Although I think we agree on some things. In terms of Wittgenstein and what he's saying, we are very far apart, especially on the idea of what hinge-propositions are, and their relationship to epistemology.

I did much on my thinking about OC on my own, and what I find interesting is how well it matches up with many of those who have studied Wittgenstein. Obviously there are other interpretations of Wittgenstein's thinking, but I think much of my interpretation fits rather well with what's being taught, and with what some of his former students have written.

The problem with what you're claiming is that it doesn't fit with the common ideas gleaned from his writings. For example, that "...all other thought and belief are grounded on hinge-propositions," he certainly didn't say that. It's true that hinge-propositions ground epistemological beliefs, but some hinge-propositions (beliefs) are bedrock, they have no ground except as our inherited background. In that sense they are the ground. And this notion that hinge-propositions aren't beliefs is about as far away from what Wittgenstein is saying as you can get. Moore's propositions are expressed beliefs, i.e., Moore makes the claim that he knows he has hands, and if this is not an expressed belief, then what is? Wittgenstein goes on to demonstrate that Moore's propositions/beliefs are hinge-propositions. It seems odd to me that you would suggest otherwise.

Where did you get this interpretation? Is it something you came up with on your own, or did you get it from what others have written, or both? It's a very different take, and of course there's nothing wrong with thinking outside the box. I did some of that myself.

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We just disagree here Sam. Do you have any evidence from posthumous works that support the idea that Witt did not follow the conventional notion of JTB? It is my understanding that hinge propositions were meant to dissolve the issue of justificatory regress. It is also my understanding that Witt never found what he was looking for(a single hinge proposition). He called them "hinge propositions"... not hinge beliefs. — creativesoul

First, OC is not meant to support the notion of JTB. That's not to say there aren't examples of JTB in his notes. I don't know of any interpretation of Wittgenstein that thinks his writings are conventional in this sense, do you? Most interpretations think that Wittgenstein's writings are unconventional, and for the most part original.

Second, one could argue that Moore's propositions are examples of what many would consider propositional knowledge. Yet Wittgenstein is going against this notion, demonstrating that these propositions aren't propositions in the ordinary sense, which is why he calls them hinge-propositions. Hinge-proposition aren't epistemological at all, they are arational beliefs. Again, not just my interpretation, but the interpretation of many others who have studied OC.

I don't see how you can possibly think that hinge-propositions aren't beliefs. Wittgenstein starts out by critiquing Moore's propositions, which by definition are beliefs. My ideas of hinge-propositions go beyond what Wittgenstein said, in that I talk about prelinguistic beliefs. Wittgenstein stays within the bounds of language for the most part. There are many hinge-propositions that are linguistic, starting with Moore's propositions (I know this is a hand), are you saying this is not a belief? Wittgenstein's arguing that they are a special kind of belief, beliefs that fall outside the conventional understanding.

Two passages that I believe show the idea that hinge-propositions are beliefs, is the examples given in OC 284 and 285, but that they are beliefs there is no doubt. There are too many examples to list. Wittgenstein never denies that they are beliefs, he denies that they are pieces of knowledge, and knowledge goes beyond mere belief, in that they are beliefs that are justified in some way, according to particular language-games.

It's true that hinge-propositions solve the problem of infinite regress, but that's not the thrust of OC. His main goal is to come to grips with the nature of these kinds of beliefs, and this he never finished. My theory is that they are prelinguistic, and when language comes into the picture they become foundational beliefs that everyone swallows as part of reality.

By the way all propositions are beliefs. Thus a hinge-propositions could very well be called a hinge-belief. In fact, that may be a better way of talking about them.

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The answers you get from people on this forum are probably going to reflect their bias toward a particular interpretation. I would read as much background information as you could on Wittgenstein, and how he developed his ideas. If I were you I would read Ray Monk's book Ludwig Wittgenstein, The Duty of Genius, it is widely regarded as one of the best book on Wittgenstein.

Does this mean that a human being raised by wolves couldn't come up with the game, or does it mean that the last survivor of an apocalypse couldn't play the game? — Marchesk

Yes, any language by definition is social due to the nature of rule-following, which is part of the point of Wittgenstein's private language argument. So the correct and incorrect use of a word is something we do together, and this is an important logical point about the nature of language. However, don't confuse this with the idea of the private use of language, i.e., once I've learned a language, then I can use it privately, but that is always subject to the rule-following nature of language, not the other way around. The point is that you cannot develop and language which is completely private. This is difficult for some people to swallow, but I think that's because some people confuse having a private language with using a language privately.

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The thing here is that people have often used subjective criteria for knowledge. The Christian will probably say they know because their experience of God gives them evidence just like perceiving seeing the sun lets us know the sun exists.

They will probably reject the idea that knowledge is limited to the empirical or the deductive. The gnostics explicitly advocated for a kind of subjective relavatory knowledge. — Marchesk

It's true that many people make claims to knowledge based on subjective criteria, but that doesn't make it knowledge. If someone claims to know X, you have the right to ask how it is that they know. Surely knowledge isn't simply a claim to know, otherwise any claim to know would be knowing. That would be weird to say the least. If you make a claim that something is true, I may express my doubts by asking how it is that you know, and my doubts will not be satisfied simply because you repeat your subjective claim, that would tell me nothing. This is why it's important to appeal to objective evidence that supports the claim. My doubts about your claim would then be satisfied. Of course sometimes people aren't satisfied even after seeing the objective evidence.

I would claim that their subjective experience of God is not the same as our sensory experience of seeing the sun. The latter is objectively observed, the former not.

I'm saying it's necessarily both. Consider that humans wouldn't have developed pain talk if we didn't feel pain, just like we wouldn't have a color vocabulary without eyes. — Marchesk

I agree there is a connection between the pain we feel and how we learn to use the word pain. However, note that in order to learn to use the word correctly, both the sensation of pain, and the use of the word are done in social contexts, not privately. So although it's true that without the sensation of pain there would be no talk of pain, that's besides the point. The point is that learning to use the word that is connected with the sensation, again takes place in language-games. This is seen most clearly in Wittgenstein's discussion of having a private language.

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Temple Grandin was of the opinion that animals thought in pictures instead of words, and that a lot of people have a hard time with this because they're thinking is so dominated by language. But she calls herself a visual thinker who has to translate pictures to words in order to communicate with others, being that she's a high functioning autist. — Marchesk

We definitely use visualizations, but I'm not sure animals do, maybe. I'd be interested in the evidence that suggests that animals use visualizations. The only reason I have to doubt this, is that our minds do much more than an animals, although they might do more basic kinds of visualizations.

Witt worked from the conventional notion that all thought and belief is propositional in content. It is my strong opinion that that served to stifle his genius on this matter of belief. — creativesoul

This just isn't true. In fact, there is much in Wittgenstein's thinking that is just unconventional. Hinge-propositions are not propositions in the conventional sense. In a sense they're not propositions at all.

You see Sam, this is actually quite contentious. Following the same logic, my chickens believe that they have beaks.

This harks back to the issue I'm raising. We must first have some notion regarding what a belief actually is, and more importantly what belief is existentially dependent upon and/or what belief consists of, prior to our being able to observe and correctly attribute belief to another. — creativesoul

It's only contentious because you're allowing a particular interpretation to take root. While it's true that actions reflect belief, it's not true that all actions reflect belief. Many living things act in some way, but that doesn't mean that every action/behavior reflects a belief. It's also true that some actions are more difficult to ascribe a belief to, but that doesn't mean that particular kinds of actions don't reflect beliefs. There are also involuntary and voluntary actions for example, certainly involuntary actions don't reflect belief.

I think for the most part we do know what a belief is, we use the word all the time in ways that show what a belief is. One use of the word belief in reference to actions is the following: There are many instances in courts of law where we can reasonably infer what someone actually believes by their actions even if they're lying. So if someone says, "No, I wasn't with my sister at 9 am on Sunday morning the 5th of August 2018," and there is a video showing him with his sister at that time, then we can reasonably infer that his actions tell another story. His actions reflect what he really believes. In some respects actions are a more reliable indicator of what someone believes.

It's the way you're using the word belief that's causing the confusion.

Behaviour alone is inadequate justificatory ground for positing any particular belief. There are also clear actual examples that serve to falsify that claim, placing it into the "some" behaviour shows belief category... clearly not all. — creativesoul

Again, not all behavior equates to a belief. I'm not sure why you would conclude this. I sure don't believe it, and I'm fairly certain Wittgenstein didn't believe it. It doesn't logically follow that because some actions or behaviors reflect beliefs, that all actions or behaviors reflect beliefs.

You're right to say that positing pre-linguistic belief is not gratuitous. I'm mistaken to say that, now that I actually think about it. My apologies. However, to say that belief consists of actions while also asserting that action shows belief renders the language use incoherent. — creativesoul

No need to apologize, it's easy to make mistakes, or to write something that we later see as an error, or even a typo.

In response to your last sentence - I think it's only incoherent based on your interpretation. Hopefully my writings directly above clear up some of this.

This leaves out the part where we also feel the pain and learn to associate our sensation with how other people are talking and behaving. — Marchesk

You're conflating learning to use the word pain with feeling the sensation of pain. We don't learn to use the word pain based on our private sensations, but we learn to use the word in association with others. This is closely related to the idea of rule-following which is not done in private. Learning a language is necessarily social, so in that sense it's not dependent on what you feel. I'm not saying it has no connection with your sensation, I'm saying that how we talk about pain is necessarily social and not private.

First actions are not reliable indicators of belief. Second, several different beliefs could be reported as an explanation for most actions. Thirdly, several different beliefs could cause the same behaviour. Lastly, on my view, positing pre-linguistic belief without getting into what belief consists of is to gratuitously assert a pre-linguistic belief. — creativesoul

When talking about prelinguistic beliefs actions are the only indicators of a belief. There is no other way to say that a human or animal has a belief other than by observing their behavior.

Your second criticism is a point about interpretation, not the belief, i.e., the action reflects a belief independent of your interpretation of the belief. If a prelinguistic human is using their hands to root around in the soil, then one can say with absolute certainty that the human believes that it has hands. You may infer other obvious and not so obvious beliefs, but that is separate from having the belief state.

The rooting around in the soil does reflect more than one belief, that's for sure, but that doesn't count against the idea that the actions reflect the beliefs. In fact, it supports the idea.

My view does tell you what the belief consists of, viz., the actions of the person or animal in question. It's not at all gratuitous. We do this all the time, linguistic beliefs or not.

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My epistemological theory Creative only requires that there be prelinguistic beliefs of a certain kind, and what gives life to these belief are our actions. The actions show the belief.

To be honest, I really don't know what's going on in the mind of a prelinguistic person or animal. My intuition and my metaphysics says there is much more going on than we realize. What that is, again, I don't know. You're going beyond my claims, and my claims are going beyond what Wittgenstein would say. There may be something to what you're claiming, and some of it may just be speculation. Whatever the case, keep thinking about it, but keep thinking about it with Wittgenstein in mind, because I think his thoughts on the subject are important.

But one of the big appeals - one of the temptations you see thinker after thinker succumbing to - is the possibility of pronouncing the Truth. Of being the one who pronounces. — csalisbury

People want to know if a belief is true, there's nothing more natural. Does God exist? Does God not exist? Is one belief better than another, or are all beliefs purely subjective? Everyone one has a philosophy of life, you can't escape it. Even your ideas put forth a certain philosophy. It needs unpacked quite a bit, but I'm sure there is a philosophy about truth pronouncements in there somewhere. Once you put forth your philosophy, people want to know if it's true. Then they might ask if it's subjectively true or objectively true, and on and on it goes. That's how we discover.

A language-less creature can touch fire. Touching fire causes discomfort. Some language-less creatures can touch fire, feel discomfort, and attribute causality by virtue of inferring that touching fire caused the discomfort. All attribution of causality is thought and belief. That creature thinks, believes, and otherwise infers that touching fire caused the discomfort. That creature's belief is true. That creature's belief is well-grounded. That creature's belief cannot consist of language. That creature's belief cannot consist of propositions. That creature's belief cannot be existentially dependent upon language. That creature's belief cannot be existentially dependent upon justification. Not all well-grounded true belief is existentially dependent upon language. Not all well-grounded true belief is existentially dependent upon justification. — creativesoul

Sorry, I should have realized that that was your example, my mistake. I did read this a while back.

So we have some prelinguistic human, or even an animal that touches a fire and feels discomfort, and you're saying that in virtue of this sensory experience "...they attribute causality by virtue of inferring..." - I follow the first part, but it's the latter that seems very problematic. It seems to me that you're giving these beings linguistic notions, viz., the concepts of causality and the ability to draw an inference. How do we know they're attributing causality and drawing an inference based on the discomfort they feel. For example, I can say that if a prelinguistic human roots around in the ground for grubs, that the prelinguistic human believes there are grubs in the ground. How do I know that this is the case? I know based on their actions. Apart from their actions I know nothing of what's going on in their minds.

Moreover, all I see are simple beliefs. The prelinguistic human touched the fire and felt discomfort, and as a result, formed a further belief based on these sensory experiences. I do believe there is a causal connection between the touching of the fire and the belief, but it's not because they attributed causality or even inferred this. The causal connection is independent of what they think. It's because the touching of the fire sent an uncomfortable signal to the brain, which caused a further belief, which is then seen in their actions, viz., staying further back from the fire. So we see the actions after the experience, which leads us to observe the further beliefs formed after the experience.

My conclusion is that these are nothing more than simple prelinguistic beliefs. I'm not sure why you want to add all this baggage, viz., that their attributing causality and inferring X.

Creative, I don't see where you explained what a well-grounded prelinguistic belief is. We agree that there are prelinguistic beliefs. Give an example of a well-grounded prelinguistic belief, and what makes it well-grounded. I just don't see where you've explained this.

I agree, we express beliefs all the time that can be justified, or that are well-grounded, without putting forth the reasons or evidence for those beliefs. If I express a belief as a true belief, one might ask how it is that I know it's true, then I will respond with my reasons/evidence. However, there are some beliefs that don't fall into this epistemological language-game. Those are Wittgenstein's hinge-propositions or bedrock beliefs. They are grounded, but they are grounded in a way of acting, i.e., my actions show or demonstrate that I have the belief. Is this what you're saying? This kind of grounding seems to be a bit different than what you're saying. Being well-grounded seems to imply something more, not sure, I'll keep reading your explanations.

Yes, I agree.

I'm adding numbers to your statements to make it easier.

Regarding the idea of prelinguistic knowledge(justified true belief)...

1. Creative knows that belief exists prior to language.

2. Creative knows that being justified is being well-grounded.

3. Creative knows that the act of justification does not cause the belief statement being argued for to be well-grounded; rather it is the act of providing those grounds.

4. Creative knows that well-grounded belief is not existentially dependent upon justification.

5. Creative knows that the attribution/recognition of causality can be well grounded.

6. Creative knows that a prelinguistic creature can believe that touching fire caused discomfort/pain.

7. Creative knows that that well grounded belief can happen prior to language.

8. Creative knows that touching fire causes discomfort.

9. Creative knows that that particular well-grounded true belief is prior to language. — creativesoul

Your first premise: I agree that a belief can exist prior to language.

Your second premise: For me justification and being well-grounded are the same. If you can say that I'm justified in believing X, it's the same as saying my belief is well-grounded, both of these are necessarily linguistic. Why is well-grounded prior (maybe because of the causal effect) to language and justification not?

Your third premise: The act of justification doesn't cause any belief, that would be weird. You seem to be saying that the act of justification is different from being well-grounded, in that being well-grounded is causal, or can be causal. I know that I made an argument that prelingistic beliefs are causally generated, but you seem to be taking it one step further, by adding in the idea of being well-grounded. I don't see the need to extend it, it's just another belief that is causally generated, it's not a matter of being well-grounded. By their very nature they are foundational, basic, hinge, or bedrock, there is no need for the idea of being well-grounded. Isn't this a kind of justification. It seems confusing. Moreover, it seems that you're still adding in ideas that are necessarily linguistic.

Your fourth premise: Based on your distinction between justification and being well-grounded I can see how this might follow.

Your fifth premise: I don't know what it means, i.e., "...the attribution/recognition of causality can be well-grounded."

Your sixth premise: I agree.

Your seventh premise: I have a problem as already stated with this idea.

Your eighth premise/conclusion: This seems to be a conclusion, but I'm not sure.

Your ninth statement/conclusion: I disagree, because I have problems with your premises as already stated. Moreover, much of what I said in my previous statement still applies.

Finally, some of this is difficult to follow because of how your defining terms.

That's funny. :grin:

Nothing is the absence of anything, even a definition. Therefore, for a true nothing to exist, every possibility must exist at every time but never any one at any particular time. These circumstances would prevent the nothingness from being defined and it would remain nothing. — unic0rnio

If you want to understand the word nothing, then simply look at how it's used in ordinary sentences. There is nothing mysterious about the use of the word. Definitions are simply guides, but use tells us much more.

Say nothing.
I did nothing.
There is nothing there.
Your book said nothing.
Nothing's easy.
I have nothing.
I admit nothing.

These along with hundreds of other uses will tell you more about the word than the musing of hundreds of philosophers.

I thought I would add the following Creative...

There is some agreement between my position on this subject, and what Creative is inferring. However, there is also significant disagreement on some of these issues. For example, we agree that without prelinguistic thought and belief there would be no language. However, we disagree in terms of what things are pre-linguistic. For example, Creative seems to believe that justification, truth, and knowledge are prelinguistic. My position is that all epistemological constructs are necessarily dependent on language. So, when we talk about truth, justification, and knowledge, these are all necessarily dependent on language. Why do I infer that this is the case?

First, some concepts, such as belief, are both non-linguistic and linguistic, i.e., beliefs can be shown to exist in these two forms. They can be shown by our actions, i.e., by opening the door my actions show that I believe there is a door; and they can be stated as part of a language, “I believe in such-and-such.”

Second, another key feature of non-linguistic beliefs is that they can have existence apart from language, i.e., they are not rule-dependent, and this is key to understanding my position. Any belief that can have existence apart from language, is not dependent on language. You can think of it this way: The word Mars has a referent quite apart from the concept Mars, so the referent is not dependent on language, i.e., the referent is not rule-dependent. Don’t confuse this with using the word Mars linguistically, i.e., there are rules that govern the use of the concept in a linguistic setting. However, this is quite different from the referent itself, which exists quite apart from any linguistic consideration. This is also true of non-linguistic beliefs, which can have an existence (a referent) independent of language. The referent that manifests itself in terms of non-linguistic beliefs, are the actions associated with the belief. In fact, this is what makes some or all of these kinds of beliefs bedrock or hinge.

Third, some concepts or beliefs are necessarily dependent on language in that they are rule-dependent, and there is no independent referent that they can latch onto apart from their use in language. Justification is just such a concept, justification gets its meaning from how it’s used in a language, and only from how it’s used in language. This is very similar to the idea that it’s linguistically impossible to have a private language, which by the way, is very different from using a language privately. The latter is done only after learning a language, the former is supposedly done in a completely private setting. If justification was something that could be done apart from language, then it would also be true that there would be no rules that governed the activity. This follows from the idea that rule-following is necessarily social. Not only would this be true of justification, but it would also be true of truth and knowledge. It’s not you who decide how such words/concepts are used.

I think the experiences of NDEs goes beyond consciousness filling in the gaps based on cultural experiences. There are just to many NDEs that demonstrate that people are having real experiences, and these are corroborated by objective testimonial evidence. In fact, what's seems weird is that while the brain is shutting down, instead of the experiences being less real, which is what you would expect of a brain that's not at full capacity, what you find instead is that the experiences are more real. What I mean by more real is that the experiences are hyper-real, NDEers experience more awareness, more knowledge, larger visual field, etc. In fact, this reality seems dreamlike by comparison.

It's fine, I have no intentions with continuing a philosophical argument with someone who can't provide a proper argument. As I said, this is a philosophical forum, not a theological or spiritual, arguments need to keep their premisses and conclusions as clean s possible. Even when they don't work, in a dialectic, the opposing side is meant to improve your own argument by challenging it. However that requires proper deductive and inductive reasoning. A total misunderstanding of science and how basic physics and biology work as the foundation for the conclusion leads no where and after pointing out all the problems over and over there's still no improvements. I'm new here so I believed this place to feature a bit higher level dialectics than other places online, but it seems there's people here as well who can't properly do philosophical discourse. — Christoffer

You don't know what the hell you're talking about, the argument I gave on the first page of this thread is an INDUCTIVE argument.

No shit, it's a philosophical forum, I didn't know that. I don't mind responding to arguments, but I don't like having to repeat myself, especially when you come in here without reading a good part of the posts. If you're going to lecture someone about arguments, know what you're talking about. I know enough philosophy to know what an inductive argument is.

Besides you wouldn't know higher level philosophy if it jumped up and bit you on the ass.

Guys if you're going to continue this long discussion on consciousness you should start up a thread. This thread has to do with NDEs and whether they provide evidence of consciousness

If you read the exchange between Fdrake and myself you'll get more of the answers to these questions. Fdrake came up with the best counter-argument, although I don't think it does the job of refuting the points I have made. If after you have read my responses to Fdrake you still have questions, I'll try to answer them. I just don't want to spend hours responding to questions that I've already answered.

Thanks,
Sam

Obviously you haven't read my arguments. If you had you could have addressed them. Most of what you argued has already been addressed.

Yes, I am familiar with this project.

A class by Dr. Duncan Pritchard on Wittgenstein's On Certainty.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ndS5MPoH4Zc

Remember, I'm telling you what the evidence is telling us, that doesn't mean that I have all the answers. I know I don't. Moreover, because you can't make sense of it doesn't mean much, unless of course there's an obvious contradiction.

Consider the things you may be willing to experience if you knew you couldn't ultimately be harmed.

But we don't have much choice about suppressing our memory when we fall asleep. It just happens as we fall asleep. Maybe it is similar with the suppression of memory during incarnation - it just happens and there is not much we can do about it. Maybe one day we will be able to control it. Maybe one day we used to be able to control it but we lost that ability due to a spiritual fall, as the esoteric sources say. — litewave

Well, the dream analogy isn't perfect, but I do believe that when we choose to come here, part of making that decision is the suppression of who we really are, what we know, and where we're from. We make an agreement when we come here, for e.g., we agree to come here for a certain period of time, which is why people who have NDEs are told it's not their time, you have to go back.

Ya Brian I see total unity of mind or consciousness, which is why I think the unifying principle behind everything is consciousness.