why can't you judge yourself as having been wrong — Metaphysician Undercover

Because you cannot simultaneously hold a rule and faithfully try to interpret it yet make a mistake. We do not have two minds, one with the 'real' rule in it and another trying to understand the what the first one meant by it.

How can anyone judge someone as having made a wrong interpretation? — Metaphysician Undercover

By consensus.

What measure of "right interpretation" does anyone have? — Metaphysician Undercover

Consensus.

It is the same issue whether the rule is public or private. — Metaphysician Undercover

No, because it is impossible to have consensus privately, there's only one of you.

On what principle do you insist that the idea of private rules ought to be rejected because there could be no "right" interpretation? The 'right" interpretation is nothing other than an ideal. — Metaphysician Undercover

On the principle that a following a rule, and thinking you're following a rule must be two different things, but cannot be privately because we do not have two minds (one with 'the rule' in it and another attempting to interpret it). The 'correct' interpretation of the rule is held publicly, by consensus.

A schizophrenic could hold a rule privately though...???

"Truth and Probability" changed my life, but I'm no Ramsey scholar. What did you have in mind? What should I reread? — Srap Tasmaner

Ramsey is probably the closest thing to a favourite philosopher that I have. In the short years of his life he produced better answers to a huge number of philosophical questions that most philosopher manage given three times the life-span. I'm amazed to find another enthusiast, I've never found him to be that popular. Anyway, I'm thinking particularly in this instance on his paper 'Theories' (from 1929, posthumously published in 1931) It's in Philosophical Papers, D. H. Mellor (ed.), 1990. Particulaly apt here is the quote "The adherents of two such theories [theories with different terms] could quite well dispute, although neither affirmed anything the other denied". One of my favourite quotes.
I'm also slightly referring to his address the apostles 'On there being no discussable subject' and in 'Facts and Propositions' - "there is no separate problem of truth but a problem about judgment".

Ramsey was very much heading the direction of unifying axiology with logic, not to derogate the latter, nor by raising the former to objectivity, but by meeting in the middle.

There's a natural, even evolutionary process here of local competition enabling global cooperation. That's a bit of a fairy tale, sure, but that fairy tale is part of the system, as norm and goal. — Srap Tasmaner

Nothing wrong with fairy tales. Here's Richard Braithwaite describing Ramsey Sentences

it would be rather like a fairy story starting 'Once upon a time there was a man who ...' or 'Once upon a time there was a frog which ...', the rest of the story going on to describe the adventures of the man or the adventures of the frog. A treatise on electrons, in Ramsey's view, starts by saying 'There are things which we will call electrons which ...', and then goes on with the story about the electrons ... only of course you then believe the whole thing, the whole 'There is ...' sentence, whereas in a fairy story of course you don't.

1. Cooperation is baked into language -- that much you should have learned from Wittgenstein. Vervet monkeys don't do their "predator" calls if there's no monkey near enough to hear them. — Srap Tasmaner

Absolutely. I too was in a weird mood, particularly misanthropic, too many encounters of clashing egos, rather than clashing ideas at the moment. Still, it's good to vent every now and then! Language evolves as a cooperative game and that's how it should be played. What we do with it these days though often falls short of that ideal, even if not quite so ubiquitously as my prior mood may have painted it. As an excersice I've tried, try applying Grice's maxims to any of the threads on this forum, particularly once you get a bit of disagreement. Hardly any meet all four, most fail every single one.

2. Thus if you want a purely competitive encounter with another human being, words are not the best tool for the job. You cite evidence of people straining against that limitation. That's interesting. Truly. It's a question how far you can get and what techniques you'll use to impose your will on others by imposing your will on words. As you say, that's rhetoric. But Humpty-Dumpty always falls. — Srap Tasmaner

I'm with you up to the last bit, Humpty-Dumpty admitted that his words have their meanings peculiar to him. Rhetoric requires that one pretend the words are expressed semantically whilst knowing they are not.

3. From competitive use of language comes argument; from argument comes logic. Logic gives us both new ways to compete and new ways to cooperate, and it cannot do otherwise. — Srap Tasmaner

Interesting link, I've not thought about that connection. Have you read any Frank Ramsey? He might well say it's the other way round.

4. That's how philosophy becomes the incubator of science. Compete how you will and you are still also cooperating. (As you acknowledge -- you can gain something from my attempts to master you.) The war of all against all is, here, in this context, only a myth. — Srap Tasmaner

Hmm, not sure about this one. I can see where you might be going, but you might have to join the dots for me. Is that the only way do you think, or just something that emerges from such confrontations sometimes?

You keep saying that it's possible to know whether you have misinterpreted your private rule, or mis-remembered it or maybe correctly interpreted but it in a novel circumstance... But you haven't explained how. How can we distinguish those three things, how could we ever know which it was? How could you later decide you were wrong about your interpretation, what measure of 'right' interpretation do you have by which to make such a judgement?

"Dog" is abstract. — Harry Hindu

I was using the term abstract in its philosophical sense with regards to language. This is, afterall, a philosophy forum and this is a thread about language, https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/abstract-objects/ gives a good account, or a more accessible definition https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abstract_and_concrete

You see the problem? We can't even agree what abstract means.

for any word to mean anything useful it must refer to something in the world. — Harry Hindu

And what does "useful" mean?

"Meaning" is the same thing as information and I defined information as the relationship between cause and effect. So when using the term, "meaning", you are referring to some causal relationship. — Harry Hindu

I'm not sure your definition tells us anything here. If meaning is the same thing as information, then what does Macbeth 'mean' when he says
“Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more. It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.”

Surely "shadow" in that verse means more than just the absence of light cast by an object. I don't see the cause and effect capturing the meaning there.

The words on this screen mean what the authors intended when they wrote them. — Harry Hindu

But this can't be the case otherwise mistakes in language would not be possible. If I write the word "Dog" but by it mean to refer to the King of France, 'dog' does not now mean the King of France, I've clearly made a mistake. Or, if everything does mean what the authors intend, then how are we to ever determine the meaning of any words at all?

Value" is how organisms behave in ways that show that something is important to them. — Harry Hindu

You've just replaced value with important. What does important mean in this context?

I have no doubt that we could come up with synonyms all day, but at no point does claiming one word is equivalent to some others actually dictate what the word means.

(1) Why would we think we're communicating when we're not? — Srap Tasmaner

I'm going to take a tangent here as I think the answers to your questions have more to do with psychology than language use. The slightly misanthropic answer is - we don't. We engage in this activity because we're trying to assert power and rhetoric is a safe way of doing that, especially over the internet. We also have a powerful need to justify our actions (or more specifically the barrage of conflicting desire which motivate our actions), which can at times seem really chaotic. Knowing there are others who see the world differently is an offence to the conceit of the 'truth' of these stories we tell ourselves, and so we engage in whatever tactics make our story seem the more real one when faced with another. At no point does 'communicating' by the definition we've arrived at enter into it.

I know this seems really harsh, but take a look at the debates going on at the moment;
"The New Dualism" - Some guy who 'just knows' he's right because he's really thought about it rearranging term to prop up his messiah complex.
"Shouldn't Religion be 'Left'" - people re-arranging history to try and make such a completely messy and un-focussed thing as 'Religion' actually be something singular and directed, just to placate their fears about the fact the science is progressing in ways they don't understand.
The 'debate' I'm engaged in with MU about Wittgenstein's rule-following, despite a promising beginning has recently collapsed into "one can follow a private rule...because you can".

I'm not trying to say that my psychological analyses of these debates is the 'true' reason, I'm just presenting possibilities. What I do claim is that the evidence both from experience and from psychology seem to weigh quite heavily in favour of a conclusion that most forms of abstract language use have absolutely nothing to do with understanding one another.

(2) Why would we think we need agreement in definitions to communicate? — Srap Tasmaner

As above, I'm afraid my honest feeling is again that we think this out of a deluded sense that if someone disputes the story we tell ourselves to explain the world, our safest way to understand that is to presume that some error of communication has taken place. We like to feel that if only 'they' understood the meaning of the terms I'm using, 'they' would accept my propositions. But we avoid actually going down that rabbit hole because we fear what might be at the bottom - the realisation that none of it really means anything at all.

I think there are exceptions to all this. There seem to be people who's way of getting through life is to get as close as possible to 'what is the case', people who are constantly adjusting their story to make it more and more resilient. To these people, challenges are a boon because they provide opportunities to shore up weak points in the story, but as I mentioned earlier, actually understanding the other person is not necessary for this, only that some story reveals a weakness in one's world-view. It does not matter whether it's actually their story or not.

I think the issues the Grice et al raise about language are fascinating and I don't want to just ride roughshod over them, perhaps we can get into them another time, but the issue here with defining terms in order to debate I think is so much more psychological than linguistic that to go down that road now would be to get distracted.

The whole issue of clearing up confusions over definitions relies on the proposition that the disputed complex abstract terms are somehow all reducible to a set of non-disputed simple terms. But if this really is the case, then the 'ideal' that you mention would be to have everything expressed in terms of these non-disputed words, but I can see this running into problems already. Take something like the question of the existence of abstract objects. An argument might get hung up on the meaning of the term 'existence' (as it actually has here). we might reduce that something that is outside of our minds (as again, has happened here), but of course that just makes matters worse ('what is a 'mind'), so we go the other way and reduce it to 'that which is the case', or the way things are' as Van Inwagen has done. But look at the words in that expression 'that', 'which', 'is', 'the', and 'case'. Could you think of five more commonly used terms in everyday language? Yet this definition, reduced to un-disputed terms has not progressed us at all in understanding what each person actually means by 'existence'

This is what leads, I think inevitably, to Quietism. Philosophical discussions might be a fun game, they certainly can be therapeutic, if conducted properly, they can help us make stories which avoid crippling us with uncertainty over the unknowable, to paraphrase Russell, but I'm fairly confident they can't actually progress us to any kind of 'truth' at all, not even a pragmatic one, I'm afraid.

Nonsense. How did you learn what the word, "dog" means, if not establishing a connection between the string of symbols, "dog" and the image of a dog? I could show you the word, "dog", or a picture of a dog, and I would end up getting my message across all the same. — Harry Hindu

My entire comment referred to abstract terms. "dog" is not an abstract term. Can you point to 'value' or 'meaning'?

I'm not sure what you are getting at here. — Harry Hindu

When abstract terms (words) need defining, then we can only use other abstract words (terms) to do that job. At no point can we simply indicate some existant thing as the referent object. So, why do these other words not need defining?

For any discussion, participants need to agree on the definitions of the terms used. Philosophical discussions are different from other types of discussions in the terms that are used and how they are defined. Philosophy itself is about questioning what we take for granted, which could be the definitions we use. — Harry Hindu

So what is so magical about the words we'd use to define these terms that they themselves do not need defining?

The rule is relegated to memory, and we act most times by habit without consulting the rule. — Metaphysician Undercover

Acting out of habit without consulting the rule would not be a case of the kind of mistake Wittgenstein is talking about. He's talking about a case where one has very consciously tried to apply the rule but nonetheless made an error. It is the impossibility of this kind of mistake which leads to the paradox. It is obviously possible to have what we think is a rule in mind and then not follow it (either deliberately, or absent-mindedly), what is not possible is to think that you are following your private rule when in fact you are not. This, Wittgenstein concludes, must mean that there is no 'fact' of the rule other than your thinking of the following of it at any one time.

Since interpretation is a major source of mistake, this procedure is unacceptable. — Metaphysician Undercover

But what would constitute a mistake. If your rule was, I must not smoke cigarettes, and a new cigarette-like device entered the market, how would you know whether smoking it was breaking your rule or not? You need to interpret the new cigarette-like item, but how could you possibly make a mistake in that interpretation? Remember, Wittgenstein is talking only about private rules, one's which cannot be verified by checking against public definitions.

In that instance, it's easy to know you made a mistake. You go back and revisit the move while holding the rule in your mind, and see that you made the move absent mindedly. — Metaphysician Undercover

Again, we're talk about a mistake made in good faith, not absent-mindedly. One made despite your best intention to follow the rule.

These would be cases of misinterpretation. And, as you describe, in these cases you do not know whether or not a mistake was made. That's life. We cannot liberate ourselves from the restrictions imposed by the facts of life, by changing the definition of rule-following, as Wittgenstein tries to do.. — Metaphysician Undercover

Obviously this is going nowhere. In my mind (and that of most interpretations of Wittgenstein) it is exactly because of the restrictions imposed by the facts of life that Wittgenstein reaches the conclusions he does.

Yes, mistakes are possible but this occurs when we do not hold the principle, or do not adhere to it. At this time, it is impossible to be thinking that you are following the rule, because thinking that you are following a rule is to hold the principle and adhere to it. — Metaphysician Undercover

This is the point. We do not have two minds. We cannot simultaneously hold a view on what a rule is and faithfully, with good intent, make a mistake in applying it. If the rule is indeed private (which means not just known only to us, but knowable only to us), then every action we take is a faithful attempt to interpret that rule for the circumstances we're faced with and a rule is nothing other than it's interpretation in certain circumstances. How can you think you are following a rule (which is known only to you) and yet not be (make a mistake)? Where, and in what form, is the rule kept in your mind which is something other than the responses to circumstances you're faced with?

Consider Srap's chess example above, but imagine a private version. A game which you invented the rules for and only you know them. In this game some piece (which only you know), moves in some way (which only you know), but playing it in your mind you make a mistake you move it in a way that is 'wrong'. How do you know you've made a mistake? How do you know that the piece wasn't actually supposed to move that way and you've misremembered the way you originally intended for it? How do you know that whatever sensory or internal input is telling you that the piece is in the 'wrong' place is the same or different to the one you had when you invented what the 'right' place for it should be? Since you cannot define a rule in your mind other than by the actions that should be taken in response to certain circumstances, you are beholden to the inconsistency of your understanding of 'action' and your meaningful interpretation of 'circumstances' neither of which you can have any faith in. And this is just one simple moving rule in a made up game. How much more unreliable will it be when we come to rules about the meanings of words or ethics?

You define until you reach agreement. If what you agreed on later raises issues, you define again. — Srap Tasmaner

Good principle, but if agreement is to mean anything at all (namely that the idea in my mind is close in form and effect to the one in yours), then I don't see how it doesn't suffer from the same problem. How would we identify that agreement? I might say (in a moment of self-loathing) "Philosophy is useless!", you say, "No it has many uses" - we disagree. Then I say (calming down a bit) "No, by 'useless' I meant, has no measurable objective utility, of course it has subjective utility", You say " Ah, OK then we agree by that definition of 'useless'". But we only agree because neither of us has disputed the definition of 'objective/subjective', and this is not because we know we agree on it (how could we, we never even discussed it?), it's only because we have not raised the issue. You go away thinking I mean one thing by it (which you agree with, and so no further discussion is needed), but actually I meant another thing by it entirely (which, had you enquired, you may well have disagreed with vehemently)

The key thing I'm trying to say here, is that this isn't just about 'known unknowns' vs. 'unknown unknowns', it's not that I can't ever know if there's some definition about which we disagree unless I ask, it's that I can't ever know if there's some definition about which we disagree even if I ask, because to explain it just requires further definitions about which I will not know if we agree.

This is not a particularly a problem in the language of normal discourse (nor in the sciences), I can point to a brick and say the word 'brick' in enough different contexts for you to grasp fairly certainly that by it I mean just to label the object and no other thing. As Quine points out, "neutrino" is not translated into other languages, it means only that thing to which it refers, not something which is defined using other words. But I don't see how one can ever hope to do this with philosophy in the way it is currently studied. How could we possibly achieve such a cross-context definition of 'value', or 'utility', defined accurately in enough circumstances to form even so much as a 'Family Resemblance' type of definition?

I read with interest, your other post on 'Losing Games'. This is what I hang around these places for. What interests me is generally not the philosophical arguments themselves (anyone who thinks they have and answer to the question of universals after 2000 years has either not read any philosophy or has massive delusions of grandeur), but the way in which the arguments are presented and play out. Your thread very much tried to explore that and was just getting interesting when it seemed no-one wanted to say anything more about it. I was tempted to respond myself but feared I would simply repeat what you'd said in different words. What I really wanted to hear was someone who opposed that general idea defend their position.

(a) there must be common ground to have a discussion at all; — Srap Tasmaner

This rather presumes a 'truth-seeking' purpose to philosophy which I'm not sure I can subscribe to any more. In order for me to clarify my own thoughts it is sometimes helpful to have an opposing view presented, but for this to happen it is entirely unnecessary that i 'correctly' understand what the presenter of the opposing view really means by what they say. It is sufficient for the purpose that I hold a meaning that needs to be countered in order to progress by own thoughts.

If this all seems a little self-serving and cold, then...well it is. But it does work the other way, so there's some reciprocation. If what I understand by your sentences has some utility to me, then you've done me a great favour in writing them. It doesn't matter if what I understand by them is not what you meant. The task here is not to simply transfer information faithfully from your head to mine. I only want to hear what you have to say because I think it might be interesting/useful. If you incidentally say something interesting/useful merely by my own misinterpretation, then the objective has no less been met.

(b) to explain your position to someone, you must put it in terms they understand; — Srap Tasmaner

Yes, but, as above, this is a sisyphean task. How do we confirm that the terms we're using are understood. If the person repeats them back to us? Well that's no good because all that's doing is testing their memory of the right words in the right order. If they apply the concept as we would in a different context? Better but then we run into Wittgenstein's rule-following paradox, in that we can only know that they are following some rule which lead to the result we expected, not necessarily the rule we've tried to convey (they could be 'quusing' not plussing'). All we can ever hope for is some probability that the terms have been understood based on a number of samples that satisfies us. But then when was this about satisfying ourselves that the job has been done?

(c) to convince someone of the <correctness, usefulness, whateverness> of your position, you must give them reasons and reasoning they'll accept. — Srap Tasmaner

Here, I think, is where philosophy is most useful, and I agree with this sentiment entirely (though maybe not for the same reasons as you have, you seem far less coldly Machiavellian than me). What matters about a proposition is the effect it has, and if you want someone to hold a belief that has the effect on the world you desire, then it's your job to provide exactly the sort of reasoning that appeals to the person your trying to convince. It's not their job to try to understand what you 'mean' by everything (which seems to be the default position in many threads here), nor to approach problems the way you do. It's your job to present your solution in a way which fits the gap in the story they're trying to fill.

simply don't believe you actually are confused about all definitions you asked for here, since you seemed to have understood my post too well for that in order to be so. — Tomseltje

But the meaning of those terms has keep philosophers in heated debate for thousands of years. What is of value, how can value be measured, is value objective or subjective? Are ideas objects? Is what is rational anything other than a public language (like ethics and aesthetics)? The whole area of how a word can 'mean' anything objectively is, in some sense, what the whole of Wittgenstein's 'Philosophical Investigations' is about.

Anyway, the discussion I'm referring to is on the Math and Motive thread, though you'll have to get several pages in, it's really just a side-track.

As I said, if you think that you can formulate a private language argument without that premise, then demonstrate it. — Metaphysician Undercover

Well that's relatively simple since the private language argument only really starts at 243, the section on rule-following being only one of the numerous preliminaries to it in PI.
The argument traditionally is expounded using definitions of signs.

1. A definition of a sign cannot be formulated privately because to define a sign is not simply to associate it with a sensation at the time, but to correctly associate with that sensation at all times. As Wittgenstein says "“I impress [the connection] on myself” can only mean: this process brings it about that I remember the connection right in the future’. For I do not define anything, even to myself let alone anyone else, by merely attending to something and making a mark, unless this episode has the appropriate consequences."

2. That such an association would have no meaning (make no sense) as a definition because it could not be doubted (being a private sensation).

Neither explanation has anything much to do with the rule-following paradox. Not that your definition of the 'impossiblity' of following a private rule is a necessary interpretation there either. The exposition of the rule following argument is simply that since you can think you're following a rule when you're not, thinking you're following a rule cannot be the same as actually following a rule. Yet privately (in the sense Wittgenstein uses the term), thinking you're following a rule is all you have, so it's impossible to claim you're following a rule privately.

I get the sense from the tone of your responses, however, that you're not particularly interested in the complexities of interpretation, but rather "he said X, by which he meant Y, and anyone who disagrees must be an idiot."

I really have no more stomach for these types exchanges.

Basically, the problem is, to use your example;

definitions that apply to words used in this question:
use : value to participants
discussing : exchanging ideas with the common goal to get a better understanding of each others position eventually leading to a better formulated unified position that all participants can agree upon.
philosophy : the rational investigation of the truths and principles of being, knowledge, or conduct.
definition : A statement of the exact meaning of a word. — Tomseltje

Define 'value', define 'ideas', define 'goal', define 'understanding', define 'better formulated', define 'rational', define 'meaning'.

Then when you've done that, define all the words you used to define those.

Interestingly I've only just been having a discussion about Wittgenstein's private language argument on another thread...

Firstly, these passages are Wittgenstein laying out the paradox and its implications, not providing the solution to it. Only Saul Kripke has really considered the phrase at 202 to be the conclusion of the argument. Most scholars (Hacker, Wright, McGinn, McDowell, for example) do not consider the argument concluded until passage 243 where he begins his attack on Private Language, with “The words of this language are to refer to what can be known only to the speaker; to his immediate, private, sensations. So another cannot understand the language.”

Which is why your conclusions about how we must respond to the rule-following paradox are not necessitated by it. As I said, There are numerous interpretations, there's no 'right' or 'wrong', there's no 'unacceptable' it just depends what conclusion you want to come to and then re-arrange the meanings of the terms to suit. The whole philosophical argument resulting from the rule-following paradox is about how we conceive of 'a rule', not about how we 'must' respond to others in respect of whether they are following one or not, that is part of the paradox, not one of the the solutions to it. If the private rule-following behaviour is or is not really 'rule-following', then does that mean anything? It's certainly some form of behaviour. It's undeniably a different form of behaviour to following public rules, so what difference does it make if we call it 'rule-following' or not?

In Remarks on the Foundations of Mathematics, Wittgenstein says "How was it possible for the rule to have been given an interpretation during instruction, an interpretation which reaches as far as any arbitrary step?” (RFM VI-38), which I think explains his position more clearly than it is expressed in PI. Basically, he's saying that if a rule must be interpreted 'correctly' to be followed 'correctly', then where is the 'correct' interpretation? It can't be in the rule itself (that would be self-referential), so it is nowhere.

Either there is no 'correct' interpretation because we have no reason to believe rules are other than as they appear to us - the quietism of McDowell, or it is not the case that rules must be 'interpreted correctly' in order to be followed correctly, or there is a 'correct', but we cannot know it (the Skeptical solution)

So, you'd said...

I was talking about a situation when a person appears not to be following a rule, but really is. These are the situations which serve as evidence that Wittgenstein's description of rule-following is unacceptable... A person thinks up a rule and starts following it. In these situations there is also "no way of knowing" that the person is following a rule, but it must be concluded according to the definition, that the person is not following a rule. This is an unjustified conclusion. — Metaphysician Undercover

But this is not what 'must' be concluded at all. This is part of the paradox. It's conclusions are the rejection of private language and either quietism, skepticism or (if you must!) the anti psychologism of McGinn.

I'm not sure if I'm explaining it any more clearly, but I will try to use the example you gave of a person quitting smoking. You'd said that such a person must be following a rule - the rule "I will not have a cigarette", but that it is perverse to say he's not following a rule simply because we cannot say if he is following it correctly by his action of not having a cigarette. So this is the paradox. But Wittgenstein says that we cannot simply say he is following a rule (one in his own mind) because even he does not know all the interpretations of that rule until they arise, he has not, for example specified whether, should some company invent a new type of smoking device, that constitutes 'a cigarette' or not. He has not defined 'cigarette' against all possible future issues, nor could he ever define 'cigarette' without using other words which he would then have to define...and so on. So either we must remain quiet on whether the man is following a rule (or breaking it), or we must conclude that he might be but it's impossible to know. Or, to use Crispin Wright's words instead;

"If a (suitably precise and general) rule is—by the very definition of 'rule', as it were—intrinsically
such as to carry predeterminate verdicts for an open-ended range of occasions, and if grasping a
rule is—by definition—an ability to keep track of those verdicts, step by step, then the prime
question becomes: what makes it possible for there to be such things as rules, so conceived, at
all? I can create a geometrical figure by drawing it. But how do I create something which carries
pre-determinate instructions for an open range of situations which I do not think about in creating
it? What gives it this content, when anything I say or do in explaining it will be open to an
indefinite variety of conflicting interpretations?"

@chatterbears

So, I've read through the "evidence" you keep quoting. I can't find a single source which supports any of the claims you're trying to make. Perhaps you could guide me to the one in particular you think best supports your claim that eating meat from hunting wild animals, scrap-fed and year-round open pasture fed animals is more harmful to ourselves and the environment.

Ive found an awful lot of papers which support the claim that vegan diet "can" be more healthy than "some" or "most" omnivorous diets. I've found a lot of support for the idea that farming vegetables "can" cause less environmental damage than "some" or "most" forms of animal rearing.

What I have not found is where you are getting your claim that all forms of meat-eating are more harmful than vegan diets.

I'm also getting very confused about your claim, reading your response to @VagabondSpectre. You seem to be making two claims at different times.

1. That all unnecessary harm is unethical, meat-eating causes unnecessary harm (to the animal, ourselves, or the environment) and is therefore unethical.

2. That all unnecessary killing of sentient creatures (or those with the potential for sentience) is unethical, meat-eating requires the killing of an animal and is therefore unethical.

The problem I'm having understanding this is that 1) is clearly a subset of 2). I don't understand why you're spending so much time defending 1) if you actually think 2) is defensible. Conversely, I don't understand why you would keep referring to 2) if you do not think it is defensible.

To put it another way, if you think it is logically inevitable from any consistent ethics that killing a sentient creature is morally wrong, then why are you even arguing about the harm issue? Just lay out your inviolable argument that killing another sentient creature is unethical and that should be an end to it.

If, however, that argument at 2) is not inviolable, then your argument at 1) only applies in so far as harm can be demonstrated and agreed. A wild animal suffers no harm (in this second, weaker sense) from being hunted, there's clearly no impact on the environment (all authors agree that management of grazing is essential to a healthy ecosystem), and you've provided no evidence that lean, wild meat is a harmful addition to the diet.

If you think you can argue 2), then argue 2), 1) is entirely superfluous if 2) can be demonstrated to be the case. If 2) cannot be demonstrated to be the case, then how does your argument at 1) alone cover hunting wild animals?

Really if all you've got to say is that your interpretation of Wittgenstein is right and mine is wrong without any attempt to substantiate that claim then there's little point in continuing this discussion. It consistently astounds me how many posters on this forum seem to have not the faintest clue as to how diverse, contradictory and most times mutually exclusive, propositions and interpretations are in academic philosophy, particularity about Wittgenstein. I suppose it takes a certain hubris to think that one can contribute meaningfully to a discussion and so that may filter out those who see the diversity of opinion as a probably the only true fact out there, but still, the level continues to surprise me.

Quine and Kripke have different interpretations of Wittgenstein's intent in removing facts about meaning. Scott Soames at Princeton disagrees with both. Cripin Wright sees a fairly full removal of judgement about rules, John Mcdowell disagrees, seeing no problem with consensus judging. If you can think of a possible way to interpret Wittgenstein, chances are someone's written it. I have not, however, yet read any interpretation of Wittgenstein that suggests that he is making the claim that we must conclude the thinker is not following a rule at all.

John McDowell has the most sympathetic interpretation to your preference that we maintain some ability to judge right and wrong, yet he specifies "Wittgenstein's target is not the very idea that a present state of understanding embodies commitments with respect to the future[rule-following itself], but rather a certain seductive misconception of that idea."

Even the more Skeptical interpretations of Crispin Wright only go as far as to say "Wittgenstein seems almost to want to deny all substance to the 'pattern' idea" (not even my emphasis, he put that in).

Or, from Investigations itself (219) "“All the steps are really already taken” means: I no longer have any choice. The rule, once stamped with a particular meaning, traces the lines along which it is to be followed through the whole of space. – But if something of this sort really were the case, how would it help? No; my description only made sense if it was to be understood symbolically. – I should have said: This is how it strikes me. When I obey a rule, I do not choose. I obey the rule blindly."

If there is an interpretation where Wittgenstein insists we must presume the thinker is not following a rule at all, however, it would not surprise me in the least. Why don't you actually quote the passage you think is making that claim (or the secondary interpretation) and we can look at it.

Or you could just join in the general condescending approach to philosophy here that every position you don't personally agree with must be the result of a deep ignorance of the subject on the part of your opponent. I'd just rather not continue under this second approach.

Presuming the former approach, pending your posting the actual quotes you're using for your interpretation, I will quote a few sources for mine;

Consider first this passage in the PI in which Wittgenstein reassures his interlocutor:
"But I don't mean that what I do now (in grasping a sense) determines the future use causally and as a matter of experience, but that in a queer way, the use itself is in some sense present." - But of course it is, 'in some sense'! Really the only thing wrong with what you say is the expression "in a queer way". The rest is all right ...."

Wittgenstein is not saying that a person does not follow a rule (this seems obvious to me from the passage at 219 where he clearly describes his feeling about the process), but that there are no facts about that rule which can be used to determine if it is being 'correctly' followed. As John McDowell puts it in 'Wittgenstein on Following a Rule', "these natural ideas lack the substance we are inclined to credit them with", or Crispin Wright saying a similar thing "there is in our understanding of a concept no rigid, advance determination of what is to count as its correct application" in his paper 'Rule Following without Reasons' (if you haven't read it by the way, it is an excellent summary of an interpretation I have a lot of sympathy with, but I'm not sure if it's available on the internet)

It is his understanding of what Wittgenstein undermines which was the reason I mentioned the whole rule-following thing in the first place (which I think may now be off topic?) He says that the rule-following problem undermines the notion that "Discoveries in mathematics are regarded as the unpacking of (in the best case) deep but (always) predeterminate implications of the architecture of our understanding of basic mathematical concepts, as codified in intuitively apprehended axioms.", @StreetlightX's position (that this recognition does not remove our ability to judge) simply tries to shift the rule-following to another dimension - how things should fall out of frames, how frames are or are not useful etc. That is the the only sense in which this interpretation of Wittgenstein on rule-following is relevant to this thread. Crispin Wright again clarifies perhaps better than I could "no response, however aberrant, in and of itself defeats the claim that a subject correctly understands and intends to follow a particular rule – you can always make compensatory adjustments by ascribing a misapprehension of the initial conditions for the application of a rule, as expressed in the minor premise in the modus ponens model" (which he explains earlier likening rule-following to a simple chess game).

If you want to discuss rule-following in general then perhaps a fresh thread might be appropriate? If you still see a relevance to the interpretation of the paper in the OP, then I'm not quite following and perhaps you could make that link clearer. Alternatively, If you'd like to just like to continue the presumption that every opposing position must stem from naive ignorance, then you would, it seems, at least have some company.

I follow rules all the time, don't you? I hold a principle within my mind and adhere to it. There is no "god-like insight" involved in me knowing this, just a little bit of self-reflection. — Metaphysician Undercover

So what conclusion do you think someone with false memory syndrome would come to about what rule motivates their actions? What about phantom limb syndrome, Capgras delusions, synathesia, or simple dementia. How are you so sure your brain serves you up an accurate report of what is it to follow a rule, not just for you, but apparently for all humanity?

Are you implying that Wittgenstein and all the well-respected experienced thinkers who follow his line of argument have all failed to do even a "little bit" of self-reflection? I mean, I don't even completely go along with Wittgenstein (or Kripkenstein) on this issue, im just trying to point out how unlikely it is that such intelligent people are categorically 'wrong' about an issue in respect of which they are in possession of all the relevant facts.

Right, so my argument is that Wittgenstein didn't account for a vast amount of usage of "rule-following" when he defined it. — Metaphysician Undercover

How many people have you spoken to about what it feels like is going on when they use the term "rule-following"? I mean, out of the 7 billion people currently speaking to each other about their experiences, how many of them have you interviewed to arrive at this "vast number" who are using the term and meaning by it exactly what you describe.

This is a misunderstanding of what I said. I was not talking about a situation of when a person appears to be following a rule, but is really not following that rule, I was talking about a situation when a person appears not to be following a rule, but really is. — Metaphysician Undercover

It needn't make any difference to the argument. What, to you, is "not following" a rule might well be to Wittgenstein "following a rule which mandates the opposite of the rule you claim the person is" not following". It all just comes down to how you use your terms.

A person thinks up a rule and starts following it. — Metaphysician Undercover

Do they?

but it must be concluded according to the definition, that the person is not following a rule. — Metaphysician Undercover

No, as I said, it's not about concluding that they're not following a rule, it's that we must conclude that we cannot know what that rule is.

But Wittgenstein's principles leave us without the capacity to judge a rule as right or wrong. — Metaphysician Undercover

Instead of having principles for judging a rule as right or wrong, which is what Wittgenstein avoided the need for, we now need principles for judging a goal as good or bad. — Metaphysician Undercover

Must we really engineer our epistemology just in order to preserve our ability to judge things as right and wrong. Are you really so beholden to your Minoan complex that you disregard every proposition that doesn't allow you to judge things 'right' or 'wrong'?

By his principles, if we cannot say anything concrete about the rule which a thinker is following, we must conclude that the thinker is not following a rule. This is the critical point which renders Wittgenstein's principles ineffectual for dealing with instances of creative thought. Such choices are left by Wittgenstein as arbitrary, unruly. — Metaphysician Undercover

I don't see how you've arrived at this conclusion. We need not conclude that the thinker is not following a rile. The Skeptical solution is that we can't know what the rule he's following is, so we can't draw any conclusions about things like consensus, or public meaning. It doesn't imply anything about what we "must" conclude. Also, you've suddenly introduced the idea that instances of creative thought are something we must "deal with". Deal with in what sense?

The op turns to "aim", purpose, to deal with these choices. This puts us back into the minds of the thinkers, which is what Wittgenstein was trying to avoid. — Metaphysician Undercover

Exactly. Despite the evident pleasure people seem to get out of it, the idea that some particular notion could be objectively "not useful", "not necessary" or any other term dug out of the thesaurus to avoid saying "wrong" just does not seem to me to be justifiable.

Funny that you were okay posting scientific references and articles when it fit your agenda, but then when I refuted it with an article from Gaverick Matheny, you suddenly state that this is not a science forum. The dishonesty is transparent here. — chatterbears

You seem incapable of following a logical argument,so I will try to make it simple for you.

I argued, from a position of epistemic uncertainty, that if there existed at least one expert who considered my belief to be sound then it is reasonable for me to hold that belief (for whatever reason). In order to prove this I needed to present such an expert, which I did. The fact that other experts disagree with him has no bearing on the argument because its not making the claim that his position goes un-opposed, simply that because it exists, it is reasonable for me to believe it.

Your position is that the current scientific consensus is the veganism, in all forms, does less harm (according to a specific definition of harm) than all forms of meat-eating. In order to support this claim you would be required to do two things.

1. Provide evidence that the scientific consensus is that veganism is less harmful (by their definition of harm) .

And

2. Provide a philosophical argument to support your assertion that whatever the scientific consensus is about what constitutes 'harm' and which diet causes least, is what we should base our ethical choices on, over and above any other considerations.

You have done 1.,but not 2.

Simple.

And you still haven't address that your linked 2002 Study [by Steven Davis] was refuted by Gaverick Matheny in 2003. — chatterbears

For goodness sake this is not a science forum. We are not here to discuss the technicalities of scientific papers. Have a look at the title bar of the page and tell me what it says just before the word 'Forum'.

A sentient being of higher consciousness can improve the lives of other sentient beings. They also have the capability to improve the lives of members from a different species. Therefore, a sentient being has more value, because it can provide benefits to other species, as well as members within its own species. We see this in nature, where one species will save and protect the babies of a different species from outside predators. Non-sentient life, such as plants, does not have this value of being able to protect other life. — chatterbears

So tigers aren't sentient then? Because they seem to do an awful lot of killing other species and not a lot of saving them. This is patent nonsense. Animals kill other animals, they rape other animals, they injure them, ostracise them, terrorise them, and we're no exception. All animals have just as much capacity to cause misery and harm to others as they do to cause pleasure. Also, plants can cause pleasure, simply by their beauty. So are you going to make an argument that they must 'intend' to cause pleasure in order to be of value? I'd like to see you try to support a theory that you have any idea what a cow 'intends' to do, let alone produce a philosophical argument that this has any correlation with value.

So far, the only answers I've received are flawed and superfluous. — chatterbears

No, you have simply asserted that they are. That's the point. You say that you're not arguing about why humans don't kill other humans, but your entire argument as to why you find their answers flawed rely on your assertions in this regard.

I never claimed that one ethical value outweighs another value. — chatterbears

Yes, you are consistently claiming it. You are, for example, consistently claiming that if the current scientific consensus say something causes more harm, we must all believe it and act on that thing. That is attaching an ethical value to avoiding harm over and above, say instinct (as Sapienta argued), or naturalness or moderation.

However, as I explained, it doesn't apply to a vast quantity of instances of rule following, therefore we would be foolish to accept it. — Metaphysician Undercover

No, you didn't "explain" it, you asserted it using your private definitions;

"In reality, to follow a rule is to hold a principle within one's own mind, and adhere to it." - Which 'reality' are you referring to here, and what god-like insight has allowed you to simply 'know' what it is to follow a rule in it? Philosophers can't even agree what a mind is, let alone what's in it. Peter Hacker, for example, doesn't even think there is such a thing as a mind.

"This allows that one is following a rule in the very first instance of acting according to the rule." - Why would we want, or need, to allow this?

"...it allows for the very important, and relevant type of following a rule, which is to restrain oneself from a certain activity, like we do with a resolution to quit a bad habit." - Again, why would we want, or need, to allow this?

"... If one is successful in quitting a bad habit, there is no second time," - Tell that to an alcoholic, most consider their entire lives to be a continual struggle to not drink alcohol.

"That means that a large number of cases where a person is actually following a rule, we have to say that the person is not following a rule." - How do you know they are "actually" following a rule? The whole point of the paradox is that we have no way of defining what it is to "actually" follow a rule.

Would you accept a description of "plant" which was inapplicable to a large number of things which we call by that word? I would reject the definition as unacceptable, wouldn't you? — Metaphysician Undercover

Yes, of course I would have to. If the rest of the speaking world were referring to some object as a 'plant' which I personally considered not to be one, or vice versa, I would have to follow suit in order to communicate. The is no thing that 'plant' means outside of its use. You're arguing that your personal uses of the the term 'rule' need to be included in the global definition of what it is to follow a rule. That's the whole of what Wittgenstein had to say about Private Language.

According to Wittgenstein's description, a person is only following a rule if the person acts in the right way. This excludes the possibility that a person who is acting in the wrong way is actually following a rule. So all the instances when a person is acting in the wrong way, yet is still following a rule, are excluded as instances of rule following. — Metaphysician Undercover

This is simply wrong, in that this is not what Wittgenstein said. His claim was that we would have no way of knowing whether a person was following a rule correctly causing their actions or following a different rule but making a mistake.

What is the point in defining "rule-following" such that it excludes a vast number of instances which we refer to as following a rule? — Metaphysician Undercover

It's not about following a rule it's about the inability to know which rule a person is following.

But this is not the right place to get into a deep discussion about Wittgenstein's rule-following paradox. It is relevant to this thread, as the authors of the paper in the OP point out, in that one cannot say anything concrete about solutions arising from framework choices because one cannot say anything concrete about what rules the respective thinkers are actually following to derive their conclusions.

There are still three ethical claims which remain un-addressed and until they are further discussion is pointless.

1. The claim that we must base our ethical decisions on a consensus or majority scientific position. This is simply asserted without any philosophical argument as to why. There is active debate in the philosophy of science as to methodology and what scientific studies can actually be said to show, and there is 2000 years of unresolved debate in epistemology as to what it is to 'know' anything to be the case. You have both ridden roughshod over all this debate to simply assert that whatever the current scientific consensus is must be used to guide ethical choices.

2. The claim that the life of a thing which can feel pain is worth more than the life of a thing which cannot feel pain. I think everyone is a greed that we should minimise animal suffering, but you maintain that to kill an animal before it's natural death (whatever that is) is worse than killing a plant before it's natural death simply because an animal has a degree of conciousness that plants lack. Again, you have not philosophically supported the argument that conciousness is equal to value, nor that value automatically precludes killing for meat.

3. You have not substantiated your claim that the reason we do not kill and eat other humans (or pets for that matter) is because of the value we assign to their level of conciousness or sentience, you have merely asserted it. It's perfectly reasonable that we do not kill other humans(or pets) in order to minimise the pain caused to their communities (or owners) at their loss. It may simply be a taboo designed to avoid recriminations - we don't kill other humans (or their beloved pets) because they are capable of killing us in turn. We don't farm tigers.

4. Finally, you have not provided any argument to support the claim that these ethical considerations (harm, the intrinsic value of sentience, internal moral consistency) outweigh other ethical values - Naturalness or moderation and tolerance (both of which incidentally are listed as universal human virtues).

I'll remind you again this is a philosophy forum, not a science forum. It is not the place for a discussion of scientific articles. If you can't get your head around the concept that some things which a culture at one time declares "scientifically proven" is at some later date shown to be entirely wrong, then you're on the wrong forum. Try reading Kuhn.

Please provide a philosophical argument to justify the assertions I've listed above, and then we can perhaps continue this debate within the context of this forum.

Interesting example of what I'm talking about.

Wittgenstein did not provide an adequate description of what it means to follow a rule. — Metaphysician Undercover

But he obviously did. I don't think there can be any doubt that Wittgenstein was a very clever man. He obviously found it adequate, as do a number of equally clever Wittgenstein scholars who still hold to his solution to a greater or lesser extent. (one could include John McDowell, Simon Blackburn, Saul Kripke, potentially Crispin Wright). So unless you are privy to some unique insight these other scholars lack, one of two things must be the case - either one group is wrong but it will be impossible to tell which (all the relevant data having already been presented), or you are simply using words differently to describe the same thing. On no account does the mere presentation of a counter-argument demonstrate anything at all about the 'adequacy' of Wittgenstein's solution other than an expression of your own personal satisfaction with it.

Its possible to arrive at dozens of counter-arguments to your position, not that doing so makes your position wrong either. We could say that the first instance is not a true expression of 'rule-following' (having just invented the term, we're free to define it as we see fit), we could justify such a distinction by saying that the first instance represented an investigation, whereas only subsequent ones can be said to follow a truly 'private' rule. We could claim that one could not be said to follow a private rule until they had personal experience which removes it from the public sphere. And on and on. At no point in time is anyone 'proving' to anything. Nothing is what is happening "in reality" because we do not have unfiltered access to 'reality'.

If, for some reason, you feel some need to be abundantly clear about your world-view with regards to the solutions to the rule-following paradox, then I'm sure that rendering them available for criticism is a good way to refine them to your satisfaction, but personally it's a point I'm happy to accept a number of possible interpretations of.

"What can a machine do? (Not this or that machine, by the way, but machines in the abstract) Tell me! Oh you can't tell me what a machine can do? Well, obviously machines cannot be evaluated as to their usefulness because you can't answer my question!". — StreetlightX

But it's easy to answer your question, I don't understand the difficulty. A machine does a job of work. If you're trying make a connection with utility, then you need a person. Utility requires a person to be useful to, nothing can be useful objectively. A machine is useful if it does work that the user of the machine wants it to do. There's no requirement that I judge its utility in order to define it as a machine, but there is in order that I judge it as a 'good' or 'bad' machine.

I don't see what point you're trying to make here.

It's a machine if it does some job of work, it's a useful one if it does that job to the satisfaction of the person using it.

It's philosophy if it makes some argument about 'the way things are' that cannot be checked against objective empirical sense data (or whatever definition you prefer). It's a useful one if the person holding it finds it satisfying.

The problem comes when someone who does not find an argument satisfying tries to claim that it is therefore universally 'bad' by some hashed-together criteria because they can't handle the relativism of philosophical propositions.

In my view this statement is pretty much the point of the thread, the math thing was just illustrating this point. — fdrake

Really? Then I must apologise for hijacking such an entirely mundane discussion with a side-track into the authority by which we judge philosophical propositions. That we can abstract enough to discuss the presumptions essential to our discourse (or not depending on your view of hinge propositions), seems, as my comment implies, self-evidently true. I'm not sure what else a thread entirely about it might be trying to say.

The statement I was arguing against was this one in the OP;

What I want to add to this is that philosophical concepts are just like this. The concepts we employ are a function of what we aim to capture with them; to employ one concept rather than another is to bring out one aspect of the world rather than another. Moreover, the deployment of our concepts is not governed by truth, but by their range of illumination. This is not on account of their being arbitrary ('subjective'), but absolutely necessary.

The paper makes the point that maths is governed by choices and proofs sometimes simply 'fall out' of making those choices, other times, as with SLX's example above, the proofs are simply chosen or ignored out of preference for what they can do.

But the argument that philosophy is "...just like this", has been advanced without further explanation as to why.

The first part, that philosophy too makes choices about frames which in turn dictate solutions, is pretty uncontroversial. The second part, that is does so out of some quest for utility, their "their fruitfulness for ... whatever it is we want to do" remains an entirely unsupported assertion. What exactly is it that philosophy "does" in this argument, that frames could be chosen on the basis of their ability to further? In what way can any philosophy be rejected as 'bad' philosophy, under this understanding? Presumably, because it isn't fruitful at producing whatever it is it's supposed to produce. And yet we have no evidence to show that this is happening at all. Hence my comment that "the levels of disagreement about what constitutes a 'solution' in maths (as a whole) are dwarfed by the wholesale and almost exhaustive disagreement on the same question in philosophy."

This is the whole point of Wittgenstein's investigation. A point not lost on the authors of the paper themselves who note the importance of Wittgenstein's solutions to the rule-following paradox.

It's rarely the actual preliminary points made in any of these threads that I object to. Largely they are trivially true. It's the game they're used to play, it's the "therefore...." that comes at the end of it all that bothers me.

So, philosophers are full of shit when they talk about hinge propositions? — Posty McPostface

I'm not sure I understand your point here.

Can hinges be analysed in contexts in which they are not presumed? It isn't as if everything that's required to philosophise about X is required to philosophise about Y. I take it that we're actually doing this at the minute; we're arguing about the framing of philosophy itself. — fdrake

I agree. I don't see how either of us could conceive of the concept of 'hinges' without being able to abstract them from their use.

Each of us is using a different framing device. This is supposed to be an impossibility, but it's not. — fdrake

How have you concluded that it's supposed to be an impossibility? I can't see how this is implied.

To operate on this level of abstraction has as a hinge that we can take other hinges and philosophise about them. — fdrake

Absolutely. So is such a hinge useful, in that it allows us a discourse we find useful? Certainly, if philosophy does anything at all, then allowing a discourse about its aims and methods should also provide some utility.

But we're straying from the point of the thread (I think). We got here by way of my claim that philosophy remains significantly different from maths, and what similarity it shares is of trivial importance. To maintain that claim, in the terminology of hinge propositions, it only need be the case that anything equivalent to a hinge proposition in maths (which I take to be something like axioms or accepted methodology?) dictate solutions to the problems within that frame in a way that does not happen in philosophy. I understand that in higher level mathematics (not my "kindergarten crap"), there will be debates about what constitutes a 'solution', but I'm afraid without a raft of evidence to the contrary (and none such has been advanced), I remain of the opinion that the levels of disagreement about what constitutes a 'solution' in maths (as a whole) are dwarfed by the wholesale and almost exhaustive disagreement on the same question in philosophy. An explanation for that is the key question for meta-philosophy.

I've grown to understand that pragmatism is what your reffering to when it comes down to assessing the utility of various beliefs. No? — Posty McPostface

Yes, Pragmatism is a pretty wide term (especially if you include neopragmatism) but basically it's the epistemological approach I subscribe to.

To my mind, you're characterising the adoption of hinge propositions as a kind of psychological excess to the discourse; why engage in this rather than that? Must be mere feeling. — fdrake

Not at all. I'm arguing, as Salvatore does in response to Wright's 'hinges', that one cannot simultaneously allow the discourse to range over both the argument given the use of hinges and the selection of hinges, which is what happens in philosophical debate. To do so would be a misuse of the terms used to judge positions in ordinary use. The selection of hinges is mere feeling, that's the point, if they were not then the problem of 'selecting hinges' would itself require hinges in order to resolve it, and so on ad infinitum. This is what I meant originally by 'having your cake and eating it'. I entirely agree that maths may well proceed by certain selections which then dictate the nature of the solution (I'm hardly in a position to disagree, given my mathematical knowledge), but the fact that philosophy will also proceed thus is trivially true. All that's being said there is that the selection of axioms/hinges/problmescapes will constrain the set of possible solutions. Solutions are constrained by factors (which themselves must be presumed to be true). I don't see anything controversial there.

What proceeds from this is the point I take issue with, the idea that there can still be 'wrong' solutions given agreement of certain hinge propositions, that there can be objectively 'uninteresting', 'non-useful' or 'unnecessary' sets of hinge propositions, or that some discourse (no matter how so constrained) can somehow still be 'measured'. Measured against what scale I must remain unenlightened, as SLX seems to have closed that enquiry.

Maths seems to me to fit all these criteria well (proofs from within agreed axioms are measured by the same metric, problems are agreed on as being problems). Philosophy quite evidently does not. There is no agreement on solutions even within accepted hinges, it remains entirely undecided what problems are necessary, interesting or useful after 200 years of inquiry. The problem, using hinge terminology (though I wouldn't personally use the term), is that hinges in philosophy are not a single early choice like they are in maths, they are a continual hierarchy of choices which is permanently in flux at the terminal branches. One selection does not produces a necessary solution, it produces another choice. That decision just yields a third set of choices, that one a fourth and so on, we are forever choosing hinges, never having the resulting discourse.

Pete Unger makes a similar point, although not with your terminology. Philosophical arguments are held to win if and only if no counter-example can be thought of in any possible world, but this is an impossible standard to meet because the field of "all that can happen in any possible world" is too large, possibly infinitely large. Thus philosophical debates become pointlessly amaranthine. I'm not sure if this counts as the proponent of a philosophical proposition playing a losing game, or their opponent playing a winning one. I'm inclined to see it as neither, but that third option you offer which is that neither realises the nature of the game.

Even if, as in academic philosophy, the debate is constrained by some accepted axioms, say two naturalist philosophers will debate about the role of reductionism, or two Kantians might argue about the extent to which capital punishment is implied by the CI, if possible world counter-examples are genuinely infinite, the tight bounding of the field will make no difference, infinity divided by anything is still infinity.

I think it comes down to the muddle people have about the purpose of philosophy. People treat it simultaneously as a series of problems with more or less 'right' solutions, and as an exercise in rhetoric where the careful and deliberate obfuscation of terms can be used to make your solution seem right no matter what.

As I've mentioned before (ad nauseum?), the only way out of this is to ditch the idea of philosophy as a method of seeking 'truth', and come to terms with it's role as therapy. Instead of opponents in a debate, you have complimentary options, rational people will choose one of the options which makes most sense (in the classic use of the term), irrational people might choose some crazy world-view which is completely incoherent, but as Mark Twain (probably) said, one can hardly expect to use rational argument to disabuse someone of a notion that was never rationally arrived at in the first place.

1) 'Sensible/Intelligible': The intelligible/sensible distinction is thoroughly Platonic in provenance and refers to the sensory ('feelings/affects') and the rational. You can find it in Plato, Averroes, Descartes, Kant and Sellars, among other places. It's pretty much among the most classic distinctions in all of philosophy. That your first associations were with - of all people and things - Austin, Tarski and 'coherence theory' - just speaks to, well, the completely different universe of discourse that you occupy. — StreetlightX

I fail to see how Platonic intelligibility has any bearing on the use of the term in your argument. What I referred to earlier was not the concept that there exists a distinction between intelligible and unintelligible in a Platonic sense, but that that distinction has any bearing on 'Good' or 'Bad' philosophy. It's not the sentence here that I object to, it's its use to label certain philosophies 'bad' on the basis of their "unintelligibility" (which you yourself have done, but you're certainly not the first). Intelligibility here is not being used in the Platonic sense, it's being used in the Tarskian sense, that the truth value is judged by it (see Patterson's Essays on Tarski for a full account). If what is meant by the term really is Platonic, or Kantian a priori, then we're on the same page afterall, but you'd also have to concede then that if someone (anyone in the world) can think of it, it is intelligible. All philosophical theories are intelligible by virtue of the fact that they have been thought of.

2) 'Measurement': Sorry, but this one really is just pure and unadulterated sophistry. Leaving aside the obvious fact that 'measurement' in the context it was used was clearly a synonym of 'assess' or 'evaluate', the idea that 'measurement' belongs exclusively to a scientific vocabulary is only something a non-native speaker of English could ever think. When Protagoras declared that ἄνθρωπος μέτρον - man is the measure of all things - do you think he meant that humans are scientific instruments? That this has to be even pointed out is embarrassing for us both. — StreetlightX

To measure something is to compare it to some scale or other, in all uses of the term. The way it enters into non-scientific use is when that scale is either subjective, or metaphorical, but the scale is still there, and that's the point here. In the sentence "Every great philosopher then, is measured by what he or she brings into view" The scale is what? The quantity of things brought into view? The weight? The volume? I think not. I think it's fairly obvious from the use the term is being put to that the scale here is the 'rightness' of the views, which means we still have not escaped a search for 'truth'. If you think it refers to some other scale, I'd be interested to hear your interpretation.

3) 'Necessity': you think necessity refers to deflationary theories?? Really? Really really? You think necessity has not been thematized with truth in philosophy until a bunch of boffins in early 1900s decided to do it? Try Plato. — StreetlightX

Again, the provenance of 'necessity' is not the issue. My preference is to reference the most recent exposition to make the point, many philosophical propositions get refined in a way that most people find useful. I'm not sure how the Platonic necessity works here for you (Plato used the term to distinguish intelligible from material necessity), but If you still find Platonic concepts of necessity useful then we can probably work with those. It doesn't make any difference to the argument, which is that necessity entails teleology (necessary for what?) and unless I've missed something teleology has not yet yielded anything other than a mire of just about every conflicting theory it is possible to have.

Most of what you say is not even wrong, it's just... irrelevant and uneducated. — StreetlightX

Or we could discuss this like adults...

1.

"The great debates of philosophy are questions of how existence should be framed. — StreetlightX

2.

Every great philosopher then, is measured by what he or she brings into view; — StreetlightX

3.

is not the resolution to a problem, but the elaboration, to the very end, of the necessary implications of a formulated question — StreetlightX

4.

Any philosophical distinction - say between the sensible and the intelligible, — StreetlightX

5.

Philosophies are only more or less useful, more or less interesting, more or less significant. — StreetlightX

In 1) "Should" implies a shouldn't, in 2) "measured" is literally the terminology of science (truth is that which can be measured), in 3) it's turned into "necessary", implying there is an 'unnecessary', by 4) its either "sensible" , or "intelligible", again implying there is nonsense or unintelligible,and at 5) it's become either "useful", "interesting" or "significant".

This thread a very nice potted history of epistemology (albeit not in order). Truth as correspondence has been thrown out at the beginning, but all that has happened is not a rejection of philosophy as 'truth-seeking' but a translation of philosophy's traditional 'truth-seeking' objective into just about every theory of truth that's out there.

"sensible" - Coherence theory.

"useful" - Pragmatism.

"intelligible" - Tarski, or perhaps Austin, depending on what is meant by "intelligible".

"necessary" - any number of deflationary theories.

All I see happening here is a shifting of the location of truth, not any proposition that philosophy is not striving for it.

If frames can be be "sensible", "useful", "intelligible",or "necessary", and if solutions to problems really do just 'fall out' from having chosen the 'right' frame, then selecting the 'right' frame is epistemologically equivalent to having the 'right' solution. If frame and solution become equivalent, in terms of truth value, and "sensible", "useful", "intelligible", and "necessary" are just synonyms for "true" under various theories of truth, then how has any of this taken philosophy away from a preoccupation with truth?

Yeah, you could call that the 'history' of the problem, I could argue that I would see that as the history of maths, not the history of that problem, which I think of in a more ontological sense. But then we're just getting into defining terms rather than saying anything interesting, and despite the inexplicable preoccupation with that kind of bullshit in philosophy, that sort of investigation bores me. I'll see if I can restate it in language that might prove less equivocal.

I don't think I would need to know why that equation needs solving in order to find a good solution to it. I only really need the language it's written in, some axiomatic presumptions which restrict solutions, and some signposts pointing in the right direction.

Philosophical problems share these features, but this is vacuously true. All that's being said is that problems all have at least some factors influencing the possible solutions.

Philosophy is different in that the psychological effect, the human reception, of the solution actually matters, matters way more than the constraints (which are trivially surmounted by simply re-arranging axioms), matters way more than the signposts of previous thinkers (which can be discarded as easily as logical positivism). What we're producing as a solution is an attractive salve to the wounds caused by the uncertainty of that which is as yet unknown. Look at the continuing popularity of the Cosmological Argument, the staying power of 'Meditations'. Do you honestly think these are solutions which just fell out inevitably from the definition of the problemscape. They are crafted such as to make the water flow where its needed.

Maths may well have choices about which problemscape to use and the solutions will certainly be guided by that choice, but that's nothing like philosophy, where the problemscapes are carved, and mass-engineered with the sole intention of producing a pre-determined type of solution.

All of that ambiguity was removed from the problem because there are signposts in the problemscape already interpreting what the problem consists of and solution methods. — fdrake

Absolutely, I think I understand what you're saying here, for maths. I'm afraid I'm still not quite seeing how it applies to philosophical problems. I mean, I can see exactly how it could apply, just little evidence (certainly in my limited experience) that is actually does.

I expect my question got lost in my rambling prose, but it would help me to understand your line of thought if you could tell me how you think the history of the problem affects the approach. As I said, in philosophy it's absolutely instrumental, I'm not seeing any way it is in maths.

I'm quite content that inquiry in general is like a landscape, and the problem is like flowing water, it's route being almost dictated by the structures in the landscape which guide it in a particular, almost determinate, course. Its just that I think philosophy (particularly of the public kind) is not an inquiry of this sort at all, but more a description of what just happened, the process by which water flows through this landscape, a reassuring story (or various such stories). To me, problems in philosophy are almost always problems of translation. I'm trying to translate a description of the problemscape (if I can borrow you terminology) not run the water through it to see where it goes.

I think Witty drew the wrong conclusion from his own argument, — StreetlightX

Well, you'd be in good company, some of my favourite philosophers are also of this opinion, but not me. I have a lot of sympathy for such a position, and I can just about see how you can reasonably make the link you're making here, but I just don't find it convincing enough... yet.

Absolutely, I agree, but that's rather the point I'm trying to make (I'm guessing you're either no Wittgenstein fan or you have a completely different take on his project to me). What was Wittgenstein's conclusion of this critique?... Philosophy is only descriptive, its purpose therapeutic. The only problem to be solved is that of the human psychology.

Interesting thoughts. I'm a fairly committed realist (even, dare I say something of a materialist... I know, but we're fairly easily killed with silver bullets and a stake through the heart). So, for me, numbers present a problem to be solved. When it comes to a belief in the subjectivity, or unreliability, of intuition, language, I think, plays the same role. Its unreasonably effective given that no-one who speaks it understands how it functions.

I think the solution I tentatively apply to numbers though can be applied to language also. Both, I think, are meta-real, by which I mean the entities themselves don't exist as real objects (numbers, words), but are a shared fiction. We must tell each other what the fiction is before we can use them, but it is because our consciousness is so desperately searching (and with such efficiency) for a 'fiction' which can be used to unite our various empirical epistemologies that these fictions have such staying power.

Post it again so I can read the study. — chatterbears

http://scholar.google.co.uk/scholar_url?url=https://www.lbs.co.il/data/attachment-files/2015/05/23994_thbahvnvt.pdf&hl=en&sa=X&scisig=AAGBfm0EnoQUILL85Pf3mP-Wo5mPQ_KHDw&nossl=1&oi=scholarr

https://academic.oup.com/ajcn/article/78/3/664S/4690011

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-017-06466-8

As for the rest of your post, it's not 'necessary' for me to kill the deer I hunt. I could buy the equivalent vegetables, or the equivalent in factory chicken. I hunt deer and eat them because it think its less harmful overall for the reasons cited in the studies above (as well as other reasons to do with the value I personally attach to 'naturalness', the meaning of which would take an entire essay to explain). So your acceptance through gritted teeth of those who absolutely have to kill animals for meat is entirely irrelevant. I wish more people hunted their own meat, reared pigs on kitchen scraps, ate the pigeons and rabbits which are killed anyway to grow vegetables. Its not about necessity, its about believing it to be better.

It's great how you've laid out what you see as a 'problemscape' in maths, that has been helpful, but (and I feel bad I didn’t think to specify this at first) I actually meant to ask what you thought an incomplete problemscape would look like in philosophy. The point being that I'm not sure how such a process would apply in philosophy even though I'm sure it does in maths.

Notwithstanding the above, I'll have a stab at explaining the problem-solving algorithm using the example you've given and highlight how it might be different if I was working on a philosophical problem within a prescribed framework, and different again if I was working on a philosophical problem somewhere like a public discussion.

My first step in both types of philosophical problem would be to understand why it's a problem in the first place, I'd first want to know why it needed solving at all, what place they have in the wider problem hierarchy? Already, I'm not sure whether this step is even necessary in your maths problem. Do we need to know why integrals even need solving to approach a solution? I could certainly solve y=x+4 (much more my level) without needing to know why we might need to know X in terms of y, but I wouldn't dream of approaching a philosophical problem without such background.

The second step would be to determine what would constitute a solution, what marks the solution I might come up with as being a good one. Again, with framework-prescribed philosophy, the solution would have constraints set by the framework, with public philosophy (I'm thinking mostly of ethics committees here, but I think it applies to this forum too) a 'solution' is a completely different thing, it's more about a perfect mixture of inter-translatable direction, and explanation mixed into one. With maths/science it very different again, the definition of a solution is all about repeatability, can others using your language do what you did and get the same result.

I mean, this is an oversimplification of course, but it might go some way to explaining why I'm not on board with this "maths is like philosophy" paradigm. I think it's like saying cars are like washing machines in that they're both designed to do a task. True, but vacuously true, it doesn't tell us anything about how to design better cars, or how to critique washing machines, for that we need to know what those objects are used for.