claim that the offspring of two tigers will be a tiger.
2. But we do have rational grounds to claim that the offspring of two tigers will be a tiger.
3. Therefore, Hume's argument is unsound.
5. Nevertheless, I will still go around wielding Hume's argument as if it were sound.

The problem with (5) is that it transgresses the first principle of dialogue: speak only what you really believe to be true.


(And of course you can keep running with the idea that we have non-rational grounds—whether emotional or habitual—to claim that the offspring of two tigers will be a tiger. I don't think that goes anywhere. To predict a future event is a rational and normative act, and there is no such thing as non-rational normativity. The idea of "non-rational grounds for claiming X," conflates description with normativity. A psychological explanation for why someone proffers a prediction is different from a reason for why the prediction is reliable.)

I don't think that knowledge depends upon that inference being valid. The proof is in the evidence -- we generate knowledge from checking wild guesses all the time. — Moliere

Hume's argument is a kind of exclusion of induction by exhaustive dichotomy. What is your response here supposed to be? Do you think that Hume would say, "Oh, someone told you that the offspring of two tigers is a tiger! Oh, well in that case my argument doesn't apply!" Or would he say, "Oh, you are 'simply asserting that you know things,' well in that case my argument really seems to break down. I wish I had thought of that myself!"

These strange responses you are giving me are wholly inadequate to answer Hume's argument, so I don't see how you think they are relevant.

Though, also, my metaphilosophical position is one which does two readings: With the grain, and against the grain. So for every philosopher you start with the grain else you won't be addressing the arguments they are making. But then it is necessary to return and look for why people might object, or where there might be an error in the argumentation, or where some uncertainty is and what we might say in response. I call this against the grain. This is a metaphor I'm pulling from carpentry for how one is "supposed" to cut the wood, but noting in philosophy we are supposed to cut the wood the wrong way in order to see the full meaning of a philosophy.

In doing so we can lay out a particular philosophers position, but then note how we might diverge, or even just wholesale steal ideas out of the text. In order to understand the concept we reference back to the text, but philosophy is a generative activity. It is creative. We can do what they did and write our own little thoughts, inferences, suppositions, and what-have-you. — Moliere

All I'm asking you to do is be logically consistent. If you think Aristotle falls prey to Hume, but then you can't countenance the fact that everyone falls prey to Hume, including yourself, then you are not being consistent. Your argument is literally as silly as this:

• Moliere: Aristotle uses words, and anyone who uses words is wrong.
• Leontiskos: But don't you use words?
• Moliere: Oh, yeah, but I don't count.

You don't get to exempt yourself from the criticisms you level at others. That's not how it works.

That's a false dilemma. We can accept the parts we agree with and not accept the parts we disagree with. — Moliere

We are talking specifically about Hume's argument from induction in a broad sense, namely the idea that we cannot reason from particulars to universals. That's the thing that you keep vacillating about, using it as a weapon to attack others while ignoring the fact that it would destroy your own beliefs if it were deployed consistently.

it's not concerning at all, but expected. — Moliere

It's not concerning that we cannot tell whether you are jesting? The reason it's hard to tell is because your position is so bizarre that it's hard to know the difference between something you would say in jest and something you would say in earnest.

Nope. Not, at all. You can just go back and see that you're cherry-picking. — AmadeusD

When you misrepresent the conversation my answer is always the same:

It would have been much easier to simply quote yourself... — Leontiskos

You claim that you have said something, but you can't quote yourself saying it, because it is nowhere to be found. Fire Ologist asked:

Would you do me a favor and show me your example and how you conditioned these out of it? — Fire Ologist

You failed to answer him. You failed to point to the quote or even the post where you said, "that I am in a cab, having told the driver where I'm going and to wake me up when we arrive." Why did you fail to point to it? The answer is simple: because it doesn't exist. You are trying to rewrite the past in your favor.

But, no, I am speaking in jest. — Moliere

Is it concerning that it is hard to tell?

You have to either embrace Hume or reject him. You can't keep playing both sides and having it both ways. It's a waste for me to spend so much time talking to someone who will not abide by the canons of logical consistency.

You can't just magically jump back and forth between pro-Humean and anti-Humean positions whenever it is desirable to do so. — Leontiskos

I can and I will! — Moliere

Not if you want to be a rational human being, you can't.

We learn about what exists by listening to others. It's marvelously simple, but it brings down the grandeur of philosophy and science a few notches. Names are learned prior to any philosophizing about the nature of tigers -- we can use names without theories as to how it is a name refers. — Moliere

So your mom told you that tigers are an existing species and that the offspring of two tigers is a tiger? The problem is that at some point we need to grow up and say, "Mom, how do you know that?" If Hume is right then your mom passed on to you "knowledge" that she can't have. This is a good example of the way that you selectively deploy Hume, against Aristotle but not against your mom. "Humean objections for thee, but not for me!"

For me I'm fine with simply asserting that we know things. — Moliere

It sounds like you have chosen option 2:

"Yes, that's right, but I reject Hume's position." — Leontiskos

That's fine, but you need to work through the cognitive dissonance inherent in objecting to other's positions on the basis of Hume's arguments, but then exempting yourself from those same objections. You'll need to work out that double standard that is so ubiquitously present in your philosophical approach. You can't just magically jump back and forth between pro-Humean and anti-Humean positions whenever it is desirable to do so.

I wrote that much to give you more to latch onto, to show where I'm coming from, and to counter your notions of me in the hopes of communicating. But all you can see is Hume. — Moliere

I'm tired of the constant evasions and circular argumentation. If you think that Aristotle cannot argue from particulars to universals, then you can't pretend to be able to do the same thing yourself (when you claim that tigers exist as a species, or that the offspring of two tigers will be a tiger). If you have a real argument against Aristotle or any other philosopher, it will have to be more than the double-standard of a Humean nuclear bomb. Until that happens, the tu quoque is a sufficient response to your nuclear option. If you don't possess an objection that does not destroy all of philosophy and all of science, then you don't possess an objection at all. :meh:

Not in so many words, but you did say this:- — Ludwig V

If P is not truth-apt, then of course S need not be truth-apt. — Leontiskos

and I think that what I said follows from that. — Ludwig V

My original claim was, "If P is truth-apt, then S is truth-apt." You responded by effectively saying, "But the question is whether P is truth-apt." My response about "need not be" has to do with the fact that you are subtly committing the fallacy of denying the antecedent. When someone denies the antecedent the correct response is, "Both the consequent and the negation of the consequent need not follow." Saying, "It need not follow when you deny the antecedent," does not positively entail anything about the possibility of the consequent.

Furthermore, the idea that P may not be truth-apt has nothing to do with my original claim, and it tells us nothing about S given that original claim. You want to discuss the proposition, "If P is not truth-apt, then S is possibly truth-apt." The problem is that there are different modalities at play, but given that such a proposition seems irrelevant to my thesis, I don't see any use in pursuing it. My original claim has everything to do with the cases in which everyone agrees that P is truth-apt.

I should have used a different variable, such as T. I'm sorry. — Ludwig V

Yes, you are right, of course. I wrote that passage badly, without explaining myself. It doesn't matter, so I withdraw the claim. — Ludwig V

Okay, thanks. I appreciate that. :up:

Listen, this conversation is getting long and unwieldy. Rather than answering the whole bevvy of issues you are now raising, why don't you just point me to two of them that you deem most central, and I will answer those.

I think you're attributing more to me than I've said. — Moliere

The fact that you wrote six posts in response makes me think that you know your approach is deeply problematic.

If you follow your Humean logic consistently, then you have no idea what you mean by "tiger," you have no grounds for believing that a species of tigers exists, and you have no grounds for believing that the offspring of two tigers will be a tiger. Brilliant stuff. — Leontiskos

If you think that you are not wielding a nuclear bomb, then explain what grounds you have for, say, believing that the offspring of two tigers will be a tiger. Aristotle, Darwin, Lavoisier, Kripke, and science and rationality generally, all believe they have firm rational grounds for their belief that the offspring of two tigers will be a tiger. Hume thinks they are all wrong, and followers of Hume such as yourself must oppose not only Aristotle, but also Darwin, Lavoisier, Kripke, and science and rationality generally.

So you have three options at this point. You can say one of the following:

• "Yes, that's right, and I accept Hume's position."
• "Yes, that's right, but I reject Hume's position."
• "No, that's not right, and therefore I can accept Hume's position while also holding that I have firm rational grounds for believing that the offspring of two tigers will be a tiger."

I think we need to figure out what to do with the nuclear bombs before we have even the smallest chance for a fruitful conversation.

The example was (roughly, and I've perhaps streamlined it here) that I am in a cab, having told the driver where I'm going and to wake me up when we arrive. — AmadeusD

That's just false, AmadeusD. Here is the example:

if you gave me an active, working Google Maps. I closed my eyes, followed the directions(pretend for a moment this wouldn't be practically disastrous lmao) and then the Maps tells me i've arrived - that's what I'm talking about. I am literally not involved in any deliberation - I am, in fact, still taking instruction. — AmadeusD

I gave the example of "waking up" as an explicitly different example:

Sure, you can decide (judge) that the app is to be trusted. Sort of like how you can trust a taxi cab driver to get you to your destination. Still, at the end of your journey you still have to judge that the app or cab driver is telling you that you have arrived (even though you are trusting them at the same time).

A case where no subordinated judgment occurs would be when you go under general anesthesia for surgery, simply trusting that you will wake up on the other side. Waking up is not a judgment, and so in that case there is only one act of trust-judgment. You are trusting that the judgments of others will cause you to wake up. — Leontiskos

You've literally lied about the example given, which was never about a taxi driver waking you up. You are resorting to this because you have no good arguments to support your strange case that no judgment occurs when you respond to the Google Maps app or the taxi driver telling you that you have arrived. Note that the lie does not help you at all, because after the taxi cab driver wakes you up, you still have to form the judgment that you have arrived. Your new example in which the taxi cab driver wakes you up in no way answers the question of how you know that you have arrived without any judgment.

I cannot remember Leon's take, but he wants to say all mental activity is judgement — AmadeusD

More nonsense:

Nowhere in that definition is the claim that every mental act counts as a judgment. — Leontiskos

You responded:

A1. Suppose every mental act counts as a judgment
A2. If so, then L3 would be true
A3. But not every mental act counts as a judgment
A4. Therefore, L3 does not follow

And my response was that I have never claimed A1. A1 is a strawman... — Leontiskos

You've stopped doing serious philosophy in this thread. You have resorted to, "The Oxford definition sucks and I refuse to give my own definition." You then went on to consistently mischaracterize what you and others have said in this thread. :roll:

(@Fire Ologist)

That's a cop-out, to be sure.

If you follow your Humean logic consistently, then you have no idea what you mean by "tiger," you have no grounds for believing that a species of tigers exists, and you have no grounds for believing that the offspring of two tigers will be a tiger. Brilliant stuff.

This has nothing to do with Aristotle. If you accept that sort of nuclear skepticism-sophistry of Hume, then Kripke, Darwin, and Aristotle are all destroyed. It makes no difference that Darwin believed in temporary species and Aristotle believed in more permanent species. Both are undermined by Hume's "induction argument" that you try to use against Aristotle. You're dropping a nuclear bomb and hoping it only affects Aristotle's neighborhood. You need to start thinking through these ideas, rather than just wielding them in the direction of those whom it is fashionable to wield them towards.

How I know it is certainly different from whether I think it. Why I think it is because I've seen them before and talked about them with others to make sure I know what I'm talking about.

I'd assert it because I have no reason not to -- unless they went extinct or some other circumstance that I'm unaware of they were alive last time I went to the zoo.

I'd say I know what a tiger is because I grew up in a community which differentiates a particular species. — Moliere

Did you see two or three things with stripes and then decide that there must be a whole species of tigers, that are all the same? You have a universal species in your hand that you call 'tiger', and I'm wondering how you know about that sort of thing. As a Humean, surely you couldn't have come to know about panthera tigris from observing particular things!

Or if you want something more characteristically Humean, think about it this way. You see two "tigers" (whatever that is!) mating. What will their offspring be? Will it be a tiger? How do you know?

Yeah, there are some tigers out there today. — Moliere

How do you know that? How do you know what a tiger even is? In fact, what is a tiger, and how do you know?

For Aristotle I would just add that there are ontological conditions to the sets, whereas today we'd prefer to abstract to the logic alone and leave the ontology undefined so that we could then speak clearly about what exists.

Make sense? — Moliere

I would say that some philosophers follow Quine today. Not sure how many. I think there are less than you suppose.

Whereas I would say that it's in the very logic itself that makes the move from species to genera invalid. There is no essence that holds all tigers together, a what-it-isness which makes the tiger a tiger. — Moliere

So do you think tigers exist or not?

The problem here is that you keep opposing even a Kripkean essentialism (for example, by saying that water is not H2O). If you think that water or tigers have no necessary properties, then you oppose not only Aristotle but also Kripke, and your critique really has nothing to do with Aristotle per se. And I am really not convinced that your critique has anything to do with Aristotle per se.

So I'm not talking about being wrong in the sense of error as much as I'm saying there is no valid construction of induction because there is nothing to universalize. This is a big difference between my understanding of Aristotle, vs. Darwinian, biology. The species aren't as distinct as what Aristotle's method indicates -- they slowly morph over time and we update our taxonomies the more we learn, but this isn't a logically valid move. — Moliere

What isn't logically valid? Again:

No one actually believes that familiarity does not breed understanding, and no one believes that there are no truths about species. If Hume were right then we could not even say that swans can fly, or that swans can honk. For the Humean there is no possibility of saying, "We can't know that swans are white, but we can know that swans can fly and honk." — Leontiskos

Do you think swans exist? Do you think swans can fly? Do you think swans can honk?

Familiarity with swans will help us to understand swans, and if we happen to notice that all birds have wings then we might say that the essence of birds is "has wings", and since all swans are birds all swans have wings since that is what holds for all birds.

In such a world, if you could correctly identify an essence -- what holds for all the tigers, or whatever species/genera is under discussion -- then moving up to a more encompassing category would appear entirely valid. — Moliere

The problem with your construal is that it isn't induction at all. It is not an inference at all, but a tautology. "I have seen three swans and they all have wings; therefore three swans have wings." Or, "I have seen every swan that currently exists, and they all have wings; therefore every currently-existing swan has wings." No induction is occurring here, much less any inference at all. If you go from "all tigers" to "all tigers" then you haven't made a move at all, and you have certainly not moved to a "more encompassing category."

(Note too that the deeper problem with your Humean approach is that it can't even recognize a single swan or tiger in the first place. It hasn't conceived the problem of how the word 'tiger' is upbuilt in the first place.)

So, in my understanding of Aristotle at least, I can understand why he believes it's valid. It's not like he didn't know what validity was. However, I think he is wrong about essence, and what you end up with for any process of induction is never a logically valid move. It's a guess. Hopefully an educated guess, but a guess all the same -- and the taxonomies we write about animals are our way of understanding life rather than the essence of life. — Moliere

I don't think you understand Aristotle. Again:

But I think I understand your general thrust. "Aristotle looks at one swan and sees that it is white. Then he looks at a second and sees that it is white. After doing this 100 times, he infers that every subsequent swan will be white, and that's like mathematical induction."

That's intelligible, but I just don't think it's what Aristotle is doing. It's what Hume understands by induction, not Aristotle, which is why I pointed to Hume at the beginning of this chapter of our conversation. Aristotle's view is represented by the essays I linked <here>. — Leontiskos

You seem to be a Humean who thinks that Kripke could never have warrant to claim that water is H2O. And of course this means that you also oppose Aristotle and Darwin, who are also involved in similar claims. Darwin makes universal claims about species as well, after all. It makes no difference that species evolve. All such species-claims, whether Kripke's, Darwin's, or Aristotle's must be opposed by a Humean like yourself. So the topic here is really Hume, not Aristotle.

I don't think I've said anything Humean here -- if I were I'd be talking about relationships between events or the wash of perception or the emotional grounding of inference or something. But I'm just saying that Aristotle is wrong about essences, and that's what masks the invalidity of going from a particular to a general. — Moliere

The argument that it is impossible to move from particulars to universals is a Humean argument.

Or I could be wrong about the role of essence in Aristotle. But at least this is how I'm understanding it. Does it make sense to you? — Moliere

It makes sense to me that you are falsely attributing the thing that Hume critiques to Aristotle. It also makes sense to me that, as a Humean, you would oppose all knowledge of species, whether Kripkean, Darwinian, or Aristotelian. I just don't think you walk the walk and absent yourself from believing species-propositions.

So if P is not truth-apt, then S might or might not be truth-apt. — Ludwig V

Well I never said that. The problem here is that implication doesn't make sense among non-truth-apt things, but that's a separate issue.

The trouble is that we might well disagree about whether a given proposition, such as "God exists", is truth-apt or not. — Ludwig V

How is that supposed to be "trouble"? Try presenting an argument to the effect that, "We might disagree about whether P is truth-apt, therefore Leontiskos' claim is false."

But the foundations of language cannot possibly entail true or false propositions; — Ludwig V

...concluding that, since S implies P and S is true, P is true — Ludwig V

These two claims contradict one another. One moment you say that S cannot entail true or false propositions, and the next moment you say that S implies P and P is true. This is a good example of the problem with Wittgenstein's approach.

The point here is that when Wittgenstein says, "But this is what I do!," he is trying to excuse himself from argument and thus presupposing that "what he does" is inevitable and therefore not arguable or truth-apt. I would say that better philosophers don't make such an excuse. Aristotle will wrestle with the principle of non-contradiction, for example, in Metaphysics IV. He won't make an excuse and abandon the obvious fact that where S implies P and P is truth-apt, so too is S.

...when he comes to the end of the justifications that he can offer and exclaims "But this is what I do!". — Ludwig V

See my post <here>.

To be honest, I don't think Wittgenstein is a very good philosopher, and I don't have much interest in discussing him or exegeting him. Of course if you think he makes a good point you can introduce that same point in your own words, but appeals to his name will be ineffective for me. I have no regard for his name, and these topics help explain why.

That seems a very sound policy. I was looking for examples that would show what I was trying to assert. — Ludwig V

Where does your desire for an argument for God's existence go? As far as I'm concerned, wherever it goes, it supports my point. Suppose I present an argument and it is convincing. In that case an atheistic way of life will be falsified (or invalidated) by the propositional truth. Or suppose I present an argument and it is unconvincing. In that case a theistic way of life will be less plausible given the propositional truth. Either way the propositional outcome will bear on ways of life.

When I said that's a bad argument, I was agreeing with what I thought was your point - that the conclusion does not follow from the premiss. — Ludwig V

I don't think the argument is wholesale invalid. The idea behind it is that intractable disagreement among intelligent persons can signify a more fundamental problem (and that this problem could be related to what is or is not truth-apt). There is a rationale to the idea, even if I think it is wrong in this case.

I don't know whether you think that "God exists" is an empirical statement or not, but I think it very unlikely that there is any empirical fact that would persuade you to abandon that claim. Equally there is for me no empirical statement that would persuade me to accept that God does indeed exist. Hence, I do not believe that "God exists" is an empirical claim. — Ludwig V

I think beliefs of this kind are falsifiable, and empirically so. Of course, it is obviously easier to falsify a negative existence-claim than a positive existence-claim. What is generally overlooked in this thread is that people change their minds all the time on the question of God, and they often do so when presented with arguments or when faced with empirical considerations (miracles, suffering, psychological insights, etc.). If the theories being proffered by atheists and agnostics within this thread were sound, then no one would ever change their mind about religious propositions. The theories are therefore empirically inadequate given the way people often change their mind with regard to religious propositions (and faith propositions more generally).

If the atheist says, "I believe God does not exist, and nothing will ever convince me otherwise," then I would say they are just being stubborn and irrational. If there is nothing that would convince him otherwise, then he is not taking the question seriously.


P.S. I think you need to address this in order to ensure that our whole conversation is not based on a misunderstanding:

Well if something is false then it is truth-apt, so this makes me think that you don't understand what "truth-apt" means. — Leontiskos

No. We know more now than we did then. — T Clark

So you don't think science ever progresses or regresses on the criteria you laid out? You don't think there can be progression or regression in the matter of, "quality control and assurance," for instance?

Let's go back to this for a second. You've identified more scientific, less scientific, and pseudoscientific. You don't seem to have left any room for badly performed science. Is that less scientific or only lower quality. Haute cuisine is good cooking while my macaroni and cheese made with Velveeta is bad cooking, but they're both cooking. — T Clark

They're both cooking: some better, some worse. Two things can both be science, some better, some worse. "Badly performed science," would presumably be less scientific. As @Srap Tasmaner noted, the method and the conclusions are interconnected.

Are you saying that scientificity is as easy to define and measure as speed? Isn’t that really the question on the table here? You and I disagree. I think scientificity is a very, very great deal less obvious. — T Clark

Does "scientific" mean something? If it does, then it looks like we have to admit that some things are more scientific and other things are less scientific. If a criterion such as, "quality control and assurance," is not uniform throughout every scientific discipline and age, then the strong science-pluralism that is being promoted within this thread looks to fail.

I agree that ways of life and propositions cannot be neatly separated. For me, at least, that was the significance of accept Hadot' remark. — Ludwig V

Okay, great.

The question will always be, then, whether P is really truth-apt and not false. — Ludwig V

Well if something is false then it is truth-apt, so this makes me think that you don't understand what "truth-apt" means.

If P is not truth-apt, then of course S need not be truth-apt.

Hinge propositions are not non-truth-apt. They are true, in such a way that whatever else gets questioned in the debate, they are protected from reputation. — Ludwig V

I don't know what "being protected from reputation" means, but the point is that truth-apt things are open to scrutiny.

Ways of life, on the other hand, in Wittgenstein's use of the term, are the foundations of language and are the basis of our understanding of truth and falsity, so not truth-apt, any more than practices are. Practices are just our way of doing things; they include the ways in which we establish truth and falsity. In practice, our lives are more complicated than that, and our ways of life and practices are always liable to development and change, often in response to facts about the world. But the relationship goes two ways and is more complicated than material implication. — Ludwig V

I suppose I just stand by what I already said. If Wittgenstein thinks his "ways of life" are not truth-apt and yet entail true or false propositions, then he is in a pickle.

Thatl would be a bad argument. — Ludwig V

It's the argument at the bottom of Wittgenstein's and everyone else's strange claims about the fundamentals being non-truth-apt.

So, could I ask what arguments you propose as evidence that God exists? — Ludwig V

I don't usually engage that question in these contexts, as the inquirer is just looking for something to try to debunk. I'm also not sure what it has to do with this conversation, especially given that you said my point about relativism, "Would be a bad argument."

two people have a right to make a contract — Outlander

I would say that all sorts of laws and positive rights restrict one's right to contract. The GDPR is not unique in this.

But I am really not up on Terms of Service (ToS) law. I know it's a complicated area.

- I've been publicly in favor of limiting the ability to edit posts to < 5 minutes for a long time. I'm pretty sure Plush Forums doesn't provide that middle-ground option.

And I think the GDPR is too strong on that front, but I don't actually know the legal history of that article.

- I don't know of any forums that are prepared to fight the legal battles required to oppose the colloquial sense of Article 17 of the GDPR. In theory they could fight those battles, sure.

The point here is that although it would be nice to retain a user's posts even against their will, there are significant legal impediments to doing so, at least in many countries. One possible workaround is to purge their identity and username but retain the posts, but even this would generally break backlinks and discombobulate the conversation history.

Forgive me. I get your drift. However ways of life, unlike propositions about them, are not true or false. But they can be validated by or founded on facts which are articulated by propositions; those propositions need to be true if they are to do their job. — Ludwig V

I mean, you could give your definition of "true," but the point here is that if ways of life can be validated by propositions (facts) then they can also be invalidated by propositions. Ways of life and propositions cannot be neatly separated.

In one way, you are quite right. However, I am puzzled why there appears to be no end to the argument about the existence of God and inclined to think that the possibility of such an argument is an illusion. — Ludwig V

"God exists," is a proposition, and there is no "the" argument for it. There are lots of different arguments for and against the existence of God.

But yes, relativists will say, "People endlessly disagree about proposition X, therefore it must not be truth-apt." That's a common argument.

Wittgenstein articulates the concept of "hinge" propositions — Ludwig V

I think hinge propositions are another example of the confusion I outlined, insofar as they involve the claim that non-truth-apt axioms entail truth-apt propositions.

and then there's Presuppositional apologetics - Wikipedia — Ludwig V

Another example of the confusion, in my opinion.

All I'm saying here is that there are alternatives to hammering round the ancient necessary proofs and empirical arguments. — Ludwig V

My point is that no "way of life," "hinge proposition," or, "presupposition(alism)" is immune to propositions and facts. I would say that the erection of such immunity is based on the confusion that I outlined <here>.

A lot of this goes back to what I said about the relation between the true and the good, for ways of life are predicated primarily upon goodness and yet are not separate from considerations of truth.

See for example Article 17 of the GDPR.

I would suggest that in general it should not be allowed — unenlightened

As I understand it, in some jurisdictions users have a legal right to have their posts and identity removed from the website if they so wish. Most forum software make it possible for administrators to do a full deletion for this reason.

Welcome to the forum. Excellent first post. :up:

So, this argument somewhat resembles an argument given by Ed Feser in his book Five Proofs for the Existence of God which he names the "Neo-Platonic Proof." — CaptainCH

See Bob Ross' post , where he gives a reference to Feser.

If you were to be the recipient of God’s grace and forgiveness, that was entirely up to God. — Wayfarer

Coincidentally, in the homily this weekend the priest talked about this. He noted that he encourages the bride and the groom to memorize the vows, yet that some do try to memorize them but then mistakenly say, "Take this ring as a sign of my love and fidelity," whereas the words in the Catholic ceremony are, "Receive this ring as a sign of my love and fidelity." He was riffing on reception as active, which was also a big theme of the Second Vatican Council. The difference between reception and passivity (and also between taking and receiving).

(never mind the dour Biblical verse 'God is no respecter of persons' Acts 10:34) — Wayfarer

Lol - Acts 10:34 means that God does not play favorites:

And Peter opened his mouth and said: “Truly I perceive that God shows no partiality, but in every nation any one who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him.” — Acts 10:34-35, RSV

The point here is that God is not like the judge who gives you an unfavorable verdict just because he dislikes you, regardless of what you did or did not do. The context is that Cornelius is acceptable to God even though he is a Gentile. There are problems with reading the KJV in a contemporary idiom. :razz:

- I saw you say that! I found it interesting. It's something I will have to consider further.

- I wasn't following his posts very carefully, but my hunch is that it might be unrelated to the discussion itself. Maybe he just felt that he was spending too much time on TPF and made a strong decision to leave.

- A dramatic exit!

Logical, mathematical and empirical truths are "one for all", not so much metaphysical "truths". — Janus

That's nonsense, and evidence for this is the fact that you put 'truths' in scare quotes. You yourself know that you are not talking about truths when you talk about things that are not true for all.

The idea that there are metaphysical "truths" that are not truths makes no sense at all. Why do people on TPF keep peddling this nonsense? Why don't they just admit that they don't believe metaphysical claims are truth-apt? That's what the moral antirealists do, and at least their claims aren't facially incoherent.

The notion that a metaphysical proposition is true but not true for all is just as incoherent as the notion that 2+2=4 is true but not true for all.

How would we differentiate it? It looks a lot like set theory to me. — Moliere

In set theoretic terms, one thing we could say is that every species is a subset and every genus is a superset. Another difference is that the species/genus schema is not predicated on the bare particulars of modern logic. That is a nominalist innovation. See for example the last quote provided <here>.

Because, for him, the genera are real. When he moves up the chain there's no such thing as a black swan, for instance. It's different from mathematical induction in that it's about concretes, but it's like mathematical induction because the sets are real and the induction is thought to apply to all cases, which is what secures the claim to validity. Also, since I'm thinking about these as sets, where a genera is only a more general set than some given species, so I think he quite literally thinks the world is structured like his categories. There's still a basic material, but it requires some form -- like a cause -- in order for something to be real. This makes sense for him because ultimately where we end up is in a finite universe which is produced by the mind of God thinking himself into being. So the categories are a part of our world, and not just our experience, and certainly not just a way of ordering our thoughts. That's why there wouldn't be any invalidity in moving up, inductively -- the categories have an essence which makes it to where there's no problem making an inference from the particular to the general. — Moliere

I'm wondering if you can make sense of that bolded portion? "Aristotle's induction would be valid given his presupposition of X, but since X is false it is invalid." It actually seems that if your account is correct, then what is at stake is not induction at all, but rather a disjunctive syllogism. In that case it is only a matter of determining which "category" the phenomena in question belongs to, which is much different even from mathematical induction.

But I think I understand your general thrust. "Aristotle looks at one swan and sees that it is white. Then he looks at a second and sees that it is white. After doing this 100 times, he infers that every subsequent swan will be white, and that's like mathematical induction."

That's intelligible, but I just don't think it's what Aristotle is doing. It's what Hume understands by induction, not Aristotle, which is why I pointed to Hume at the beginning of this chapter of our conversation. Aristotle's view is represented by the essays I linked <here>.

Simplified, Aristotle is basically saying that familiarity breeds understanding. If we become familiar with swans then we will begin to understand swans. There is no guarantee for Aristotle that there are no black swans. There is no Humean induction.

Basically because we can always be wrong when we follow a procedure of induction it's never valid -- there is at least one case where the inference could be false, where we are mistaken about the object we are talking about, so it fails to the basic definition of validity. — Moliere

I think recently said something that parallels your basic error in this. With Hume you think analysis is possible and legitimate but synthesis is impossible and illegitimate. Aristotle's epagōgē ("induction") is a matter of synthesis; of moving from the particular to the universal. Sime helpfully identifies the false assumptions underlying anti-synthesis thinking, but it is also worth noting that no one actually believes Hume, not even himself. No one actually believes that familiarity does not breed understanding, and no one believes that there are no truths about species. If Hume were right then we could not even say that swans can fly, or that swans can honk. For the Humean there is no possibility of saying, "We can't know that swans are white, but we can know that swans can fly and honk."

I think post-modern skepticism re grand narratives, and a more general skepticism of logos's capacity for leading human life, has a larger impact on popular culture that is often acknowledged (through a variety of pathways, particularly its effect on the liberal arts). I'd argue that it is this skepticism that makes truth threating (rather than empowering) for democracy. That is, truth and reason should make democracy more secure, but in this climate the two come into conflict. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Can you say more about why post-modern skepticism makes truth threatening?

When faced with tensions between duty and personal pleasure or self-aggrandizement, reasonableness is not the sort of principle that gets people to do the hard thing, especially not when that means taking on significant risks. For that, you need a sense of thymos, arete, and pietas, all the old civic virtues. — Count Timothy von Icarus

A good point.

Certainly, thymos can lead to great evils, but it also leads to great goods. That's Plato's whole point. Logos needs to rule through thymos. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Where could I find this in Plato? This is the sort of thing that I tend to think Simpson neglects in his critique of liberalism.

Because “goodness as rationality” hinges on individuals’ separate systems of ends, a fully common good and ultimately the (ontological) “common or matching [moral] nature” (1971, 523; cf. 528; 1999, 459; cf. 463) on which it must be founded cannot be said to exist within Rawls’s liberal paradigm. — Mary Keys - Aquinas, Aristotle, and the Promise of the Common Good

Excellent. :up:

Rawls has a "thick" theory in some respects, but this conception of the common good is thin. I don't think it's thick enough to support the demands of civilization in the long run, although it might work well enough for a while, especially for a civilization with economic and martial hegemony already in place and an existing culture it can draw on for values. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Simpson would add that Rawls himself admits that he is incapable of adjudicating in favor of Western values over any other value system. His project is a working out of the axioms of Western values without being in any way able to justify those values. This is similar to Keys' point.

"Physicalism" is a very common contemporary view that is usually recognized to be a form of materialism. It seems to me that all sorts of people believe this stuff. See for example Baden's thread, "The Empty Suitcase: Physicalism vs Methodological Naturalism."

I think Materialism is a metaphysical ideology that came about due to mainstream society overlooking synthesis and intepreting science and the scientific method, which only concern analysis, as being epistemically complete. Consequently, the impossibility of inverting physics back to first-person reality, was assumed to be due to metaphysical impossibility rather than being down to semantic choices and epistemic impossibility, leading society towards a misplaced sense of nihilism by which first-person phenomena are considered to be theoretically reducible to an impersonal physical description, but not vice-versa. — sime

Excellent. :up:

I think when @Count Timothy von Icarus talks about "smallism," he is basically talking about the idea that reducing wholes to parts is a legitimate move, but synthesizing parts into wholes is not. Or else that only the former is explanatorily or epistemically useful.

If materialism is, as you assert, a popular and intuitively attractive view, then I don't find your characterizations of it plausible. — SophistiCat

So apparently you find his characterization unattractive. Do you have some reason why you think it is unattractive?

I'm a bit cautious about a general claim about all religious claims. I don't exclude the possibility that some, even many, may be truth-apt. But I do think that an important part of religious claims are interpretations of the world that are the basis of various ways of life and practices and that those interpretations are not truth-apt. The same applies to secularism and atheism. — Ludwig V

I would lay out a general principle that addresses all sorts of things on TPF.

Suppose that S → P, and P is truth-apt. It follows that S is truth-apt. It doesn't really matter what kind of thing S is. S could be a way of life or practice.

For example, if S is the "way of life" of theism or atheism, and P is a proposition like, "God exists," then we have a case where a way of life is truth-apt. If P is true, and yet is made false by a way of life, then that way of life is to that extent false.

It would be hard to overemphasize how relevant this is to all sorts of things that are said on TPF. For example, fdrake gets at something very similar when he resists the notion that a stance is simply "upstream" of facts:

Nevertheless Alice's beliefs have not been formally refuted in accordance with only the logical principles of their connection, she would need to change a stance defining principle - trust AI more. Which would be a belief about which methodologies are admissible. But that would render discoveries, facts, results - methodology - as potential changes for the admissibility of methodologies, and thus undermine a stance's construal as "upstream" from facts and matters of ontology. — fdrake

When Pierre Hadot emphasizes the way that ways of life and discourse are mutually influencing, he is crucially aware that latter also influences the former.

,

Here is a silly example. Suppose someone is a dog speed pluralist. All dogs are capable of running at the same top speed.

In response we could point to the same dog at a young age, a prime age, and an old age, noting differences in speed. We might point to differences in speed within the same litter or breed. We might point to differences between breeds (size, breeding purpose, etc.). We could easily infer that given the way that speed varies over an individual dog's life and between dogs of the same breed, therefore speed will also vary between breeds.

This is obvious, but I want to say that scientificity is not a great deal less obvious. There is a generation of people that really like egalitarianism, and they project it everywhere. Yet the simple fact of the matter is that almost nothing in nature or in life is equal. Therefore sweeping generalizations of equality are almost always wrong, such as, "All the sciences are equally scientific."

As to , I see this as a moral confusion more than anything else. "If we don't say that all the sciences are equally scientific, then we are being immoral," or, "If truth exists then some people will be wrong, and it is to make others wrong." What is needed is a way in which to be intellectually honest without being immoral.

(, I will come back to this post of yours)

Okay, that's a good start. It seems to me that, given your substantial notion of science, pluralism among the sciences will not hold.

I could give an alternative argument for this view. Do we agree that sciences can progress (and possibly regress)? For example, do we agree that the field of molecular physics fulfilled your criteria better in the 20th century than in the 19th century? If so, then it seems that molecular physics was more scientific in the 20th century than in the 19th century, and therefore scientific pluralism does not hold between 19th and 20th century molecular physics. We simply cannot say that both were equally scientific.

The next step isn't so hard. It's just the idea that that difference between 19th and 20th century molecular physics is also possible between different contemporaneous sciences, and in all likelihood inevitable. Scientificity ebbs and flows within fields and between fields. How could it be otherwise?

My thesis here is that pluralism will begin to fail insofar as 'science' begins to mean anything substantial at all. — Leontiskos

intellectual honesty should disabuse one of the idea of "one truth for all" — Janus

If we are intellectually honest then we do not talk about "truth" if we are subjectivists. "The same truth for all," is vacuously true, and follows from the notion of truth itself. If 2+2=4 is true then it is true for all, not just for some. That's what truth means. *sigh*

The intellectually honest naysayer needs to start admitting that they don't think religious claims are truth-apt. They can't have it both ways:

I think religious claims are truth apt. That may be the elephant in the room here. — Leontiskos

And so none of this discussion of ‘what is faith’ is necessarily about God or a religion. And further, relegating faith to belief without reason or incorrigible choice, only misunderstands faith (or far too narrowly construes it), and misunderstands the role of evidence and reasoning, and consent, and how people are called to act in everyday practical situations all of the time. — Fire Ologist

Yep. :100: