It may be metaphorically said that Natural Selection is daily and hourly scrutinizing, throughout the world, the slightest variations; rejecting those that are bad, and adding up all that are good; silently and insensibly working whenever and wherever opportunity offers, at the improvement of each organic being. — Charles Darwin, On the Origin of Species — Wayfarer

The passage you quoted from Darwin is metaphorical, as he acknowledges. and again it's not clear what you intended it to address. — Janus

While I don't want to derail the thread from the OP more it already has been, for the sake of historical accuracy, Darwin himself was a teleologist. (Disclaimer: I've only skimmed through parts of the linked-to article, but it serves its purpose of providing strong evidence for the claim.)

The metaphorical aspects of Darwin's given quote regards the very conscious intentionality that we've been previously addressing - but not the issue of goal-directedness. Better expressed, as the terms have been so far used by us, Darwin viewed the very process of Natural Selection as telos-guided yet devoid of that notion of purpose which is contingent on a conscious agency (i.e., that of an omnipotent God).

:grin: :up:

OK, I think I see where you are coming from now, and I agree that telos, considered as simply denoting the seemingly invariant tendencies of things to go certain ways (what we call "laws") is everywhere to be seen in nature as we perceive it.

You still refer to these as "aims", though and that is pushing the idea further than I would. It seems the actual concrete tendencies of things do begin to look like aims when we generalize and abstract them as laws. It is easy in thought to reify the notion of a law into something which stands over and above the actual things, the phenomena and processes of nature, directing them, so to speak. — Janus

I see that. Thanks. Something to consider. One however cannot reduce all teloi to laws since laws, at least as traditionally interpreted, are invariant - this contrasted, for instance, with the Peircean notion of (for me, personally, at least some) natural laws as ever-evolving global habits. Natural laws are also understood to be global. A consciously held goal (which one has chosen among other alternative goals at some point in the past and now pursues) will itself be a telos, but it is neither global nor invariant. But yes, I agree, "aims" is too cognitive for all instantiations of teloi if one is to go about thing as impartially as possible.

I think we are arguing for and/ or from and/ or about different conceptions of 'purpose'. I don't think of the general ways things tend to go as being purposes; I reserve the concept for those things that are either consciously planned. or at least sub-consciously driven by felt needs or wants. — Janus

Right, I can see that when it comes to purpose. As I initially said, to me it's a fairly fuzzy term when it comes to precise meaning. It's why I initially used the term teleology rather than purpose in my reply to Wayfarer. And why I tried to elaborate on purpose being a type (maybe better expressed, a subset) of teleology - maybe all too poorly - in my reply to you.

Teleology is the study of final causes, or teloi, which bring about motion by drawing things toward themselves. You were addressing that that all life strives to survive. Here granting this, and though I know this the issue of teloi is contentious in metaphysical discussions, this to me indicates that one of the teloi of life is the sustaining of life. Such that this non-conscious aim, which can become conscious in some such as us humans, limits the activities of all life such that these activities remain aligned to optimally approaching and/or actualizing this aim ... which, after all, is an ideal when considered in absolute, or complete, or perfect form.

Not really odd when you think about it. Many people think that true pleasure and happiness comes from moderation (rather than indulgence) and cutting out that which is unnecessary - hence the appeal of minimalism in this vulgar consumerist era. — Tom Storm

:up: All things in moderation is, I think, a good motto. My thoughts were framed in terms of what Epicureanism has come to commonly signify today. Thought the same distortions of belief can be said of Cynicism, to not also get into Ancient Skepticism. :razz:

Funny in its oddness but true: Epicurus’ hedonism was pretty much about aiming to be an ascetic to obtain the greatest state of pleasure that could be obtained. From the last paragraph of this section at IEP:

An example of a natural but non-necessary desire is the desire for luxury food. Although food is needed for survival, one does not need a particular type of food to survive. Thus, despite his hedonism, Epicurus advocates a surprisingly ascetic way of life. — https://iep.utm.edu/epicur/#SH5a

Emphasis mine. No indulgences in grandiose feasts or Roman orgies, or the like. Go figure.

And, from The University of Chicago Press, the more traditional rendition of Epicurus’ thoughts on the issue of sex (although, in fairness, the article argues that it is improperly translated): “They say that sex is never beneficial, and you are very lucky (or, “it is surprising”, or “it is marvelous”) if it does not do harm as well.”

From which you get this:

[...] when asked "why it was that pupils from all the other schools went over to Epicurus, but converts were never made from the Epicureans?" [the Academic Skeptic, Arcesilaus] responded: "Because men may become eunuchs, but a eunuch never becomes a man." — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epicureanism#Criticism

… and this, I think, only gets the ball rolling.

At any rate, history has a weird way of sometimes distorting people’s views.

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But to remain on topic, as to the issue of letting go of hedonism:

Pleasure is obtained from that which pleases one. It is, tmk, impossible to do without. If it pleases one to do away with being pleased, there is yet the pleasure that awaits when this goal is reached, as well as the pleasure held in the active pursuit of this goal … if only one could figure out how to obtain it. But I don't see how one can.

If you mean biological evolution as a scientifiç principle, then indeed it is not sentient nor does it consciously plan. In it's ultimate form, based on the, get this, central dogma of molecular biology (!), teleos is incorporated into selfish(!) genes, a most extraordinary theory of life and being. — Hillary

Yes, indeed. For Dawkins, the implied final cause is immortality, of genes that is. Which in turn makes them selfish.

Dawkins’ Selfish Gene has become very well known and accommodated within fields of neo-Darwinism. (Having read Darwin’s works and his autobiography, I’m confident he would have objected to Dawkins’ theory, whose book I’ve also read.) There however are other, granted so far more fringe, interpretations from scientists in the field. Here is the blurb from a book called "The Genial Gene: Deconstructing Darwinian Selfishness" published in 2009. The book is loaded with data to back up the claims.

Are selfishness and individuality—rather than kindness and cooperation—basic to biological nature? Does a "selfish gene" create universal sexual conflict? In The Genial Gene, Joan Roughgarden forcefully rejects these and other ideas that have come to dominate the study of animal evolution. Building on her brilliant and innovative book Evolution's Rainbow, in which she challenged accepted wisdom about gender identity and sexual orientation, Roughgarden upends the notion of the selfish gene and the theory of sexual selection and develops a compelling and controversial alternative theory called social selection. This scientifically rigorous, model-based challenge to an important tenet of neo-Darwinian theory emphasizes cooperation, elucidates the factors that contribute to evolutionary success in a gene pool or animal social system, and vigorously demonstrates that to identify Darwinism with selfishness and individuality misrepresents the facts of life as we now know them.

Considering the actual evolution, sentient beings are actually on the scene, and these beings have actual plans. — Hillary

Here is what I think is a related take:

Other philosophers of biology argue instead that biological teleology is irreducible, and cannot be removed by any simple process of rewording. Francisco Ayala specified three separate situations in which teleological explanations are appropriate. First, if the agent consciously anticipates the goal of their own action; for example the behavior of picking up a pen can be explained by reference to the agent's desire to write. Ayala extends this type of teleological explanation to non-human animals by noting that A deer running away from a mountain lion. . . has at least the appearance of purposeful behavior."[49] Second, teleological explanations are useful for systems that have a mechanism for self-regulation despite fluctuations in environment; for example, the self-regulation of body temperature in animals. Finally, they are appropriate "in reference to structures anatomically and physiologically designed to perform a certain function. "[49] — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teleology_in_biology#Irreducible_teleology

And yes, sexual selection in animals, as one example, is greatly based on choice regarding which mate(s) to copulate with.

If these are in service of some higher ideal as dogmatized in evolution theory, is highly questionable, and the new dogma is probably an attempt by lack of better or inability to understand truly. — Hillary

Agreed.

Not easy issues to explain in soundbite form, but I'll give it a go.

Firstly I can't see how the notion of purpose has any purchase without the accompanying idea of conscious planning, and I can't see how we can imagine conscious planning occurring in the absence of an at least sentient, if not sapient, agent. — Janus

As one example: Do you need to consciously plan on choosing that alternative which you deem optimally beneficial, hence good, relative to your principle, momentary conscious interests in order to so choose? Both purported saints and the vilest of villains will do this at all times regardless of their conscious planning. As will toddlers. I'll opine that, to the extent that lesser animals do in fact choose, the same will apply to lesser animals. Sentience cannot help but choose that which it deems to be optimally beneficial for itself, hence that which it momentarily feels to be optimally good for itself. This affirmation could be questioned (and can easily become complicated by issues such as that of short v. long term benefits), but supposing it's not here questioned: here, all our choices are partly manifested via the pull of the Good as a telos we all invariantly pursue at all times for ourselves - and this without any conscious planning to so pursue. It's instead a predetermined facet of our being we cannot escape: for in deeming it (consciously or unconsciously) good to escape it, we are nevertheless bound by it. Here, then, is telos (final cause) doing its work in the absence of conscious planning. This of course gets complicated, in part, by conscious planning ... but all such is yet existentially bound to the same telos of doing what is deemed best for you regardless of what is concretely planned.

But I grant that - even despite it's many potential points of contention - this example yet requires sentience which does the choosing.

There's also the example of biological evolution as having a telos. Momentarily suppose this to be true. This telos pulls towards itself. It does not push things this way and that - for such pushing would not be teleological. Were there to be a sentient agent (omni-God) in charge of evolution, it would push things this way and that; it would thus not be the telos addressed that teleologically moves evolution along toward itself as end... for ease of argumentation (nonsensical as this may technically be to those with biological knowledge), say for example toward a state of perfect fitness as end. Biological evolution is not sentient and has no conscious plans; in this example, it yet has a telos, hence purpose, that is independent of sentience and its conscious planning.

That offered, can you form an argument for the logical necessity of all final causes being themselves driven by, or else dependent on, sentient agency?

As to the vague idea of a teleology that is neither that of an individual mind or a "cosmic' mind; I fail to see how it could have any explanatory power when it comes to human values, which I think are readily explained as being formed on account of the significance that things and entities of the world commonly have for us as embodied beings. — Janus

Human values include ethics, metaethics, and aesthetics - none of which are to my knowledge satisfactorily explained in such simplistic terms. As to explaining teleology's explanatory power when addressing such values, they all address wants, which can be accounted for teleologically: see, for one example, the aforementioned drive to optimally approach that which is good for oneself.

To be clear, I argued for a teleology that neither pivots on individual minds nor on an omni-God of any sort. This, however, does not imply that such teleology does not apply to all coexistent minds, both sapient and non-sapient ... as I reckon it must if it is to hold. And again, I'm a lot closer to a Peircean objective idealism than I am to any materialism in my overall metaphysics.

As a reminder, I'm not here arguing about proofs, but only about the quite valid possibility that cosmic teleology can operate in the absence of a monotheistic deity. You've overlooked issues regarding the contradictions that unfold when considering such monotheistic deity the arbiter of purpose/telos.

You've also not offered a defense of nihilism.

However, as you pointed out, there's going to be inconsistency issues. Axioms will clash. I'm not proficient enough in logic to predict how and where exactly contradictions will appear. Do you have any ideas? — Agent Smith

Hmm. I ascribe to the law/principle of noncontradiction, which expresses that contradictory propositions cannot both be true at the same time and in the same respect. For instance, the position of dialetheism (the view that true contradictions occur) cannot be both a true claim and a false claim at the same time and in the same respect. As to justifications for my so ascribing, I'm among those who find true contradictions utterly nonsensical and thereby absurd. Have to make due with the reasoning I have.

Or did you have in mind forethought of future occurrences as regards the unfolding of contradictions? In which case, my knowledge is as falliable as anyone else's.

well said — Wayfarer

Thanks for that. Though I'm positive there's plenty about here that disagree.

Just saw the Western Buddhist Review quote. To confess, haven't yet read Nagel's Mind and Cosmos, though I've been itching to. This is a good reminder that I should sooner rather than later. Nice quote to read, btw.

Yea, I maybe unthinkingly opened up this can of worms ... I'll work with it for the time being.

If nihilism is the idea that there is no purpose behind the manifestations of the cosmos, and teleologism is the idea that there is a cosmic purpose;and given that the very meaning of 'purpose' is something like " the aims or wishes of a conscious agent", how are we to avoid anthropomorphizing the notion of cosmic teleology? — Janus

Purpose is nowadays a fairly fuzzy term. In terms of teleology, though, it is the causal motions toward an end such that the given end propels the movements toward it. Causal agents have goals as various ends they pursue, yes. This signifies teleology/purpose for us, conscious agents. The envisioning of a cosmic teleology/purpose does not however necessitate a cosmic psyche that governs all via its own personal goals ... this, hence, toward who knows what ends that gives this deity purpose (a bit of a logical contradiction to me in relation to cosmic purpose, akin to the contradiction regarding laws of thought I previously mentioned, but this aside).

As to the alternative I at least have in mind, it's a mouthful, but here goes: Cosmic purpose/teleology could be self-consistently upheld - though not in any materialist conceptualization - in what has been termed "the One" or "the Good" as an ultimate state of reality, which is not itself a mind that thinks, wants, perceives, and judges but a non-dual (hence, lacking any dichotomy between self and otherness; hence, perfectly selfless; hence, in an important sense, a perfectly objective and non-quantitative) state of awareness (think of the eastern notion of Nirvana for one possible example: in short, not a mind), one which serves as an Aristotelian final cause as the unmoved mover of all that exists in states of duality/quantity (the "unmoved mover" read as: not a mind that has goals and hence wants, hence ends it itself pursues, but a state of pure and selfless awareness devoid of all otherness and wants ... on which all else is in either direct or indirect manners dependent but which is itself fully unconditioned, instead just being) ... which individual, naturally dualistic minds such as our own can either choose to approach (via earnest love of truth, or goodness, or impartiality, etc.) or to further ourselves from (via attempts at benefiting by means of deception, falsehoods, egotism, etc.).

If one happens to be theistic, the same can then be well argued of incorporeal gods (necessarily plural and non-monotheistic) and angels ... or whatever other faith one happens to theistically uphold: they too can either approach or distance themselves and their contexts from the ideal of the Good. All this without there being such a thing as a monotheistic deity, which would necessarily have will and hence wants, i.e. would necessarily be wanting by sheer fact of willing. Or, one can uphold the same state of "the Good" in a perfectly atheistic manner.

Yes, I get that its a strange conception to most nowadays. But this general notion of "the One" is nothing novel. Nor is the reinterpretation/misinterpretation of "the One" as a human-like psyche that determines and controls everything via its human-like will something novel. I argue that the latter postulation is and can only be bogus. The former, though contradicted by the position of materialism, is however not itself logically inconsistent.

This notion of "the One" then being that which defines what is correct, right, and good in existential, non-biased manners. Signifying an overarching moral objectivity that can yet manifest in context-relative manners. One that is un-created and unconditioned to which we are all willingly or unwillingly subjects of.

Yes, lots of justification would be required to make this position even close to bulletproof - and I think we both know a forum isn't amenable to such.

But as a shorter answer to the same question you ask: by not being egotistic about what is and can be, while yet remaining rational about what is and can be possible.

Surely the human imagination is bound to think god or gods in terms of the human writ large, or else the whole notion of cosmic purpose becomes too vague to be of any use, no? — Janus

I'll offer that "too vague to be of any use" would only apply to something that has little to no explanatory power. To the extent that value is important to us - inclusive of notions such as right/wrong and good/bad - teleology that is neither pivoted on the of ego-centrism of individual human minds nor on the imagined cosmic presence of such a human-like mind would be of considerable conceptual usefulness.

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While I'm defending my credence in a godless cosmic teleology, what defense for nihilism is there ... other than the knee-jerk rejection of some monotheistic deity that controls everything we think and do?

In fact I think it's one of the reasons for the wholesale rejection of religion and such ideas of 'universal reason' in the Enlightenment. — Wayfarer

Yea, and I have my hunches that it goes hand in hand with the turn to reject teleology as well. When teleology is only understood anthropomorphically, it then can only be interpreted as necessitating a globally governing psyche via which it manifests. So it gets rejected wholesale, baby out with the bathwater and all, and we end up with the meaninglessness of nihilism - which might ring just a bit truer if the very concept were to in fact be meaningless to people as well. :smile:

Ah, got it now.

Words can be powerful and maybe even change lives, though of course it takes more than them aline. — Hillary

Yea, there's the truism that the pen is mightier than than the sword to further back this up.

Funny thing though, when it comes to "logos" I always get frustrated that in English it translates into the plural of "logo". This missing the point of the term. As can also be said of the term interpreted in an Aristotelian sense. Still, I'm glad that the term "logos" in its Heraclitan and Stoic sense is of value to at least some of us. :up:

I too noted the relevance of the Stoic 'logos' a little earlier. It seems rather like that other axial-age philosophical motif of the East, dharma. — Wayfarer

Wanted to more properly back this up with a quote or two from my copy of Heraclitus’ translated fragments … can’t locate the book in my haphazard pile of books I like to call my bookshelves. From memory, to at least Heraclitus, logos is as much natural laws as it is the active causal processes the pervade the world – from which human judgments and speech commence, this while they remain intimately intertwined with the former. In this I find that there’s nothing notably different from Stoic interpretations. Though my knowledge in these fields is far more limited than yours, this to say that to me too it seems to be a different culture’s parallel formulation of the metaphysical principles applicable to dharma; I’d add of karma as well - this despite the divergences when one gets into the details and cultural applications.

The word (logos!) can be very powerful though! :smile: — Hillary

Will be erring on the side of caution here (I'm sure you'll correct me where needed):

The Word? Hmm. Causation isn't made up of words, never mind a word, no?

I'm all for Stoic notions of logos; but do not favor the Abrahamic re-invisioning of it. It's like laws of thought: they cause our abilities to think in the ways we can. Part and parcel of the logos. But to address them as the word of some deity is to run into the contradiction of a psyche that either is itself determined by the same laws of thought we are prior to ever creating them or, else, of some omni-this-and-that deity's mind that is beyond any law of thought and hence logically trivialistic and contradictory all the time and at no time in the same respect, including in the good/evil respect ... not my cup of tea this, to say the least.

Still, I was focusing in on the relation(s) between reason and causation.

Makes sense! Modern science could learn a lesson about that. Or be taught a lesson! The "hard problem" of consciousness would be "solved" in a couple of lessons! — Hillary

:grin: Yup. I agree. Like other things though, its something easier said than done. :razz:

Maybe reason and physical causation meet at the divide between the mental and physical world, at the epistemic cut, i.e., in our bodies. — Hillary

Here interpreting "reason" in the common modern sense, I rather like your take. So as to emphasize, to me both yet being aspects of the Stoic notion of universal logos.

truth and justification do not necessarily fall under the same category. — Varde

In a philosophical context "a justification for one’s belief consists of good reasons for thinking that the belief in question is true." As I noted, you seem to be giving the word a different meaning. — T Clark

Are there any non-philosophical contexts where this does not hold?

I’ll offer that to “justify” means, at the very least etymologically, to make, else evidence, as just; i.e., as right, correct, or fair/good, and, hence, to evidence as true in many of the term’s commonly used senses (from conformity to what is real to the moral fidelity of being loyal/faithful to that implicitly addressed – be this some other, the ideal of objectivity or goodness, or something else).

There is the dichotomy between moral justification and factual justification - and there is equivocation between the two often enough - but to me they both yet pivot around the evidencing of X as just.

So conceived: In practice, justification can never be philosophically perfected for it typically, if not always, leads into an infinite regress of justifications for previously given justifications. This though in principle that which is correct/true could hypothetically be endlessly justified (shown to be true) were that span of time available to one to so endlessly justify. However, that which is not correct/true can be conclusively evidenced wrong, false, and hence unjustifiable via contradictions in reasoning, for one prominent example.

Interested to see where differences with this take on justification might take place for anyone that might have them.

But, to address the OP: if the offered definition holds, and if all claims are justifiable, then it would be concluded that all claims can be evidenced to be correct/true, including all deceptive, false, or otherwise wrong claims. This line or reasoning then concludes in the absurdity of logical trivialism.

The next generation of theologians then went to work on these tenets, reasoning backwards to axioms that would support them. This is just a hypothesis of course; cum grano salis. Modern psychology has a term for this: rationalization! — Agent Smith

Sure, but in this sense rationalization conceals true motives and is thus a form of deception, even if only self-deception. Last I remember, the theologians you speak of have more than a few contradictions in their justifications to contend with.

↪Banno
It wouldn’t surprise me if she did. And yes the issue is a metaphysical one. It revolves around divesting the world of reason. No coincidence that Hume is also associated with the -is-ought problem’. This is not fortuious. — Wayfarer

While I don’t believe this will resolve much here, a possible metaphysical missing link in this thread is the relation between reason and causation. Reason consists of reasons. A reason can consist of a) a cause, b) a motive, or c) an explanation (with this latter including our epistemic understanding of causes and motives). Motives cause motions of psyche, i.e. cause cognitive behaviors. Explanations are commonly understood to be effects caused by psyches. Hence, the occurrence of any possible subcategory of “a reason” is at base dependent on the notion, if not the reality, of causation. Reasoning, the act of engaging in reason, is commonly understood to apply to at least human psyches. Were something like the Peircean idea of physicality as effete mind to take place, then reasoning - again, the activity of engaging in reason (which, again, can consist of causes, motives, or explanations) - would naturally be something which the physical world engages in; this in so far as the physical world engages in the activity of (physical) causation … which is a form of reasoning: i.e., the act of engaging in reason … here, in particular , of engaging in causes, hence causation. Of course, this interpretation harkens back to the Heraclitan and Stoic notion of logos, from which the notion of logic takes its form. And that’s a no-no for all materialist conceptualizations. (For which reasoning ipso facto can pertain only to certain psyches ... often enough, psyches that a fully controlled causally by a fully deterministic physical world ... hmm, something's amiss, me thinks.)

BTW, if it hasn’t yet been mentioned, Hume - despite his various imperfections (who is perfect?) - was a diehard compatibilist; he had no issue against the reality of causation as a metaphysical aspect of reality. His take was only that any particular cause we can identify to any particular effect will not, as a particular instantiation of causation, be logically necessitated by deductive reasoning. Instead, it will be so judged based on repeated like experiences inductively affirming the connection between particular causes and effects. E.g., that I cause the light to turn on when I turn the light switch - an instance of causation that most take for granted - is not a logical necessity … but only a belief habitually formed from repetitions of experience. I walk into a house, push a light switch, and the lights come on, making me believe I caused the lights to turn on … when, maybe, the light switch I pushed might have no wires attached and someone in an adjacent room not seen by me pushed the functional light switch to the light bulb I saw turned on at the same time I did. This only to illustrate the lack of logical necessity to my causing the lights to turn on in this one example. To any concrete instantiation of causation for that matter. But this observation in no way rationally justifies there being a lack of causation in the world. Again, there can be no variant of compatibilism absent the metaphysical reality of causation, and Hume, for starters, was a stanch compatibilist.

For the admiration of skill and stamina, one can also watch ballet, or breakdancing, or do gardening. Etc.

Watching fights that don't go and end the way they would "in the real world" -- what is that but bloodlust in a "safe context"? — baker

It strictly depends on the intention with which one watches a boxing match, for example, doesn't it?

Some of us have needed to physically fight in the real world. Some who have not can empathize with the dilemma - as can happen when watching a move where physical conflicts occur. Safely enacted combat sports, as I’ve previously said, can then serve the purpose of practice for the real thing. In so being they are mock-aggression - this as can be found in a good deal of childhood play. If one watches for the sake of seeing as egregious an infliction on injury as possible, then there is bloodlust joys in so watching. Be it a boxing match, or in a movie, or some other context. Just like some kids will watch bullies beat up so-called weaklings in kindergarten with joy. If, however, you were one who’d do everything in your ability to prevent or stop such a fight - and, say, joined a karate club to better practice means of so doing - then you would obtain no joy in seeing bullies beat up “weaklings” but would watch with admiration of skill and stamina fellow kids engaging in fair ways in karate practice and in safeguarded karate competitions.

That we project of ourselves onto others is no novel notion. I, for one, don’t watch boxing matches with a desire to see injury done. Others do.

Injuries can occur in ballet and breakdancing (don’t know of too many being spectators to gardening). The difference between combat sports and these activities is that combat sports address preparedness for real life physical conflict. Yes, it would be wonderful if physical conflict never occurred and we’d all live in some impossible heaven on earth. That’s not the world I live in. And so, at least as a youngster, I would watch safely played out combat sports not wanting blood spilled but wanting to learn from others about optimal physical self-defense. As I said, admiring skill and stamina.

In summation, reality is for us usefully split into four categories: The Imaginary Real, The Unknown Real, The Real Imaginary, and The Purely Imaginary. When discussing things in a philosophical way, asking "what is" this or that, a good start would be, "to which category does it belong?" — hypericin

The agreed upon value of a piece of paper we label as money is a cultural artifact. Taking a step back, are cultures real or imaginary? Most would say “real” though not in the sense of that which is physically real.

I’ll suggest the sometimes derided term of “intersubjectivity”, such that money is an intersubjective reality - else, is intersubjectively real - this just as much as cultures are. In contrast, the printed paper itself is a physical reality: an aspect of the physical reality at large upon which all subjectivities and intersubjectivities to a significant extent depend.

The “collective intentionality” which @Banno addresses would then be an aspect of intersubjectivity.

A caveat, however: When reality is taken to be the sum of all real givens, so classifying would require a stanch rethinking of reality categories. For one example, that which is imaginary and strictly applicable to one subject - such as one’s immediate experience of an REM dream - would then be an intra-subjective reality (as in, “that dream I told you about was real rather than a fictitious fabrication”). Even more cumbersome to classify become intersubjectively held fictions, like unicorns, which are not intersubjective realities in the same sense that moneys and cultures are - yet are still actual/real as culturally present fictions: unicorns then being a real, rather than an untrue, fictional notion within the cultures we partake of (in contrast to not being a real/actual fictional notion within cultures that never entertained the concept, such as that of some Inuit tribe), e.g. “unicorns (as fictional animals) are a real aspect of my culture”.

If one believed in magic, one might say these phrases are magical incantations. — emancipate

Such reactions to sneezes are customary, traditional, and so don’t imply much in terms of magical thinking. But humans are brimming with magical thinking even when they don’t believe in it when asked. Intently talking or else yelling at a TV screen as though one can alter the results of a game by so doing is a common enough example, one that can be enacted by theists and atheist alike. Or else the cursing of an inanimate object when one can’t accomplish what one wants with it; the talking to drivers of other cars that cannot possibly hear you, this when they drive in manners that displease; I’ve seen such magical thinking based behavior enacted by atheists often enough.

Okay. Name any politician who is in your opinion a 'goody two-shoes'. — Olivier5

My vote is for Bernie Sanders. I see them as rare but not nonexistent.

I would appreciate particularly the sceptical response to Episode 5: Methodologies for the Study of Magic. — unenlightened

Only read the cover page to the linked to episode but, in case it’s of interest: From my multicultural studies I’ve so far gathered that “magick” is commonly understood amongst modern practitioners (e.g., self-labeled neopagans, witches) as simply being the ability to conform reality (more properly, aspects of it) to one’s will. Hence, if one’s will is to blow one’s nose, one’s being capable of so doing and then so enacting would be a proper, and quite technical, instantiation of magick. Obviously by this, it's deemed commonplace, if not utterly pivotal, to the ordinary occurrence of will-endowed-beings and, by the extension of such interpretation, the world itself can be deemed to be magical (shit and all). From this pov it’s esoteric only in that most people don’t consciously realize they engage in it 24/7. And then it’s considered both “a science and an art” whose details haven’t yet been adequately figured out with any semblance of precision.

TMK, it’s taboo typically applies to monotheistic folk who deem that everything should be done via God’s will: hence magic only via prayer to God who is then the agent that does the deed—this rather than via a spellcasting wherein the spellcaster proclaims “so mote/may it be (this in accordance to one’s own will as agent who does the deed)”. As with most anything in life, those who deem themselves to practice magick affirm that it too can be intended for either good or bad, this depending on the practitioner’s intents. But I reckon the same can be said for prayers as well—which tmk can sometimes take the form of curses upon others.

As to the skepticism, well, causal determinism and physicalism tend to contradict any ontic ability to conform aspects of reality to one’s will, either because everything is deemed to be predetermined in full or because no such thing as the will is deemed to hold ontic reality (instead being deemed illusory).

Mentioning this in attempts to demystify the notion of magic as it is held by modern folk who don’t use the term as a derision - as per magical thinking and such.

(P.s. Me? I too will sometimes blow a runny nose but I don’t make much of it.)

Again: belief-that-X ... hence, belief - that - event/situation. Where X is event/situation.

I'm going to withdraw from this conversation for the time being.

No, its in fact what I'm point out.

Consider the simplistic case of perception, for example. One's perception of X can either be true or false. Same with a lesser animal's. When a lesser animal innately trusts what it perceives, it un-reflexively believes what it perceives to so be; and, in so doing, it holds the implicit (un-contemplated) attitude that what it perceives is true. Same as we do on most all occasions. "Is that a real tree that I see?" hardly ever enters into the equation of our believing that the tree we see in fact is, i.e. we hold an implicit attitude that our perceptions are true most always. And, arguably as with at least more intelligent lesser animals (like great apes for one example), we are only uncertain about what we perceive when it conflicts - of fails to fit into - the coherent / consistent body of all associated perceptions and their assumed relations: the "I can't believe my eyes" attitude.

Granting that we believe what we see, do we not then necessarily assume what we see to be true - this even when we do not contemplate our former and present perceptions in terms of propositional beliefs? After all, it's only after the fact that we analyze via analysis of propositional beliefs.

While I don't want to drag this into the mire:

Perhaps, but is it of any consequence? — creativesoul

Yes, the difference between attitude and fact is of significant consequence.

X equals there is a mouse behind the tree does it not? — creativesoul

Yes, and in so equating, how does belief-that-X not entail an upheld implicit attitude that X corresponds to what is - thereby, the implicit attitude that X is? An attitude what leads to some form of surprise or bewilderment when and if it turns out that the mouse is not behind the tree.

My own appraisal is that you’ve misread what I’ve said: entails the attitude that X is true; not the fact that X is true.

But OK.

Do you see humans as "the measure of all things", that humans are the ones who decide what is and could be, and humans get to decide this for all other beings? — baker

No. Definitely not.

As just one measly example: A bee can and will decide for itself whether it will or will not sting a human.

And again:

lesser animals' abilities of awareness pale in comparison to our own


On what do you base this claim? — baker

Well, on the best, though imperfect, knowledge that we currently have. Technology aside, human awareness is able to understand and analyze its own meta-cognition, issues of meta-ethics, the ontological nature of the cosmos, advanced probability theory, and so forth. No other living being currently known to us exhibits any indication of holding an awareness that is so capable.

Why do you ask?

To be clear, you're referring to this post. On first reading, I agree with what is said in it. But I gather that it only addresses proportional formats for beliefs in relation to the issue of truth. This as stated here:

Some say, and rightly so, that when we believe some proposition or another, that we have a particular sort of attitude towards that proposition, and that that belief has propositional content. I would readily agree. When a competent user believes the following proposition...

"The mouse ran behind the tree."

...they believe that that proposition is true. The proposition is sometimes said to 'sit well' with the individual's other beliefs whenever there is no readily apparent disagreement between the proposition and the individual's worldview. I've no argument against that much.

What I'm asking is how can a belief-that-X (be it in propositional format or not; so phrased to contrast to belief-in-A) not entail the attitude that X is true?

I ask because I so far disagree with the notion that a belief-that-X (be it in propositional format or not) can be held without entailing the attitude that X is true - i.e., corresponds to what was, is, or will be. So, if a lesser animal believes-that-X (without this belief being in propositional format), this to me so far entails that it believes-that-X-is-true (or: that X corresponds to what is) - despite there being no linguistic proposition to contemplate.

There is an actual distinction to be drawn and maintained between holding something as true and holding a belief, for they are not always the same, even though some beliefs are held to be true. — creativesoul

Can you exemplify a belief-that-X wherein X is not upheld to be true?

E.g.: If one believes that Santa Clause is fictional, doesn’t that entail one upholds that “Santa Clause is fictional” corresponds to what is?

Or, more in-tune with the thread, if a cat believes that “it will soon have food” doesn’t that entail that it expects its emotive attitude of “I will soon have food” to correspond to what will be - being in some way surprised or dismayed if it turns out otherwise?

This going on the presumption that truth is understood as “that which corresponds to what is (to include what was and what will be)”.

If you have a lot of political power, you can hide your tracks to a degree, control the narrative. And then your bad deeds become invisible. — Olivier5

I can see it both ways. But then power/ability can be subcategorized into power/ability-over-other and power/ability-with-other: power-over and power-with for short.

Societal power-with tends to remain so over time when all factions that constitute the power-with are in roughly equal balance of power-over ability relative to each other, each checking the other factions so that no one faction gains the upper hand in their power-over all other factions. The US government was once upon a time founded upon this principle. (Today its dynamics have changed in significant part due to the unchecked power-over of financial institutions – including the one-percent-ers - in relation to government; a different story though.)

My point being, in our society men typically - on average - hold power-over relations with women, this rather than power-with relations. On a different front, same can be said of society’s typical (average) relation with nature: it’s one where we want power-over nature rather than power-with the natural world - so instead of wanting to live in balance with nature we tend to plunder it at will … leading to things like global warming.

At any rate, if one qualifies power as power-over (and neglects power-with) then I find the infamous phrase you reference tends to make sense: “Power-over-others tends to corrupt, and absolute power-over-others corrupts absolutely.” Caveat: this where corruption is deemed to be the valuing of one’s own ego’s interests as superlative at the expense of all other’s interests. This would be of weak or degenerate morals, i.e. corrupt. It would also make etymological sense in a way: it would be the rupture, or the breaking apart, of all power-with structures when absolute (as in "togetherness breaking").

But then, the only way to combat a corrupt faction with increased power-over will itself be via some form of power. So power in and of itself cannot be the culprit, i.e. cannot be viewed as a perpetual bad regardless of context.

You'll perhaps be aware that I've a generally anti-philosophical approach. — Banno

Very candidly stated. I can find admiration for that. Maybe akin to the moto of not fixing what isn’t broken? Just as candidly, I remain curious … and dissatisfied with not knowing what is right and what is wrong in that oh so philosophical sense. So, from where I stand, we’re at a friendly enough impasse.

But to be clear on my part:

So I think that there's a fundamental methodological error in starting by deciding what is good. — Banno

Not deciding, but discovering.

Virtue ethics lacks the hubris of deontology and utilitarianism.

Sure, being fair, being consistent, and being happy are worthy; but there's more to it.

Hence, goals — Banno

Other than what I previously mentioned here, I don't have anything against virtue ethics.

The plurality of goals you mention to me misses the point. Of course there are a plurality of goals in practice within an individual, to not address a culture. As to their ethical standing, what is it that makes all these deemed to be good goals commonly defined - or better yet understood - as good? Herein lies the meta-ethics of good, or goodness. All concrete instantiations of good - regardless of perspective from culture or person - share in common the property of being good. And this property that defines all concrete instantiations is singular. Liken it to a universal and its instantiations: the universal is singular, the instantiations of it are plural.

While I can understand that it's a non-concern for some, it is yet a valid, if not very important, philosophical question: What is this ideal good that defines the innumerable, often enough times conflicting, instantiations of good relative to different cultures and to the different individuals within?

And again, the point is to act. — Banno

This reminds of a somewhat tasteless analogy: that of a headless chicken (which is set on the ground rather than held upside-down by the legs to hurry up the rush of blood - yes, as the high school joke goes, I sometimes eat dead animals too … and they have to be killed in order for this to be … this great news flash aside). A headless chicken will act in all sorts of ways - can even be said to interact with others when other chickens are around - but this without a coherent goal. Ethics on the other hand, in order to so be, requires action governed by a coherent goal.

Deontology: that good is best approached when all one does can become a universal law were all others to find themselves in an identical situation. Utilitarianism: that good is best approached when dolor is optimally minimized among one and all within the cohort(s) considered. Virtue ethics: that good is best approached when virtue is optimally enacted in oneself and in the populace. At the very least when so expressed, all systems of ethics are founded upon an optimal approach toward a good - a good that is never fully, perfectly obtained and maintained in its pure form within practice; an ideal good, in other words. Action not governed by this ideal good is thereby not ethical regardless of the ethical system implemented - so too does this ideal good define the unethical as action that stands in opposition to the very same ideal good addressed. The headless chickens’ actions, however, stand outside both the ethical and unethical, this as best as we can tell.

What, then, is this ideal good that all ethical systems address implicitly, if not explicitly?

As previously mentioned, and in accord with @Joshs, I strongly sympathize with the notion that its discovery resides in reflection upon the nature of the self, which naturally incorporates not only oneself but what all other selves desire by shear fact of being (when philosophically addressed, even when they are deemed mortal enemies). And, in accord with @Astrophel, I can’t see how it can be discovered without discovering truths in respect to the affective beings we are - some universally applicable affective truth(s) which reason serves to guide and benefit but which is not reasoning in and of itself.

[My own answer, BTW, will be quickly disregarded as mysticism, pomo, or some such, for it in part pivots around an ultimate state of nondual awareness wherein all dolors can only be rationally inferred to vanish while awareness remains - a state of awareness that awaits to be obtained for as long as it might existentially take - in this sense akin to cosmological notions of Nirvana, Brahman, the One, etc. So, because of this derision from others, I’m not going to be offering my own answer as a contender for argument. But the philosophical question regarding ethics remains even when such “mystical” answer is at best shunned:]

What is the ideal good aspired toward that all ethical systems address - this implicitly, if not explicitly - without whose governance actions become at best amoral (i.e., neither moral nor immoral), this as per the actions of a headless chicken?

Else, how can ethics obtain in the absence of any ideal good?

Thanks. :grin: And a noteworthy aside! :up:

I see more of a love of wisdom in modern psychology than in modern (especially analytical) philosophy. — ZzzoneiroCosm

:grin: I second that. Then again, there is the philosophy of mind to take notice of psychology, at least in principle.

Interesting as all of this belief talk is, it doesn't seem very important. More important to my mind (in the Facebook age) is the psychology of belief. — ZzzoneiroCosm

Yup. Hmm. Tentatively addressed, I figure it this way. Can there be belief without trust? I can't discern it if there is. Belief that = trust that. Belief in = trust in. Trust is a funny concept. It's essential to who we are and yet, philosophically, more or less a mystery. Trust can be betrayed. Including by one own very self; like when one trusts that one has set the alarm-clock but has not. One wakes up and might feel self-sabotaged. We humans gain most of our instantiations of trust. Many lesser animals have their instantiations of trust inherited genotypically: e.g. a duckling innately trusting that the silluete of a bird of prey indicates danger wheres that of a goose does not; else its innate trust on what it imprints on.
It gets even more intense in terms of innate trust when it comes to insects. We, on the other hand, are birthed with little preset, innate trust - but yet exhibit it in (for example) trust that caregivers will caregive as needed, this from the moment we first emerge into the world. Most all the rest we build up over time. A lot of what we trust is habitual to us. But to form these habits of trust, we typically initially consciously ponder, deliberate, the issue with some momentary degree of uncertainty: choosing what to trust and what not to trust.

A small hint of background to the following idea: belief is trust (at least for the most part: belief is a thing; trust is a process). Belief/trust can then be a) inborn, phenotypically obtained via genetic inheritance, b) inherent in what we do (like a habit) and formerly learned in part via inborn beliefs/trust, or c) enactively made via conscious deliberation and choice founded on (b), and thereby becoming (b) after the fact.

Might be unclear, but I'm throwing this out there for the sake of sharing. Not currently looking to argue for it. But if its of interest as a possible alternative to other perspectives, there you have it. Belief is a concrete instantiation derived from the general process of trust. Or so I currently believe. :smile:

Yeah, I get it. I suppose it's just a matter of opinion whether we should call certain attitudes of languageless creatures "propositional." — ZzzoneiroCosm

At the end of the day, though, I agree. And it's not high up on my list of priorities regarding beliefs/opinions that need to be maintained and justified. So it's known.

It sounds weird to me. Sounds like a stretch possibly deployed to serve some philosophical agenda.

It also commits one to the view that propositions or at the very least propositional attitudes can exist in the absence of language. That sounds weird too and (in my mind) points to an agenda. — ZzzoneiroCosm

If I do have an agenda, here it is: I uphold an evolutionary cline in the abilities of life. That's it. I don't uphold a miraculous metaphysical division between such abilities.

As to language, animals don't have (the human) language (wherein, for example, signs can be freely created to reference relatively advanced concepts). But mammals for example readily communicate via things such as body language all the time, not only within species but also between species.

It seems ancient Egyptian women fared better than current day ones, with a report of 87% of women there undergoing female genital mutilation currently. — Hanover

There was a drastic change in religion between ancient and modern Egypt, wasn't there.