I'd like some coherent story of what these NHI people are doing here. — unenlightened

This is fun! But, like @unenlightened, I require more information before I could have an intelligent opinion. This is quite often the case with so-called "magical hypotheses," in which you're presented with some outrageous counterfactual situation (usually ethical) and then asked "What should you do?" All one can say is, "I have no idea, given this scanty data. Can you tell me why the brain is in the vat / why the people are on the trolley line / why the evil Programmer has put me on Twin Earth . . .?" etc. etc.

Yes, that's a useful distinction, although I don't think the two are unrelated. The numbers you are adding up play a role in the second sense of "reasons." They are the reason you add those numbers and not any other. The signs on the paper are the content determining cause of some of your thoughts. That's the causality unique to signs, to make us think one thing instead of any other. — Count Timothy von Icarus

I'm glad the distinction makes sense to you as well. I may not quite be following what you say next, though. The numbers -- that is, the specific marks on paper -- are the reason, in the sense that I would give as "my reason," for why I perform that particular addition and no other. You're saying, as well, that these signs (presumably uninterpreted?) cause some of my thoughts, that they "make me think one thing instead of any other." Does this process stop with the identification of one number? Or does it also compel the first sum, then the next, then the next . . .? It's that kind of physical-ish causality that I'm leery of, if you really do mean that I had no choice other than to "think one thing." But before I go on about that, tell me whether I've grasped your point.

Misunderstand, or just don't agree with? — Count Timothy von Icarus

I'm not sure which is the case for you, that's true.

You apparently have the idea of a government that can "give answers" on matters such as human telos, or avoid doing so. But what would this mean in practice? - J

This was a genuine question for you. There is a classical liberal response to the question of how a government would "give answers" on such weighty questions -- that it involves unacceptable uses of state power -- this was the answer I sketched. I'm still wondering how you think of it, though; I'm not really sure which part of the position seems wrong to you. How ought the state, as you conceive it, give answers about the human telos, and why would that be acceptable?

. . . when [the state] answers such questions. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Again . . . what do you mean? Who is answering, and with what means? Do you mean through laws, or proclamations, or economic policies? I know you have something in mind but I can't see it yet.

One person's individual liberty can be justly constrained only because it "gums up the works for everyone else," i.e. because it infringes on other's individual liberty. — Count Timothy von Icarus

I'm still at a basic loss about what you conceive the alternative to be. What would be the other, presumably more attractive, reason for constraining individual liberty?

Here is a potential confusion. We might say we think or do something "for no reason at all," when what we really mean is "we acted without any rational deliberation." — Count Timothy von Icarus

Causes and reasons are fairly synonymous in some senses. — Count Timothy von Icarus

“There is a reason that X . . .” is different than “I have a reason for X,” when X is some belief or action. In the first case, it’s closer to saying “Something caused X”; in the second case, it’s saying, “Here is why I chose X.” So, while I agree that the equivocal overlap in usage can create the sense of synonymy, it’s usually more perspicuous to keep them distinct.

This can also be brought out with another example. You give me a string of numbers and ask me to add them up. I do so, and say, “Fifty.” Have I been caused to say “Fifty”? Or would we say that I can give my reasons for saying “Fifty”? And if I’ve added incorrectly? My reasons, as we’d ordinarily understand the word, for saying “Fifty” can’t be the same as what caused me to say “Fifty.”

I realize that's grossly over-simplified, but starting from the premiss that society and government are impositions on us is a mistake. — Ludwig V

Not grossly, though we both know there are important nuances left out. And funnily enough, I associate the position that "government imposes on individual freedoms" with certain strands of conservatism, not liberalism. The current hatred, in the US, of the federal government by right-wingers may be an offshoot of this, though of course no intelligent conservative would create DOGE.

I daresay there are strands of liberal thought that downplay the role of societal formation, and imagine a citizen as being in a position to make some ideal free choices. All I can say is, Rawls and Habermas (if you count him as a liberal theorist) are painstakingly aware of the trade-offs here.

Well I don't want to say that interpretations of mystical or religious experience cannot be correct, but I would say that there is no way of determining whether or not they are correct. — Janus

Yes, this is a good distinction. I stand by my hunch that those who firmly oppose such interpretations go further than you, and claim that they could not be correct. This moots the question about how we could determine whether they are.

It seems we have three sources of grounding for our beliefs, or if you prefer, the premises upon which we base our (hopefully) consistent reasoning―logic, perceptual observation, and reflection on and generalization from experience. The latter is what I would say phenomenology at its best consists in. — Janus

That third category is the problematic one. Is this where we'd put hermeneutics? Do you allow that hermeneutics can produce genuine knowledge? In its original sense of textual interpretation, we want to say that there can be better or worse readings, and that some readings can be known to be incorrect, and that some (perhaps quite small) group of readings can be known to be correct. Let's say this is so. Do we arrive at knowledge here by generalization from experience? I think so, but what kinds of experience? The experiences themselves are neither perceptual (that is, physical) nor logical.

Likewise we have no way of determining whether our beliefs about the reliability of others' judgements, or our scientific theories are correct, even though it seems reasonable to think we have a better idea about the veracity of those based on whether the predictions they yield are observed.

The only certainties would seem to be the logical, including mathematics, and the directly observable. — Janus

Yes, but I thought we agreed that this level of certainty is not what we require for something to count as knowledge. I know the special theory of relativity is correct, though I am not absolutely certain, because I can't do the math. On the JTB model, I think my belief is justified because of how I rate the scientific community which asserts it. I could be wrong. Just about all knowledge claims can be defeated. But I think it does violence to what we mean by "knowing something" to take this as a formal skepticism about non-analytic knowledge statements.

Oh, and the obvious reason that LNC is taken as a metaphysical or epistemic principle is that it is a grammatical principle, and our language is common to both. Language underpins both. — Banno

This is interesting. But it's open to the objection: How do we know that it's the language that underpins the metaphysics and the epistemology, rather than the reverse -- that the language has developed to reflect the metaphysics and epistemology? This, by the way, wouldn't involve positing a pre-linguistic metaphysical practice of some sort. We could have been building the grammar as we went along.

The leap from "no determinate causes" to "no reason at all" in particular still eludes me, too, and in particular because it "raises the unpleasant spectre of there being only one reasonable way to think and do". — Banno

The OP I started a while back, "Epistemic Stances and Rational Obligation," discusses this in some detail. Can't recall whether you and @Count Timothy von Icarus followed it. The debate there, between scientific realist Pincock and "voluntary epistemic stance" advocate Chakravartty, is a sharp one, and highlights the stakes. Essentially, what we want to know is whether "a reason" must cash out to "an obligatory cause" of holding a particular belief. This is troubling, as discussed on the thread.

Thanks for a considered and sympathetic response. — Banno

I always try, when the person I'm responding to shows the same traits.

So better, perhaps, to say that agreeing with either p or ~p is what we do, rather than a rule. — Banno

Hmm, this may wind up mattering quite a bit, but let's not worry about it for the moment.

There's this, about (p v ~p): "My puzzle is: How is it that these are two phenomena, which resemble each other so closely yet have such different objects?" The trite response is that p and ~p are not phenomena. What they are has been answered at length and in different ways. But further, what is salient, and what we discussed in our previous conversations concerning Frege, is that we read (p v ~p) as about one thing, not two. That's part of the function of "⊢" in Frege. — Banno

Some confusion here, likely my fault. By "two phenomena" I didn't mean p and its negation, but rather 1. the phenomenon of (p v ~p) as what I called a logical law, and 2. the phenomenon of (p v ~p) as a description of what must be the case concerning objects in the world. (Again, by using words like "phenomena" or "objects" I'm only seeking neutral nouns; no metaphysical baggage implied.) So I think your response involving Frege, while true, doesn't address my puzzle. My puzzle wants to know how it is the case -- if it is the case -- that we can understand 'p' as referring either to a logical proposition or, say, a rock.

Our difference may be that I think there is a point at which our spade is turned, a point at which the only answer is "It's what we do", but that you would try to dig further. I take the "counts as..." function to be sufficient, so that putting the ball in the net counts as a goal, no further explanation being possible. You seem to me to want to ask why it counts as a goal, to which the answer is it just does.

Does this seem a fair characterisation? — Banno

Yes.

So I'll throw the ball back - can you convince me that there is a further issue here that remains unanswered? — Banno

In reflecting on this, I notice that the difficulty is similar to the one I pointed out concerning allegedly pseudo- or misfiring questions. How can one demonstrate that a question is legitimate? The temptation is simply to reply, "Well, if you've never been troubled by this question, what can I say?" but I think that is a bad response. Getting people to be troubled by questions they haven't heretofore been troubled by is a primary goal of philosophy! So let me try.

How about if, for starters, we both agree to eschew "game" analogies. I've often wondered if Witt understood the connotations of "game" in English. Certainly the implication that "It's all a game!" drives many people batty -- but I doubt he meant it that way, as a trivial pastime we could just as easily not engage in, or exchange for a different one. The point, surely, is about rules, and about how knowing the rules is a spade-turning experience.

Before I go further, does this seem OK so far?

Setting some criteria of relevance, to me, is a sibling to just saying there is such a thing as a definition. — Fire Ologist

More like a second cousin, I'd say, but I understand you. :wink: Again, though, let's keep in mind whether the "such a thing as a definition" is meant to refer to our innocuous, stipulated-for-the-purposes-of-discussion definition, or something more permanent and indisputable. Because the question of relevance can be similarly discriminated. Biologists are clear on their criteria of relevance for discussing and defining "tiger" in the second sense. We philosophers are not, when it comes to terms like "faith" -- again, excluding silly limit-case examples.

OK. With respect, you really need to read Kripke and his critics before tackling this. The concept of a rigid designator is indispensable for understanding what's being debated. All the things you're calling "obvious" about possible worlds and identity are the very topics of this discussion.

Naming and Necessity is a transcription of lectures that Kripke gave, very informal and accessible.

So while I don’t disagree with what you are saying, I don’t think you’ve said enough, or as much as I am saying. — Fire Ologist

That's fair. I could easily have added something about how even a stipulated or tentative definition is going to have to exhibit certain features, if there's to be any point to it. Which features, exactly? Lots of dispute about this. We probably want to include something that will prevent talking about "socks" as part of a discussion of what faith is. In other words, some criterion of relevance. But, apart from the obviously absurd cases, this is a lot harder than it looks.

I'll try to come back to this . . .

And so on. — Ludwig V

Of course. Some sort of absolute personal freedom to do anything whatsoever is a non-starter -- and has nothing to do with liberal political philosophy. I can't think of anyone, actually, for whom this is a "slogan" -- some early 20thC anarchists?

The context in which this came up was whether there's something sketchy about a government organizing itself "primarily to enable the freedom of the individual to flourish." I don't think either @Count Timothy von Icarus, who raised the question, or I meant to imply that such a government wanted to return its citizens to some nightmare of self-willed anarchy. The question, rather, was why a desire for individual freedom, in and of itself, should be suspect. I don't want to be free of traffic regulations; I very much want to be free to read what I like. I was asking why talking about "freedom" as the freedom for an individual to flourish seemed wrong-headed to Count T.

It's all a convoluted mess with the mind, with thoughts about things, or with language about thoughts about things, and further convoluted when we try to get two people to agree on the language about thoughts about things. It's why so many threads devolve into this same issue - "what can be said clearly, at all, ever, about anything?" — Fire Ologist

Welcome to philosophy!

you were forced to draw a clear line, provide a provisional, cursory, placeholder definition of "definition" to show a distinction between your concept of things and mine.

That is all my point is. — Fire Ologist

Then we're in accord. This is what I mean by "stipulating a definition for the purposes of discussion."

We dance around the elephant we keep inviting into the room when we think we are not defining things as we speak about things. — Fire Ologist

Well, this isn't quite so simple. Usually, when people talk about defining something, I think they have in mind more like a dictionary definition, an agreed-upon use of a word which makes it correct. But you've said, and I agree, that "stipulating a definition for the purposes of discussion" isn't like that. It's more like drawing a temporary distinction in terms so that two people can converse intelligently. I'm not sure what's elephantine here.

It's the question of "how do we know." It's "what is truth?" It's "What is meaning?" It's "What is a thing?". Same ultimate issues presented. Words-concepts-communication. — Fire Ologist

Just a suggestion: In a sense, you're right that all these Big Questions refer to, and hinge upon, each other, but by linking them up like this, they become so flabbergasting that it's hard to know where to start. It makes it sound as if you have to address them all, and all at once, in order to get any philosophical work done. In my experience, picking smaller, more tractable questions works better. You arrive at the big ones anyway, but the path is clearer.

it does rule out action that is not determined by prior actuality. Defaulting on this would be defaulting on things having causes and the world being intelligible. — Count Timothy von Icarus

I can just about imagine this, in the physical world, though the determinism is breathtakingly thorough. But does this principle also mean that everything you and I think and do is similarly poised between "determined by prior actuality" and "having no reasons at all"? Apart from the metaphysical difficulties around causes versus reasons, it also raises the unpleasant specter of there being only one reasonable way to think and do.

It would take us a while to sort out the differences in our terminology (potency, "determined by being", "moved to actuality by prior actuality," et al.) but that's all right, I just wanted to help you and @Banno disagree constructively -- may have failed completely! The leap from "no determinate causes" to "no reason at all" in particular still eludes me.

Oh, about the bent key: Surely it's just terminology? Sometimes we think of a key as something that opens X. Other times we think of it as a thing that used to open X, or ought to open X. If we favor the "working model," so to speak, then it's perfectly sensible to say of a bent key that it used to be the key to my house, but now isn't a key to anything, and that when it's bent back, it is so again. I didn't mean any of this to be controversial, sorry.

Thanks for this. I haven't forgotten you. I'll reply soon.

But that isn't what "your house key" means. If someone changes the locks on my door while I'm out, my key doesn't cease to be mine. And if I bend the key, it won't turn the lock, even though it is still the same key and the same lock. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Hmm, I dunno. In the first case, it's no longer my house key, though it is still mine. And in the second, calling it "the same key" is equivocal; it isn't really isn't a key any more at all.

If we allow "why does my key turn my lock?" to become an aporia, then what won't be? — Count Timothy von Icarus

Oh, I agree. I don't want it to be aporetic at all. It's just a hard question to answer, when the analogy is extended to logical primitives.

What would it mean for them to have different objects? It would mean that thought is arbitrarily related to reality. — Count Timothy von Icarus

I don't see why. Why must the difference be arbitrary? If anything, my puzzlement postulates the opposite: that it isn't arbitrary, that there ought to be some explanation. But you can't deny that a rock and a proposition are extremely different items.

If reality is arbitrarily, randomly related to appearances . . . — Count Timothy von Icarus

Again, you're reading way more into my position than I intended. Arbitrariness and randomness are not the only alternatives.

. . . unrelated to any thought or experience anyone has ever had, or could ever have? — Count Timothy von Icarus

And again. Why puff it up in this way? No one, least of all me, is saying anything like this.

PNC can be formulated as a metaphysical, epistemic, or semantic principle. — Count Timothy von Icarus

OK. So you're saying that, as it happens, it applies to three areas or types of phenomena. Or would "types of activity" be better? I don't want to put words in your mouth.

Ultimately, the latter will tie back to the former if the former is affirmed because being (existence) is prior to being experienced and being spoken about. — Count Timothy von Icarus

"Tie back" raises the problem once again. Why does it do so? In what way? The priority of existence to human experience wouldn't guarantee the fidelity of our descriptions of that existence. Why does the key fit?

I think what you're saying is that PNC is a principle both of thinking and of being, full stop. It (and its cousins in the P family :smile: ) is what we mean by "truth", mean by "exist". But if that is all that can be said, then shouldn't you agree with @Banno and Witt? Further questions about how or why this is the case would be ill-formed.

In other words, your classification of the ways we perceive and use PNC may be quite accurate, but it leaves untouched my question about why, about what grounds what. See my reply to @Banno above: How is it the case that the world, and our experience of it, is so structured? Does the PNC and its cousins represent spade-turning principles about both thinking and being, in the same way, and for the same reasons?

Now we might be tempted to ask why p v ~p is so much more useful than p ^ ~p. But isn't one answer here just that we can do more with it? That it is more useful because it is more useful? — Banno

I'm not sure that qualifies as an answer, even generously.
— J

It's not so much an answer as an attempt to show how the question misfires.

You seem to be in the position of someone who asks how it is that their key just happens to fit their front door and no one else's. — Banno

In a funny way, that is what I'm asking. It seems too good to be true -- not that the key fits, but that I find myself with that particular key to hand. — J

OK. Deep breath. No, I don't think your response is a deflection, as @Count Timothy von Icarus is suggesting. When a philosopher believes that a question is a not a good one -- that there is no answer that can be meaningfully given, because it doesn't discriminate between two genuine alternatives -- it's often hard to show this. Telling a little analogical story can help. Witt of course was the master of this.

So, faced with a question that you think is defective, you ask me to imagine myself puzzled about why my housekey fits my door, and only my door. Very well. Imagining this, what might puzzle me? It could be two things: I might ask, "Why does this key uniquely fit my door?" or I might ask "Why do I happen to have this key?"

Now I think what I'm supposed to imagine next is that both questions get an explanation or a deconstructive answer that can resolve my puzzlement. To the first question, the reply is, "Because that's what 'your housekey' means. You can't have 'your housekey' without it having both those attributes: it fits your lock, and only your lock. So if you understand 'your housekey', there is no further question to be asked about it." To the second question, the reply is, "Because that's how an object comes to be yours: you possess it, it's been made for you and given to you. Also, since it's an important object in your life, you'll have it to hand, and shouldn't be surprised that this is the case. Are you still puzzled about why you live in a world in which all people fortunate enough to be housed have keys? You just do; that is your world; there's nothing special about you."

Being a philosopher, I can make trouble for both these replies, but I don't really want to. On the whole, they're reasonable, as an account of the keys-and-locks "game." But I challenge whether the story is analogical to my questions about logical primitives.

(p v ~p) appears to fit -- to "be the key" -- to two types of phenomena. It appears to be a law of thought, perhaps normative, perhaps transcendentally descriptive, perhaps psychological, depending on how we rate Frege. It also appears to describe necessary facts about objects in the world, all things being equal. My puzzle is: How is it that these are two phenomena, which resemble each other so closely yet have such different objects? Or am I wrong about that? Must I simply accept that the "key" of logic fits the "lock" of the world? Is it the case that, just as you can't have "my housekey" without understanding "my uniquely fitting key", you can't have (p v ~p) without understanding "our description of the world" or perhaps "what we do, talking about the world"?

It's interesting that both the time-honored view of mind as reflecting the structure of reality -- a "unique fit" if there ever was one -- and the contemporary Witt-based view that questions about the relation of mind and reality are defective, aim at resolving the same question, the question I'm posing. I don't find either view persuasive on the merits. Both attempt to dismiss the question at a bedrock level. Each finds its "spade turned" at the idea that this just is how it is, though I think most earlier versions would postulate God as the reason.

I don't think what I've just written is a satisfactory rebuttal to the analogy of the locks and keys. I would need to say more about what makes logical items like (p v ~p) hold up under the deconstructive dismissal I've described. But for now, I just want to give a picture of how I see the question. If you want to correct my versions of how the question might be said to misfire, please do; I don't want to waste anyone's time with straw-persons.

If we do not accept that the frog can be both alive and dead, then a logic that allows this is not suitable. — Banno

Conversely, if we do accept it, then such a logic would be suitable? — Count Timothy von Icarus

I think you two are trying to formulate an answer to the question I keep posing: What is the LNC about? What is it a law of? What domain does it govern? What can fill in 'p'?

I don't want to interrupt your conversation, which perhaps you find fruitful, but you might take a stab at answering -- or dissolving -- that question, tentatively. I'll expand this in a subsequent reply to @Banno about the suspicious key that fits my lock.

The problem is that my "ordinary accumulations of experience cannot be obvious to anyone else, so I think my intuitions about something like choosing intuitively who to hire as Tom Storm gave as an example does not seem to offer any cogent justification for my believing his choice was correct unless I had my own accumulated experience that showed a substantial history of his good judgement of character. — Janus

I meant to suggest something similar, when I wrote about the trustworthiness of people's intuitions. Your intuition about the job candidate is private and, in an extreme case, unjustifiable to anyone but yourself. But my choice to trust your intuition can be justified fairly easily -- again, not with any absolute certainty.

the belief in the existence of God or that some metaphysical thesis is the true one are not experiences, but may be held on account of experiences, and in turn give rise to experiences. — Janus

Yes. This takes us to the question of meaning, of interpretation. My sense is that those who are firmly opposed to the idea of religious or mystical experiences believe that no conceivable interpretation of experience that include references to godlike entities could be correct. That, I'm sure we both agree, needs independent argumentation.

Could you say what you have in mind by something being in a different world "at the same time"? The same time as what? It's a different world, isn't it?
— J — Metaphysician Undercover

This was in relation to Banno's explanation: "Possible Worlds Semantics (PWS) avoids fatalism by allowing multiple possible futures, each with fixed truths...". The different possible futures, each with its fixed truth, would all refer to the same future time. So the same item would have contradictory properties, at the same time, because that same item would have existence in a multitude of different worlds, with different properties, at the same time. — Metaphysician Undercover

The bolded sentence is what I'm asking into. Do you conceive of possible worlds as sharing an actual, existential timeline? Such that event A in world W literally happens at the same time as event B in world Y? I remain troubled about what "sameness" would be here. The two events, being distinct, can't share the same space, so why would we imagine they could share the same time?

the same object maintains its identity as itself throughout the multitude of possible worlds (Kripke) . . . The first case (Kripke) violates the law of noncontradiction. — Metaphysician Undercover

Not as Kripke understands "same object" -- and I would argue that this is the common-sense understanding as well. You've read Naming and Necessity, I suppose? In his example, "Richard Nixon" is a rigid designator; thus, Nixon remains Nixon -- the "same object" -- regardless of whether he wins or loses the 1968 election. For this to violate some law of non-contradiction, you'd have to maintain that every single property, action, and attribute of a given object is essential to its being what it is. Do you really want to do that?

Good one! And in a funny way, that is what I'm asking. It seems too good to be true -- not that the key fits, but that I find myself with that particular key to hand. End of story? Hmmm (frowns suspiciously).

I'll pick this up again tomorrow (USA).

Do you still think that intuition is enough to justify acceptance of logic? — Banno

No. Maintaining the distinction between self-evidence and intuition, I think that e.g. modus ponens is self-evident but not intuitive. No further act of interpretation, such as described in the dream example, is needed to arrive at 'q'.

The problem remains about how this connects logic with the world. What is modus ponens self-evident about? Thought, or the world? I think this is still a problem even if you replace self-evidence with "it's what we do." Are we "doing it" with propositions or with objects?

logic is a grammar for our talk about how things are. — Banno

Indeed it is.

Now we might be tempted to ask why p v ~p is so much more useful than p ^ ~p. But isn't one answer here just that we can do more with it? That it is more useful because it is more useful? — Banno

I'm not sure that qualifies as an answer, even generously. Unless usefulness is an unanalyzable bedrock?

Asking why p v ~p and not p ^ ~p is like asking why the bishop stays on it's own colour, or why putting the ball in the net counts as scoring a goal. It's what we do. — Banno

This separates the Witts from the NitWitts. :wink: A NitWitt like me (on this particular topic) will deny that bishops and goals are good analogies for what p v ~p is. But as you know that's a long and intermittently fascinating discussion -- probably not for here.

OK, I'm completely confused now! Sorry it's gone amiss for you.

.

So there is no difference between arguing about a word and communicating about a concept. — Fire Ologist

I guess if we had any hope of sorting this out, we'd need to start there. My own view is that words and concepts are quite distinct. But we can let it go.

OK, so identity is preserved, even though the same thing, according to that identity, may have contrary properties in different worlds at the same time. — Metaphysician Undercover

Could you say what you have in mind by something being in a different world "at the same time"? The same time as what? It's a different world, isn't it?

I might be inclined to call your interpretation an insight rather than an intuition. — Banno

Consistent with recommendations I've made before, I'll say that I'm fine with either "insight" or "intuition" here -- and perhaps everywhere that "intuition" is used. The term is less important than what it's trying to capture. What I notice about the dream example is that it's about meaning -- a very special class of knowledge. Hermeneutics rather than factual truth. Might it be the case that this is how intuitions (or insights) gain their validity? We do want to say that we can know what something means. Is such knowledge intersubjectively valid?

Logic became more dynamic — a tool for reasoning, not a blueprint for metaphysical truth. — Banno

This brings up what seems to me a deep question, raised recently by Kimhi and others: What is the overlap between logic and the world (including, if you don't mind, metaphysics)? If we commit to a certain understanding of normative logic, must we also commit to some parallel truth about the world, whether metaphysical or everyday? Can 'p' equally refer to both a sentence and an object? Must it? In short, can logic really be just a tool rather than a map?

I'm agnostic on this question. But we can see how different answers to it will give rise to important differences in how we view the connection of mind and the world. Oddly, the sea-battle debate taking place over on the "Demonstrating Intelligent Design . . . " thread exemplifies the same question: Should a commitment to semantics, or logic, dictate what we say about the future, understood ontologically?

Hmm. Are you familiar with Taylor's work on this, and DF Wallace's response? Fate, Time, and Language (published under Wallace's name, though really it's an anthology) is an accessible discussion of how modal and Aristotelian versions of the sea-battle problem may conflict or find resolution. It includes the classic Taylor paper "Fatalism," along with several of Taylor's responses to his critics, and Wallace's ingenious suggestion for resolution -- though he does take the position that the problem is semantic rather than existential. You might want to take a look.

[Rawls] strongly believes that justice is best served by the government's regarding basic issues of religion and morals as "diverse and irreconcilable." — J

This was badly phrased, and gives the impression that Rawlsian liberalism would take no stand on, for instance, matters of public safety. What Rawls in fact says (in the opening pages of Political Liberalism) is that democratic societies will always be marked by disagreement on some moral doctrines, and that some of these disagreements may be both "perfectly reasonable" yet irreconcilable. Part of the job of a good liberal government will be to find a workable balance for these disagreements within a state that protects the rights and safety of its citizens.

Apologies for the poor gloss.

Lots of liberal theory sounds utopian, that's true. I remember thinking that with Rawls. But this is also true of plenty of Marxist theory — Count Timothy von Icarus

And my personal favorite, Habermasian social democracy, as well. It seems to come with the territory, since our states are so far from utopian.

If you have a theory of government that avoids giving answers on man's telos, instead making this a private, individualized matter, then what is important is enabling the private exploration and attainment of that telos, whatever the individual determines it to be. — Count Timothy von Icarus

This is where I think you misunderstand liberalism, or the Rawlsian version, at any rate. You apparently have the idea of a government that can "give answers" on matters such as human telos, or avoid doing so. But what would this mean in practice? How does a state "give an answer"? The liberal replies: by imposing authority, by precluding or impeding the realization of answers that disagree with the state position. And this it must not do, if a reasonable degree of individual freedom is to be preserved. Or, if by "give an answer," you simply mean that a state can name founding principles while ensuring that active, legitimate opposition is respected ... well, that is liberal democracy!

Also, as I've noted before, to say "what is important is . . ." implies that it's the only important thing. But Rawls considers many factors to be important, not least of which is finding a just balance between "enabling private exploration" and gumming up the works for everybody. It's essential to keep this concern for balance in mind when discussing Rawls. He simply doesn't fit the model of "advocate of individualism."

many people who claim that political theory should not be based on morality — Count Timothy von Icarus

Who are these people? Rawls is obsessively concerned with morality, ethics, and justice -- he just doesn't see them in the terms you do. He strongly believes that justice is best served by the government's regarding basic issues of religion and morals as "diverse and irreconcilable." The crucial emphasis is on regarding. We must insist on public neutrality in this arena -- demand that our government take this attitude -- regardless of what we may personally hold true, if we want a just society.

Good government is a priority, and can be given extremely expansive focus in progressive liberalism, but it's also there primarily to enable [the freedom of] the individual to flourish. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Suppose you removed the bracketed phrase, so we're just talking about individual flourishing. Wouldn't that be OK? It certainly would be to me, and I think to Rawls. So what is it about "freedom" that seems so wrong-headed to you? Is it the idea that humans may flourish best when they are not politically or economically free? Genuinely not sure what you have in mind here.

I don't get seeing "faith" as one of those things that cannot be usefully defined, and then continuing to talk about faith. Ridiculous. — Fire Ologist

There's an aspect of the ridiculous to it, quite often: People talking past each other, banging their metaphorical tables, never appearing to notice that they aren't talking about the same thing. No doubt many of these conversations would be better off with a stipulation everyone could accept for the time being.

That said, you're certainly putting a lot of faith (sorry!) in the idea of a definition. Has it actually been your experience that, without clear definitions that can be shown beforehand to be correct, progress can't be made in intellectual areas?

I think the insistence on lexical correctness is the problem. This is a matter of whether a word fits a concept, yes? You have a certain concept and you believe that the word "faith," let's say, fits that concept, just as biologists have examined our concept of "tiger" and clarified our word for it. In discussing this with someone else, you might find that they understand your concept quite well, and agree with much that you say about it; however, they don't think "faith" is the right word to apply.

So: shall the two of you wrangle about who is correct about the word "faith"? What would be the point? How would you ever settle it? What you're interested in is a particular concept (or fill in whatever your metaphysics may allow here, if you don't care for concepts). Rather than arguing about a word, why not keep looking at the concept, the idea, the thing under discussion, under whatever name or description?

And when all that is over, and in the happy event that the two of you see eye to eye, you might realize, "Ah, it seems that 'trust' might be more helpful here in capturing what we've been talking about. Let's share what we've learned with others and recommend they also adopt this use of 'trust.'" Now if you want to call that "discovering a definition," I can't stop you, but I think definitions are established by universal agreement within a particular community, not by the sort of ameliorative process I just described. What makes the use of a word like "trust" helpful or not helpful, in a sample case like this, will be whether it carves up the conceptual territory in a perspicuous way, a way that lets us understand what relates to what, in the cluster of concepts under examination. It's not because it was the "correct word" all along, nor does it become the "correct word" now. We can only recommend, on intelligent grounds.

When talking about “x”, such as “faith” or “metaphysics” or “cats, not mats”, we can either talk about “x” using definitions, or we can talk about the difficulties of “talking about x” and avoid talking about x and instead talk about talking. — Fire Ologist

I understand what you mean, but why not do both? As I was saying over on the other thread, there's a great deal to be learned about the methods of philosophy by "talking about talking." And there's no need to avoid the more specific topics, just because a hard-and-fast definition of some term may elude us. Two different conversations, no?

I agree it is hard to define certain ideas, like faith. But admitting the difficulty in fixing one permanent all inclusive definition of things like “faith” is not the same thing as admitting “there are no definitions, or essences or meanings of words to define.” — Fire Ologist

No indeed. I contrasted this with "tiger," saying:

"Another reason I'm in favor of being more self-conscious about terminological wrangles is that we can learn something, in the process, about what can be usefully defined. That poor tiger we talk so much about can in fact be given a definition which admits of being accurate or inaccurate. It may not be the "only way to define a tiger," but it allows us to sort them out with near-perfect success, and accords with a naming tradition (biology) that has won universal acceptance. Such is not the case, sadly, for putative definitions of love, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, to name three. So . . . what is the difference? Plenty of food for philosophical thought here."

So it's not the question of definition as such, but rather of whether and how to try to define terms like "faith" or "metaphysics" that lack universal acceptance, definitionally. But even here, it's fine to stipulate for the purposes of discussion. What I'm calling the "wrangle" begins when someone tries to claim that the stipulation is correct.

Words like “faith” are notoriously slippery and context-dependent, and reducing them to a single formula (like “faith is trust in authority”) oversimplifies the richness of how people actually use them — Areeb Salim

This, interestingly, is very similar to the point I made about "metaphysics," over on the "Hotel Manager" thread, where we began discussing whether "a wrangle over definitions" is usually useful or not. Trying to pin down a definition does, as you say, ignore what might be learned from a variety of usages. But anyway, the underlying assumption is dodgy at best: That one of these definitions is correct. We can stipulate a definition for the purposes of a discussion, or we can talk about how "faith" or "metaphysics" was defined and used in a particular tradition, or by a particular philosopher, but beyond that . . .?

Another possible way to characterize the difference: PWS avoids fatalism because it doesn't allow semantics to determine what will be ontologically true. Aristotle's formulation, it seems to me, wants to hold "the future" fixed, ontologically, and monkey with the laws of logic as he understood them in order to avoid fatalism. As Wallace puts it:

[Richard] Taylor's claim [in "Fatalism," following Aristotle] was never really that fatalism was actually "true," only that it was forced upon us by a proof from certain basic logical and semantic principles. — Fate, Time and Language, 212

Good questions and thoughts here. Just to address one thing quickly:

. Do you mean are there any cases where I feel absolutely certain that something I intuit to be true, but which cannot in any way be tested, is really the case? — Janus

No, I think "absolute certainty" as a synonym for "knowledge" is way too high a bar. I have in mind the same criteria for knowledge we'd use in the ordinary cases. "I know the sun is shining." "Are you absolutely certain?" "Not absolutely. Memory and perception can be false at times. But I'm happy to insist that I know this fact nonetheless."

If we ground our logic in self-evidence or in intuition, . . . — Banno

I think we should preserve @Janus' distinction between self-evidence and intuition. The standard logical forms are arguably self-evident in the way you describe: "To understand the operator "⊃", is to understand that if p and p⊃q, then q. Asserting p and p⊃q counts as asserting q." Let's say that this is so, and that "self-evidence" is a good-enough way to describe this. Then we want "intuition" to mean something else, something that is not "contained in the premises" or "understanding a language game."

But this, I would say, is no longer a matter of grounding logic. I agree with everything you say about the necessity of grounding logic in shareable, normative principles. (And this also agrees with your claim that "[Intuitions are] a pretty poor grounding for the whole of rationality.") But this seems very different from saying, "I intuit that so-and-so is a good job candidate" or "I intuit that my interpretation of my dream is correct." "Intuition" may be an awkward stand-in for some other process, but at any rate it's not the same thing as pointing to logical self-evidence or unquestionable first principles of rationality.

So, you [@Tom Storm] have rightly drawn attention to the fact that intuition is not one simple kind of thing at all. — Janus

Right, but how we want to discriminate them and evaluate them is not obvious. The suggestion here seems to draw the line between some ordinary accumulation of experience which is shareable, more or less, with others, versus an esoteric metaphysical/religious insight which isn't produced by any kind of accumulation of experience, but is strictly personal. In short:

Intuitions which are based on accumulated experiences and prior processes of reasoning are different than intuitions about gods or metaphysical ideas. — Janus

Devotees of various religious traditions and practices would certainly find this odd. The whole point about such ways of life is that they are based on accumulated experiences, both personal and collective. But I won't try to argue for that here.

They may even feel that what they intuitively know is an absolute or objective truth, but none of this can be anything more than faith-based, and as such not susceptible of rational justification. This seems to be very hard to accept for those who think this way. — Janus

The key phrase here is "not susceptible of rational justification." That is so. But see above. What allows us to insist that rational justification, based on self-evident principles perhaps, is the only legitimate means to achieve intersubjective agreement? Two things about this: First, it's a preference that is deeply rooted in doing philosophy at all, and one that I share. I like things to be rational and intersubjectively justifiable! Most of what I philosophize about falls into this category. But it is not the entire compass of knowledge. Second, it is surely true that dogmatic folks get annoyed when others don't accept their intuitions, especially if they believe they can give a good rational account of them. So much the worse for dogmatism. But it's equally true that many folks (lo, even on TPF :wink: ) find it very hard to accept the idea that rational justification is not necessarily the only gate to wisdom.

This gets us to the problem of how an intuition, no matter how firmly held by the individual, might be justified intersubjectively. I'll pick a low-voltage example, one that doesn't raise hackles about religion or metaphysics. Last night, let's say, I dreamt about crashing my car, which in the dream was an Aston Martin. I've never owned such a car. Upon awakening, it isn't immediately clear what the dream signifies. I'm aware, though, that I frequently use cars, both waking and dreaming, as a symbol for "my life" or "my life direction." And now I experience a flash of insight, an "intuition." Many years ago, I was married to a British woman and looked forward to moving there with her, and restarting my life there. But the dream, and the marriage, failed, to my great sadness. So the crashing of the Aston Martin was a concise image for the death of this particular hope, which my psyche has yet to fully accept. (Please pardon the dash of autobiography.)

So . . . what is the status of the truth claims involved in this intuition? For my part, I know this interpretation is correct. (I'm not absolutely certain, though, as explained above.). The knowledge relies on the idea that a dream may indeed be interpreted correctly. I think that if someone wanted to challenge my intuition, they'd want to do it at that level, by questioning the idea of interpretation tout court. But if it's granted that dreams have meanings, then my intersubjective audience is likely to also grant me my knowledge of what the dream means to me. So let's call this an example of intuitive knowledge. There is no rational process, no empirical investigation, no analysis of self-evidence -- I simply know.

Now obviously I wouldn't try to convince you that, if you had this dream, it would mean the same thing to you. But I do want to convince you that you should trust my interpretation of my own dream. But wait -- it isn't intersubjectively verifiable, and my access to the dream itself is privileged. Why, then, am I unlikely to get an argument about this (except, as I said, at the level of interpretation per se)? Because, if I'm perceived as a trustworthy, sensible, and self-reflective person, you'll take my word for it. This is a meager result for a longish argument, but I really do think it gets to the heart of it. We accept the cogency and validity of intuitions to the extent that we trust the person who has them.

This is not the end of the argument, by a long shot, because the stakes involved in dreams versus faith in a god are enormously different. But that's enough out of me for now.

I put stock in my own intuitions — Janus

Yes, I was going to suggest that it would be good, at this point, to examine what we actually say about our own intuitions. You say you put stock in them. Am I right in thinking that this means you trust them to be accurate, all things equal, but wouldn't claim knowledge about their objects? You rightly contrast this with trying to convince someone else to accept what you intuit, but is there ever a case when you do know, for yourself, that something you've intuited is true? Can the object of intuition ever be as solidly known as our rational and perceptual objects? (please take "object" loosely, of course)

I think there are such cases, in my own experience, and that they carry some intersubjective weight. I'll try to get back to this soon. . . a long day away from the computer lies ahead.

"Considerations on Representative Government," — Count Timothy von Icarus

Thanks for this reference, I wasn't aware of it. Sigh, even Mill . . . racism runs deep.

Looking over the historical moments you cite, all I can do is repeat that such a picture would have us believe that some monolithic thing called liberalism never gave a damn about morals or justice or good government, caring only for individual freedoms no matter the cost, tearing down whatever was necessary to achieve them, etc., etc. That is very far from what I see in Rawls, the liberal theorist whose work I know best, and what I know of modern history (though I am not a historian). Meaning no disrespect, have you actually read A Theory of Justice and Political Liberalism? There's much in both books that would interest you, I think.

I maintain that Western Civilization has been in serious decline since the death of Marcus Aurelius and the ascension of his son to the purple! :cool: :rofl: — Count Timothy von Icarus

Yeah, that Commodus was a severe disappointment . . . downhill ever since.

it seems absurd to me to call this cherry picking when all the major liberal states engaged in absolutely massive colonial projects that they justified in the terms of liberalism, — Count Timothy von Icarus

Again, we're just at cross-purposes in terms of what we're referring to as "liberal." I call citing such views cherry-picking because they are (far) outliers in terms of liberal philosophical theory. (And are you sure about Mill and "enslavement"? He says the opposite in "The Negro Question.") To put it mildly, this isn't what we study when we study Locke and Mill, any more than we give time to Kant's racism or Heidegger's Nazi nonsense. It's too easy to pick the worst things Philosopher X said, and claim you've characterized their views fairly.

Whether there is such a thing as "major liberal states" justifying bad actions in terms of a benighted understanding of philosophical liberalism, I leave to you. And of course the atrocious colonialism of European nations is the opposite of rare; you and I agree there, no cherry-picking involved. I just think blaming it on liberal political theory is too easy.

the rather titanic problems of liberalism in the current moment, — Count Timothy von Icarus

OK, as long as we don't equate these alleged problems with "the apocalyptic decline of Western civilization"!

I think Locke and Mill's justification of enslaving populations by force to "liberate them from indolence," is a prime example. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Of liberal political theory? Extreme cherry-picking, wouldn't you say? :smile:

Cold War colonial war rhetoric is also a good example. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Yes, of rhetoric, not liberal political philosophy.

An ideal society maximizes liberty for individuals as individuals — Count Timothy von Icarus

This I would accept as a traditional liberal political tenet, but set on its own, it sounds as if there has never been an issue about what kind of maximization is appropriate or possible, nor how social identity may further individual flourishing. We both know that isn't so. Not for nothing is Rawls' book called A Theory of Justice, not A Theory of Liberty.

The "veil of ignorance" is all about the individual for instance, and indeed the individual as initially abstracted from all community and common goods or social identity. — Count Timothy von Icarus

But it needn't be, as Rawls makes clear. If common goods and social identity are part of what you want the ideal state to value, then you'll choose accordingly from behind the veil, even though you may not know your own status. This isn't to say that the original-position thought experiment isn't rife with problems. Perhaps for that very reason, it's proved enduringly useful, as philosophers like Nussbaum work to clarify and improve it.

Intuition and self-evidence are two very different things ̶ — Janus

I agree this distinction is important, and your description of what counts as self-evident seems fine. But I think you've begged the question a bit against what "intuition" might refer to. Does it have to be a feeling? Can something "ring true" on other grounds? Part of the problem is that we lack a decent vocabulary for intuitions, and so we range from the cozy ("feelings", "ring true") to the theoretical ("noetic understanding", "direct intelligibility"). And naturally this makes us wonder whether there's really anything to it at all, if clear descriptions are so hard to come up with.

You also say:

with intuitions you don't know whether they are true — Janus

but that's precisely the issue. The claim about intuitions is that we do know. And the debate is about whether such self-credentialing knowledge, absent either self-evidence or rational argument, is possible. I think what you meant was, "We can't know whether they are true, given the usual philosophical understanding of what 'knowing to be true' means." But this is exactly what the intuitionist wants to challenge. They may be entirely misguided, of course.