Too obtuse? Sorry. Tim commenting on a post of mine that indulged in the sort of psychological discrediting we see here between Leon and Fire. It's a way to not address the actual contents of the arguments presented. "Othering" atheists so that they can safely be ignored, and we don't have to give due consideration to what they say - perhaps.

Hmm...

The problem with this sort of "argument from psychoanalysis" is that they are very easy to develop...

Such arguments might be plausible, or even true to varying degrees, but they don't actually address the real issue at hand. — Count Timothy von Icarus

That you are caused to so reason? — J

Phhhh.

Big issues. Let's leave it aside for now.

The problem with this sort of "argument from psychoanalysis" is that they are very easy to develop.[/quote
Of course; I quite agree. Furthermore, even if the account I gave of Klima's motivation is true, it does not impact the validity of the argument in the article.

Their use is in setting out in general terms the territory in which the discussion is taking place. Kinda like claiming that Wittgenstein on Laws is a variation on Hume or Parmenides. Or saying things such as "Moderns come to define freedom in terms of potency", as if "moderns" were a monoculture.

We have found some agreement.
— Count Timothy von Icarus

2. Water was not H2O before 19th century chemistry. — Leontiskos

Perhaps it is worth noting that while before Cavendish announced the composition to the Royal Society in 1784, we didn't know that water was H₂O, water was nevertheless H₂O before his announcement.

Seems to me the core distinction here is between those who would say that a property is essential to an individual iff it is what makes that individual what it is (or something like that...) and those who say that a property is essential to an individual iff it belongs to that individual in every possible world. That, and 1-3 are not obviously mutually exclusive.

I would claim that water was not H2O before Lavoisier. — Moliere

That seem quite mistaken. And on either account of essence.

In Kripke - that is, in the standard accepted modern model of modal logic - the essential properties of some thing are those had by it in every possible world.

The tension here is that this is a different definition to that found in Aristotle, and held by most philosophers up until the seventies.

Aristotle's definition is along the lines of an essence being something like "what it is to be the thing it is and not another thing..." As you can see this is a comparatively vague notion, and no doubt others will be able to finesse it in various ways, but it makes use of notions of hylomorphism and teleology somewhat foreign to science.

The tension is that these two definitions have somewhat different consequences.

So it's not that modal logic rejects essentialism, as some supose. But it treats it in a very different way. There are a couple of other threads right now that are dealing with these issues.

If all we wish to do is save any aspect of modal reasoning so as to avoid absolute collapse, we have to show such a thing as modal reasoning exists in impossible worlds. — Hanover

An unusual phrasing, but I supose modal logic apples to impossible worlds and is what shows them to contain the contradictions that render them impossible.

That is, can I not logically reason based upon the antecedent without the antecedent being true in this world? That seems what modal logic is. — Hanover

Yep.

Now, in the present, certain things have certain potentials. Joe might potentially be asleep at 10 PM or be awake then. A rock, by contrast, cannot be asleep or awake. So, we can speak about possibilities in the future according to the ways in which things in the present possess potentiality. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Better: now, in the present, certain states of affairs might be accessible. One accessible word is that in which Joe might be asleep at 10 PM, another accessible world is that in which he is awake at 10 PM. A rock, by contrast, cannot be asleep or awake. So, in no possible world is there a rock that is asleep or awake, and so no world is accessible in which the rock is awake. We can speak about possibilities in the future according to the ways in which things in the present are accessible. But that is only a small part of what we can do with PWS.

And to be clear, accessibility is a formally defined, semantic notion, and part of the possible worlds modelling of formal modal logics, avoiding any messy ontology of potential and actual.

And far more flexible than the Aristotelian model. It handles a wider range of modalities, cleanly avoids category mistakes, and is rigorous enough for computation.

There is no problem with time. The law of noncontradiction is clearly qualified with "at the same time". — Metaphysician Undercover

Of course. And it is also, after Kripke, clearly qualified with "in the same possible world". To ask what might have happened if Caesar had not crossed the Rubicon is not to ask what might have happened if Caesar had both crossed and not crossed the Rubicon.

That's the point. You allow indexation for time, but not for possible worlds. Why?

As you and I discussed the "possible world" is how we relate to the future. — Metaphysician Undercover

I hope it is clear, and as the Roman example given above exemplifies, possible worlds can be about the past as well as the future. If we accept rigid designation, the possible Caesar who did not cross the Rubicon is the very same as the actual Caesar who did. That that is, "what might have happened if Caesar had not crossed the Rubicon" is a question about Caesar, and not about some other person in some other possible world who happens to have the same name.

...we need to be clear to distinguish between the "ontological possibility" of the future... and the "epistemic possibility" of the past... — Metaphysician Undercover

As previously explained, this is addressed in a Kripke-style answer to the sea battle problem. Will there be a sea battle tomorrow? Two possible worlds are accessible, one in which the sea battle occurs, the other in which it does not. As things stand, today we do not know which is the actual world, tomorrow night we will. But the accessibility response is not limited to temporality, in the way your response is.

In trying to throw out the bath water of fatalism, you have wholly thrown out the babe of modality. And needlessly, since accessibility allows us to make choices.

You really would benefit from reading a bit of the modal logic done in the last hundred years.

That would decimate the fora.

"if I were you... — Hanover

Then, by p(x)⊃☐p(x), I would be you in the actual world, which is false. So I don't see that Meta can get even to this.

isn't your analysis of Meta's argument a contradiction of your argument. — Hanover

Well for Meta, it must be, since it supposes the possibility that he is correct, and it must follow from p(x)⊃☐p(x) that he is necessarily correct...

What other folk do is imaging a possible world in which Meta is correct and work out what the consequences would be in that world. So yes, we look to see what a possible world in which Meta is correct would be like. Meta says we can't do that. I think we've shown that he is mistaken. Even by this very conversation, in which we consider what a world in which he was correct would be like.

Can you see another way to save Meta from modal collapse? Is p(x)⊃☐p(x) too strong a rendering of his account?

Edit: What p(x)⊃☐p(x) says is that if (x) has the property p, then (x) has the property p in every possible world. It supposes only that if a property is essential to an individual, then that individual will have that property in every possible world. He said "every property of an object is essential to that object's identity". Tricky to see another interpretation.

Going back to the Klima article, to my eye Kripke’s modal account of essence, grounded in rigid designation and necessity de re, renders traditional Aristotelian essences unnecessary. It explains essential properties through semantics and logic, not metaphysical natures. For Christian philosophers, especially Thomists, this is a threat: metaphysical essences underpin the real distinction between essence and existence, the intelligibility of creation, and arguments for God's existence. Without real essences, classical theism loses its metaphysical scaffolding. Gyula Klima’s work is a strategic response—aiming to reclaim Aristotelian essence as a metaphysical foundation that grounds, rather than depends on, modal necessity. His goal is not only to preserve essence but to defend a metaphysical worldview in which nature, teleology, and God remain intelligible in light of modern philosophical developments.

It’s a form of special pleading, in that it reintroduces Aristotelian essence as necessary without sufficiently justifying that move in neutral or broadly acceptable terms. To sympathetic readers (especially Christian metaphysicians), it will seem like a vital recovery of lost depth. To others, it looks like a philosophical backdoor for preserving theological-metaphysical commitments that the Kripkean revolution had already made optional.

But that's the sort of thing I would say, isn't it, being a godless heathen.

To keep whittling away... — Richard B

I'm happy to join in. Is ice still water? Good question.

I don't find Stroll convincing. Ordinary people do say things such as "Take care, the water froze to ice overnight". And here they might be puzzled if you suggested that the water and the ice are different things. Freezing is the sort of thing that water does in the cold, after all. It's not utterly improper to say that ice is frozen water, and thereby mean that ice is one type of water amongst others.

We might, of course, simply choose to use "water" to refer only to the liquid, and "ice" to refer only to the solid. We might equally choose or stipulate that "water" is the genus of which "ice" is a species.

And there is the alternate mentioned above - to accept that either view is valid, and the choice discretionary. That there is no fact of the matter, but just two slightly different ways of using the words "water" and "ice".

It's this anti-essentialist last that I take as the better account.

But I am also happy to go along with Kripke and say ice is one of the various states in which we can find water, and that necessarily, all water is H₂O, as might suit the circumstances. This seems to me the better way to think about essentialism, if one must. Perhaps by keeping what's useful in essentialism, and let go of what’s dogmatic.

You're facing the same stonewall I've faced many times previously.

Odd, that it's apparently OK to index a proposition in time: "Joe was asleep at 4 am but awake at 4 PM"; but to refuse to index a proposition in reference to possible worlds: "Joe was asleep in w₀ but awake in w₁"

Anyway, there may be a way of parsing @Metaphysician Undercover's account into modal logic with a possible worlds semantic, so as to clarify the consequences. His core claim is "every single property, action, and attribute of a given object is essential to its being what it is".

□(P(x)) for any property P that x has in the actual world.

This is modal collapse. There are no possible worlds. It imposes metaphysical essentialism on the system. Meta’s view amounts to a denial of genuine modality.

Recapping, for any individual x, and any property p,
p(x)⊃☐p(x)

On this view:

• Nothing could have been otherwise.
• If an object lacks even one actual property, it's a different object.
• So every possible world is identical to the real world resulting in modal collapse (if we interpret PWS in terms of rigid designation)
• So there are no counterparts of an object with slightly different properties. (if we interpret PWS in terms of counterpart theory)
• Therefore: no true modal variation for any object.

So how are we to understand modal sentences? That "the table could have been red instead of blue" is an impossibility, since then it would not have been that table. Even taking it that "the table could have been red instead of blue" amounts to "there might have been some other table that was blue" fails, because that other table would not be this table. Any variation in property means we are talking about a different object.

The upshot is that while in Meta's system we might be able to say "Meta might have read Kripke", this cannot be more than a string of words. We cannot make any deductions therefrom, like "If Meta had read Kripke then we might not be having this conversation". And there is no basis for assigning truth values here. Deliberation becomes meaningless, there's nothing to decide, since we only ever do what we in fact do. Prediction loses grip, since we can't consider various potential futures. Explanation and understanding suffer, since we can't ask why something happened instead of something else — because nothing else could have happened.

So Meta can go ahead on this path, but the results are somewhat catastrophic.

Mostly I think it would be great if we could discuss religious topics without anti-religious evangelization constantly occurring. — Leontiskos

The rules are very specific in this regard.

Evangelists: Those who must convince everyone that their religion, ideology, political persuasion, or philosophical theory is the only one worth having. — Site Guidelines

So if evangelism is occurring, please, report it so that it can be dealt with.

Cheers.

We have a plague of them at present. Glad to see some nuance.

Cheers.

...other essentialists... — Apustimelogist

Is that "other" advised? As in, would you consider yourself an 'essentialist'? If so, may I ask what would that involve - that things have a set of characteristics which make them what they are, and that the task of science and philosophy is their discovery and expression? Or that essence precedes existence?

Deuterium is, of course, an isotope of hydrogen. It follows then that D₂O is a isotopologue of H₂O.

Hence, heavy water is water.

It seems odd to say that science did not discover that water is H₂O. We used the terms "water", "Hydrogen" and "Oxygen" prior to the discovery. There's two ways to think about it. In the first, "water" refers to a particular substance, and science uncovered its deeper essence. On this view, water = H₂O is a necessary truth, discovered empirically. Profound metaphysical stuff. The other way to think about it, the meaning of "water" is based on its place in our dealings with it — that it is clear, potable, etc. On this view, saying water is H₂O is just a shift in how we describe it.

Different ways of talking about the same stuff. Are we obligated to say one is right, the other wrong? I don't see why.

Another interesting aside.

What we discussed in that thread isn't Aristotle's answer to the question Wittgenstein took up, just an ancillary point that the positive skeptic's position is self-undermining. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Which, of course, was Wittgenstein's response. So I remain puzzled as to what it is you are actually proposing. However, it's a big topic and as you say, peripheral to this thread, so we might leave it there.

unless you have more to add?

I was saying much the same thing. — J

Good, good. So we might have some agreement that there is no paradox in talking about the "pre-linguistic" world.

So back to

Essentially, what we want to know is whether "a reason" must cash out to "an obligatory cause" of holding a particular belief. This is troubling, as discussed on the thread. — J

So, not so sure about the "obligatory".

Yeah - Graylingstein: Wittgenstein on Scepticism and Certainty

Perhaps your point parallels my "what counts as a hinge proposition is not dependent on the structure of the proposition but is a role it takes on in the task at hand". Its not that "What is true for me might not be true for you" but that "if we are going to do this together, we need to act in this way..."

I will go back to Adorno sometime, to see if he can be made a bit more analytic...

Again, yes. We ought not proceed from "The bible says it's so" to "It is so".

Hence, see ; I like my post better because it is not dependent on an the authority of James 2:14.

They didn't even have the number zero. — frank

:gasp:

Then there might be some benefit accruing to those who pay attention to more recent thought? There might be something new in Kripke or Wittgenstein?

Or is it that now, we have nothing? :wink:

I thought the same thing.

Have there been no advances in philosophy or logic in the last few hundred years?

...for someone so averse to conversations of God — Hanover

Yes, here I am! I'm not at all averse to such conversations!

It shouldn't be this hard. That objection is not to talk about god, but to talk that takes some particular holy book as authoritative. to blatant appeals to authority. As explained, I'm not so keen on such theological meanderings, to what may have began here:

Such arguments are very old — Count Timothy von Icarus

Are they? Or is this about having a hammer and seeing only nails? It's easier to only see the arguments they have encountered previously.

As previously, I don't recognise what I understand of the discussion of rules that came from PI and Kripke's Wittgenstein in what you have said.

Yep. Happy for folk to do theology if that's their thing, but theology is not philosophy. The other thread made the additional point that this is a philosophy forum, arguing that therefore theology was inappropriate. The powers that be, probably quite sensibly, apparently decided not to follow through - too hard, no doubt.

The result is that god is now everywhere.... :wink:

I blame ... And of course you are welcome to your views.

...and there's Leon's personal denigration when confronted.

(...and dog whistle to Tim)

Pretty much. The thread was about demarcation, arguing that if the authoritative source is, for example, the bible, the presumption is that one accepts the bible as an authority, and hence the argument is theological not philosophical.

"What philosophy is adverse to is assuming claims upon one's interlocutor, including claims of authority."

Well, I'm intrigued by the acceptance of messiness. Just not sure why it has to be obtuse. If he stuck to "antagonism" instead of "contradiction" things might be easier. But too many threads, too many replies to write...

The "rule following argument," like the many other empiricist arguments from underdetermination, relies on presupposing empiricism's epistemic presuppositions and its impoverished anthropology (which denies intellectus from the outset). Since these arguments lead to all sorts of radical conclusions: that words do not have meanings in anything like the classical realist sense, that they cannot refer to things, that induction—and thus natural science—is not rationally justifiable, that we cannot know if the sun will rise tomorrow, that we don't know when we are performing addition instead of an infinite number of other operations, that nothing like knowledge as classically understood can exist, etc., one might suppose that the original premises should be challenged. Indeed, epistemic presuppositions that lead to this sort of skepticism would seem to be self-refuting; they cannot secure even the most basic, bedrock knowledge we possess. — Count Timothy von Icarus

I don't recognise what I understand of the discussion of rules that came from PI and Kripke's Wittgenstein in this paragraph. It's as if you are talking about something quite other. To my eye it misrepresents that argument.

No progress here, then.

Edit: I just went back over the last few posts in this discussion. We are indeed talking past each other. Care to look for common ground?

But it is so impenetrable... taking forever to say the obvious. I do kinda get it.

How do we know that it's the language that underpins the metaphysics and the epistemology, rather than the reverse — J

Well, I suppose that's a worthwhile point. Language takes it as granted that there is stuff to talk about, and true and false things to say, so maybe the conclusion is that we can't seperate these out.

...a pre-linguistic metaphysical practice... — J

Like the dog chasing the rat up a tree? Here's a minefield. Fine, but I'll insist that there can be no "pre-linguistic metaphysical practice" that we cannot put into words post-hoc; otherwise how could we be said to recognise it as a practice? I think this a swamp not worth approaching.

I followed your thread for a while, but couldn't get traction in the ideas involved.

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

This is difficult. And hence interesting.

I'm stuck on a bit of pedantry, which I will have to set out before I move on. There are limits on what we can substitute for p in (p v ~p). It has to be truth-apt. So you can't treat 'p' as the name for a rock, becasue Fred the Rock is not truth apt.

And notice that these are limits on what we can do with (p v ~p). If you do substitute "Fred the Rock" for "p", then you have stoped playing the game that I had thought we were playing, and we ned to drop back a step and reconsider what the rules of the game are.

So if your puzzle is that you want to know how it is the case that we can understand 'p' as referring to a proposition and not a rock, then my answer will be the same... that's the game we are playing.

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

...but, but...

No, Witti didn't mean it that way, and I agree that the term is overused, but it is so difficult to put up an alternative.

While I'm happy to talk about rules, you can guess where I will go: following a rule is ultimately a practice; it can't be rules all the way down.

But, ok, let's continue.

(trouble is that I get up as you go to bed, so the conversation here is always going to be interspersed with a whole lot of other stuff. Feel free to PM as needed - I do)

Okay, but that's not what you said in the post I responded to. — Hanover

Perhaps. But it is what I had in mind.

I wish you'd number your three elements for clarity. — Hanover

The dots dropped out when I used the quote function. See the original, linked.

1) Not all theological systems require scripture be the word of God, which would mean your objection is to only certain theologies, — Hanover

Sure. Some stuff is both good theology and good philosophy.

(2) you need to define what "philosophical argument" rightly is to explain why your criteria are necessary to remain within in it. — Hanover

I don't agree. It will suffice to point out that "bad" philosophical arguments include those that rest on authority, divine or otherwise.

But practice changes too. I wonder if one of the criticisms of psychologism works against this Wittgensteinian view as much as it does against psychologism: if logic is relative to our practices then it's contingent. — Jamal

Well, there's a lot to unpack here.

Yes, practice changes, but there is the Davidsonian limitation that if it were to change to much it would cease to be recognisable as a practice. One supposes that in order to count as a practice it must be recognisable as such.

Then there's the difference between psychology and sociology. Treating logic as the result of psychological preference fails in much the same way as does grounding it in intuition - it doesn't take shared action into account. And then there's the further step of accounting for the normatively of logic, which might be doable if it is treated as a community activity. Logic is a shared, not a private, practice. seems to miss this point.

That's the classic Wittgensteinian response to accusations of psychologism or even behaviourism.

Then there's the problem that the conclusion - that logic is contingent - doesn't follow directly form the premise - that logic is relative. So taking the extreme, it doesn't follow, from logic being associated with practice, that logic is random.

So from Wittgenstein we might see logic as a practice, and from Davidson we might see it as a constitutive restraint. But you have drawn my attention to is that these views may not be mutually exclusive.

But you also have given me Adorno to think about. Damn your eyes.

I've argued elsewhere that

In summary there are three things that identify a move from a philosophical enquiry to mere theology:
claiming that god is the answer to a philosophical question
using scripture, revelation or other religious authority in an argument
entering into a philosophical argument in bad faith. — Banno

I'll stand by that.

Did you notice the discussion of intuition in the "what is real" thread? Intuition might not be a firm basis for agreement.

I’m thinking that pretty much all a child has is the essence of mum. No words or definitions. Mum may mean security, nourishment, and the like, on an instinctual or just ‘feel good’ level. — praxis

Something like that is perhaps correct. The babe understands the essence of mum, but not yet the details.

Is that the same use of "essence" as that of the Philosophers hereabouts? "that which makes a thing what it is and not another", or whatever?

It's a tempting thought, but what exactly does having the concept "mum" amount to, apart from being able to tell mum from Aunty Jean and getting her to come by calling her name and so on? Some neural net, perhaps, that is active when one thinks of 'mum'? Or a form of "Mumness"?

What is it to "have the essence" of mum, beyond what one does?

If we can identify something we must have some conception of it... — praxis

What is it to have "some concept of it" beyond being able to identify it?


And essences are a bit different to concepts...

Dogs don't know things? A bit harsh on the pup?

...he does not know what is 'sugar' or what is 'intruder'. — Jacques Maritain, The Cultural Impact of Empiricism

He doesn't use the words, perhaps; but his reactions show something....

So why are 'sugar' and 'intruder' in quotes?

First, I didn’t think you could understand me, so why bother. — Fire Ologist

And yet here you are.

Second, There are fifty things prior to my posts with Leon that you didn’t respond to. — Fire Ologist

Again, if you want me to respond, link my name. A common courtesy. I'll not be going over your posts looking to see if you ask me something. You are not that interesting.

Third, Seems muddle-headed for you expect courtesy from me. — Fire Ologist

I agree. Seems I erred in expecting curtesy from you.

Fire, I honestly havn't been able to follow most of what you wrote. I gave it a go. It didn't work. I'll leave you to it.

Well, philosophy tries to get at the underpinnings of empirical thoughts and thoughts in general. That makes it different to the empirical sciences, and also considerably more difficult. Unlike scientists, philosophers don't have the benefit of being able to look around to see if they are right.

Or perhaps they do. The language and logic uses in philosophy is there for all to see.