While it's true that on balance China is a net creditor, so is Japan, along with Germany, Singapore, Taiwan...

The USA is again outstanding in being a huge net debtor.

Australia is an interesting case, since it has such a high rate of Superanuation. An example of how the relation between labour an tax was broken. Wealth can be structured so that retirees are supported by accumulated savings and productivity, not simply by taxing the next generation’s wages. But not if it is concentrated in the hands of the few.

(except the Chinese) — Punshhh

Chinese debt is about 75% of GDP.

...world population is not only not growing but it is actually deceasing world wide. — dclements

All the data I see points to a 1% growth, decreasing steadily. Population is predicted to peek at 10.3 billion in 2084.

The relation between labour and tax was broken long ago. Labour force size and tax revenue are no longer tightly coupled, but the way tax systems are structured means they still matter. Tax on capital rather than labour can make good such shortfalls.

I think you were distracted away from a quite valid point.

Albo is streets ahead of the Libs. They are cutting each other up over "zero emissions" legislation. Australia recognised Palestine the other day, pissing off Trump, and Albo is in London at present trying to make some sense of AUKUS.

Maybe this will explain where we are at: As the government rejects Trump's UNGA rhetoric, Liberal leadership aspirant Andrew Hastie sounds decidedly Trumpian

My guess is that it would have something to do with entropy. — javra

Yep. It's entropy all the way down.


Old. I am surprised that Apo was reduced to name calling so quickly.

Weird, ain't it. — javra

A merely physical mythos cannot speak of such things.

Indeed, and you apparently caused some pique in ...

I think the difference between the billiard balls and the inoculations is the difference between a very simple instance where efficient cause probably does make sense and a more complicated one where it might not. — T Clark

The invitation in your OP was to consider how we use the word"cause", and you showed that causal chains and inferring probabilistic causes are quite different ways of speaking.

That's kinda the point. We imagine the cave and what we think being out of it looks like, but the reality is we can never know. Pretty sure solipsism pointed that one out. — Darkneos

Saying things such as that is how the fly constructs their bottle.

Some more:

The fact that it's unconscious means you cannot be aware of it, no matter how much more aware you become. — Darkneos

Getting out of the bottle, ironically means accepting there might not be a world or others with which you are a part of. — Darkneos

Seems you may be on your own on this one.

Ok. Curious, since I would not have thought it so far from your "What constitutes the cause is a matter of convention, not fact". That the reed hitting the black on the billiard table, causing it to move, is a different sort of explanation to that you went to the fridge because you wanted a beer, and different again to vaccinations causing the number of measles cases to decline. Do we agree that, despite these all being labeled causal explanations, they are quite different? And perhaps that indeed, there need be nothing that they have in common - wasn't that much the argument in your OP?

So yeah, whether the speech act counts as an act of violence is incidental to the speaker being culpable.

If you have time, take a look at at least the first few pages of Speech Acts and Unspeakable Acts. It elicited an interesting discussion. At issue is the extent to which a perlocution is separable from an illocution.

Plato's cave is fine and all but the assumption in there is that we know what being out of the cave looks like. — Darkneos

As opposed to the assumption that we don't know what being out of the cave looks like...

Yep. That we know about our unconscious shows that it is not outside of our ruminations...

The fly bottle is self-imposed. — Ciceronianus

Yep.

Ok, fair enough. His is an answer for everything, so certainly not my cup of tea. There appear to be various quite different sorts of causal accounts, and no need for an overarching explanation as to what they have in common, beyond the general idea of regularity and our capacity for inference. it's more a way of offering an explanation than some underlying universal mechanism.

PoMo - How rude! :rofl:

My conclusion - identifying one element as the cause of another depends on where you look. What constitutes the cause is a matter of convention, not fact. — T Clark

Reality is dichotomies all the way down. — apokrisis

Wouldn't one response be, T Clark, that identifying a dichotomy also depends on were you look? That what constitutes a dichotomy is also a matter of convention, at least as much as a matter of fact?

But further, it's not clear that making such a move would be at odds with what Apo has to say. After all, isn't viewing nature in the systems science tradition one choice amongst many - a matter of convention?

, then is the purpose of philosophy showing the way out, or shaking the bottle?

Yes. But so often the fly is comfortable where it is.

Why would we have advertising, prayer, speeches or Fox News if language was powerless? — Tom Storm

Indeed.

But that is the opinion expressed hereabouts. It has a place in the Sovereign Citizen virus, which has become more prominent Dow Nunder. It's part of the great myth of individualism.

I appreciate your continuing with this thread, Javra. I'd given it away, as on a par with the discussions of gun law and transgender issues - too fraught with high dudgeon to progress.

This caught my eye:

Do you think speech IS violence when it is hate speech?
— Fire Ologist

No. It can be quite harmful depending on subtext and context, but not all harm is violence. So, again, no. — javra

From earlier:

In Speech Acts and Unspeakable Acts Rae Langton consider an example elaborated from Austin:
Two men stand beside a woman. The first man turns to the second, and says "Shoot her." The second man looks shocked, then raises a gun and shoots the woman.
Do we say that, since the act of shooting was not constitutive of the utterance of the first man, that he bears no responsibility for the killing? I think not. The consequences of an act might well be considered as part of that act. — Banno

Do we say that, since the act of shooting was not constitutive of the utterance of the first man, that the utterance was not a violent act? Well, is the issue here whether the utterance is violent, or whether the utterer is culpable? What part does the man giving the order have in the death of the woman?

You presented an interesting argument earlier, in response to assertions that utterances could not injure. You asked if Hitler injured people through his utterances. I don't think you received an answer, those you were addressing instead choosing to take offence by interpreting your argument as comparing them to Hitler - a merely rhetorical move, and somewhat sanctimonious given their attitude towards causing offence via mere words.

Perhaps the account I gave, from Searle via Langton, avoids the offence while maintaining the point. Can we sidestep the rhetorical deflection, and focus on the function of language in the action described. Do we hold the speaker responsible for the killing, despite his not having pulled the trigger?

It's also worth noting that the argument is not that all hate speech causes violence - another rhetorical ploy being used here. It's more about the othering that is central to hate speech, together with the issue of the culpability of the speaker in subsequent violence.

Cheers.

The who in JTB is most reliant on the belief. That's where the propositional attitude enters, and so the person who has the attitude.

Hence if you know something, then by that very fact you believe it.

If someone says we know such-and-such, it remains up to you to decide if they are correct - to decide if you believe them.

Still not seeing much here. I'll read the rest of the stuff from overnight.

Bits and pieces. But the OUP Very Short Introduction is at about my level.

as long as we don't stop there — Moliere

Never. It's a method, not an answer.

Three areas of interest, at least to me, are probabilities, and counterfactuals, and the relation between causation and action - not as competing alternatives but as complementary approaches addressing differing aspects of the wider topic of causation.

But of course what is being done here is not the search for an overarching theory so much as a group of interrelated explanations. Familiar stuff.

...there are four different (kinds of) causes :
* The material cause or that which is given in reply to the question “What is it made out of?” What is singled out in the answer need not be material objects such as bricks, stones, or planks. By Aristotle’s lights, A and B are the material cause of the syllable BA.
* The formal cause or that which is given in reply to the question “"What is it?”. What is singled out in the answer is the essence or the what-it-is-to-be something.
* The efficient cause or that which is given in reply to the question: “Where does change (or motion) come from?”. What is singled out in the answer is the whence of change (or motion).
* The final cause is that which is given in reply to the question: “What is its good?”. What is singled out in the answer is that for the sake of which something is done or takes place. — SEP

These are the classical Aristotelian varieties of cause. They are supposed by Aristotelians to be quite general. But they are not unproblematic. At their core, although they provide various examples of causes, what is not presented is an account of what it is to cause, or to be caused.

That's an issue addressed in more recent metaphysics of causation, and to which a not insubstantial reply is that there is not some one thing, or even group of things, that are common to all causes.

The notion of a family resemblance might be appropriate here, as in so many other cases of mooted definition.

This is the absurd "deduction" I was addressing above. Satisfying the JTB criteria is not what makes a sentence true. — J

Due, what's the "T"? If a sentence satisfies JTB, then it is true. Further, from "B", those who say that it satisfies the JTB account agree that it is true.

I'm genuinely at a loss to make sense of what you are saying.

f "My aunt lives in Denver" is a JTB, it must be the case that my aunt lives in Denver. No further verification is required. My point is precisely that this is absurd. To avoid the circularity, you have to posit X as true without knowing it to be true, whether on the grounds of pragmatism or T-truth or grammar or something else. — J

Well, no. If S is some sentence that satisfies the criteria JTB, then by that very fact it is true; by that very fact it is already verified; and by that very fact we already hold it to be true. The circularity, so far as there is one, is in your then asking "But is it true?" - and the answer is a resounding "yes".

What?

Knowledge of what one will do later in the day is not quite the same as having intentions or plans for what one will do later. — Ludwig V

One knows one will go for a walk later today if and only if one does indeed go for a walk later today. that is, if "I will go for a walk later today" is true. Otherwise, one was mistaken in thinking that they know they will go for a walk.

I hope that's pretty clear. Seems it is to you, Ludwig, but not so to others here.

I'm a bit puzzled about you are getting at here. — Ludwig V

Tim is playing pretty loosely with "possible". It's not the case that if some sentence is true, it is not possible for it to be false, in any but a very limited way.

That's circular. You can only satisfy the JTB if you know that X is true. — Ludwig V

Yep. I pointed this out a couple of times previously.

My concerns with JTB are all about how the truth of P is supposed to be established — J

Again, there is a difference between P being true and it being established that P is true. @J still hasn't taken this to heart.

Cheers. I'm reading some secondary material on Adorno, after my brief encounter here. And you are correct, overcoming the individualism of Kant, Hegel and subsequent writers is an issue.

"As if to encourage continued conflict, some of this body are seeking to unilaterally recognise a Palestinian state," Mr Trump said at the UN.

"Unilaterally" once meant "done only by one person". Trump used it to mean "Done my everyone except me".


List of countries that recognise a Palestinian state:
Afghanistan
Albania
Algeria
Angola
Antigua and Barbuda
Argentina
Armenia
Australia
Azerbaijan
Bahamas
Bahrain
Barbados
Belarus
Belgium (recent announcements in 2025 — see sources)
Belize
Benin
Bhutan
Bolivia
Bosnia and Herzegovina
Botswana
Brazil
Brunei
Bulgaria
Burkina Faso
Burundi
Cabo Verde (Cape Verde)
Cambodia
Cameroon (varied positions historically; check source notes)
Central African Republic
Chad
Chile
China
Colombia
Comoros
Congo (Republic of the Congo)
Costa Rica
Côte d’Ivoire (Ivory Coast)
Croatia (debated at times)
Cuba
Cyprus
Czech Republic
Democratic Republic of the Congo (DR Congo)
Denmark (varied; see source notes)
Dominica
Dominican Republic
Ecuador
Egypt
El Salvador
Equatorial Guinea
Eritrea (position has varied; see source notes)
Estonia (varied; see source notes)
Eswatini
Ethiopia
Fiji (historical / parliamentary positions vary)
Finland (varied; see source notes)
France (formal recognition announced in 2025 — see sources)
Gabon
Gambia
Georgia
Ghana
Grenada
Guatemala
Guinea
Guinea-Bissau
Guyana
Haiti
Honduras
Hungary
Iceland
India
Indonesia
Iran
Iraq
Ireland
Israel (does not recognise — included here only for completeness of discussion)
Italy (varied; see source notes)
Jamaica
Japan (does not recognise — included here only for context)
Jordan
Kazakhstan
Kenya
Kuwait
Kyrgyzstan
Laos
Lebanon
Lesotho
Liberia
Libya
Luxembourg (recent actions 2025 — see sources)
Madagascar
Malawi
Malaysia
Maldives
Malta (recent recognitions/announcements 2024–2025 — see sources)
Mauritania
Mauritius
Mexico (varied; see source notes)
Mongolia
Montenegro
Morocco
Mozambique
Namibia
Nepal
Netherlands (varied; see source notes)
Nicaragua
Niger
Nigeria
North Korea (Democratic People’s Republic of Korea)
Norway
Oman
Pakistan
Palau (position varies; check source notes)
Panama (varied historically)
Paraguay
Peru
Philippines
Poland
Portugal (recent announcements 2025 — see sources)
Qatar
Romania
Russia
Rwanda
Sao Tome and Principe
Saudi Arabia
Senegal
Seychelles
Sierra Leone
Singapore (does not recognise — included here for context; see source notes)
Slovakia
Slovenia
Somalia
South Africa
South Sudan
Spain
Sri Lanka
Sudan
Suriname
Sweden
Syria
Tajikistan
Tanzania
Thailand
Togo
Tunisia
Turkmenistan
Turkey
Turks and Caicos (territories may have local statements; check national government positions)
Uganda
Ukraine
United Arab Emirates
Uruguay
Vanuatu
Venezuela
Vietnam
Western Sahara *(recognises Palestine — note: Western Sahara itself is a disputed/non-UN member entity)
Yemen
Zambia
Zimbabwe

Complied by ChatGPT. Recent additions may be missing.

Banno recommends just starting with that truth, which seems similar in spirit to the pragmatic approach you describe. I'm still thinking it over. — J

The offer certainly is not mere pragmatism. That one rock and another rock is two rocks is not a question of practicality so much as of grammar. The suggestions that there are different types of truth, as opposed to different true sentences, is hopeless.

Tarski's theory of truth is the most we can do here without falling into error. Truth is a logical device, setting out the move between a sentence and what is says.

The "T" in JTB is that move.

The SEP article on metaphysics of causation offers an analysis in terms of type and token that looks promising. And reduction to "probabilities, regularities, counterfactuals, processes, dispositions, mechanisms, agency, or what-have-you".

But here we are yet again stuck with Aristotle.

Rather, the comment shows how "woke" is used to close off a conversation. Which is, ironically, the very complaint against "woke".

Men and women range themselves into three classes or orders of intelligence; you can tell the lowest class by their habit of always talking about persons; the next by the fact that their habit is always to converse about things; the highest by their preference for the discussion of ideas. — Attributed to Henry Thomas Buckle

It largely doesn't even make sense as a coherent concept — Mijin

Quite so.

Your description of use in the UK matches that Dow nunder.

Yep.

Did you notice the hit piece in Crickey today, from that ratbag Bernard Keane?

It is an “agenda” of the white male id — capricious, short-fused, anxious, paranoid, jealous, demanding of control but resentful of the burden of responsibility control brings — the nihilism of privilege.

...how can we be certain of the reality of the world within which the Matrix is sustained? — Janus

Bertrand Russell had just finished giving a public lecture on the nature of the universe. An old woman said “Prof. Russell, it is well known that the earth rests on the back of four elephants, that stand on the back of a giant turtle.” Russell replied, “Madame, what does the turtle stand on?” The woman replied, “You're very clever, sir. Very clever. But it's turtles all the way down".

It's VR all the way down...?

The facts are readily available.

Notice this, too:


Nothing surprising here.

, yes, I agree with , an excellent post.

I do hope that the US has the resilience to move beyond its present malaise, and expect that it does. In the meantime it makes for entertaining viewing for us in foreign parts. So much so that twice a week the ABC (ours, not yours) airs a late night show called "Planet America". Some might find it interesting.

I'm curious as to whether it is available in the US?