Should put the whole thing to bed. — Apustimelogist

You'd think.

But we have a couple of folk who insist on using syllogistic logic together with essentialism, in order to defend a particular theological dogma.

The thread isn't going to end any time soon.

Cheers.

To be sure, anomalous Monism remains an area of great interest and ongoing development. Just look at the list of supplements to the SEP article on that topic.

SO all ready to watch Putin play Trump, yet again?

but the issue is similar, — Count Timothy von Icarus

No, it isn't. An individual is not a kind.

Israel is Palestine
Israel is a Jewish state
Therefore, Palestine is a Jewish state. — Count Timothy von Icarus

All this shows is ~(Israel = Palestine). They are not identical, and so substitution fails.

That there is some difference as to the identity of Spiderman suggests that we sort out the identity before we start substitution.

Referential opacity is not about ambiguity.

...catness... — Count Timothy von Icarus

But it seems you can never quite say what "catness" is.

Catness is that which is had by a cat, such that it is a cat and not some other thing.

As if this were an explanation. Somewhat circular, no?

I suggest that we do manage to use the word "cat" without having available some essence that specifies what is a cat and what isn't.

We can of course stipulate such an essence. But we do not need to in order to use the word.

It simply is not true that there is some fundamental unchanging nature which all cats possess, unless we stipulate such a nature.

67. I can think of no better expression to characterize these similarities than "family resemblances"; for the various resemblances between members of a family: build, features, colour of eyes, gait,
temperament, etc. etc. overlap and criss-cross in the same way.— And I shall say: 'games' form a family.

And for instance the kinds of number form a family in the same way. Why do we call something a "number"? Well, perhaps because it has a—direct—relationship with several things that have hitherto
been called number; and this can be said to give it an indirect relationship to other things we call the same name. And we extend our concept of number as in spinning a thread we twist fibre on fibre. And
the strength of the thread does not reside in the fact that some one fibre runs through its whole length, but in the overlapping of many fibres.

But if someone wished to say: "There is something common to all these constructions—namely the disjunction of all their common properties"—I should reply: Now you are only playing with words. One might as well say: "Something runs through the whole thread— namely the continuous overlapping of those fibres". — Wittgenstein, Philosophical Investigations

Added: for those watching on, The article in question is Why alchemists can make gold.

Essence is the meaning of a word that might be compiled from an analysis of all of the uses of a word - if we quantify and collect all of the uses of a word and find its mean use, we’d hold the essence. — Fire Ologist

Fucksake.

The 20th century just didn't happen for some folk.

It's coming to Broadway next month with Keanu Reeves. I hear the music score and dancing are amazing.. — Hanover

I can't wait for Disney to release the animation...

Who's the positivist?

You aren't using the identity elimination schema there. — frank

Yep.

The schema says that if we have a true formula containing an individual variable a, and if we have a=b, then we can replace a in with b, and the formula will remain true.

Do you recall this?

The problem here is an equivocation on "water" as chemical identity versus as a particular phase of that substance. — Count Timothy von Icarus

No. The problem is that you have moved from individuals to natural kinds.

Oh, Tim.

Referential opacity is to do with individuals, not natural kinds.

In first-order logic a,b,c... are variables picking out individuals. Identity elimination is the rule that if a=b than for any formula that contains a we can write another formula replacing every instance of a with b and this formula will have the exact same truth value. That's pretty much the definition of "=".

That's why we use the individuals Superman and Kent.

Your examples use kinds, not individuals.

Steam is H2O
Ice is H2O
Therefore, steam is ice — Count Timothy von Icarus

would be parsed as

U(x)(x is steam ⊃ x is H₂O)
U(x)(x is ice ⊃ x is H₂O)
Therefore
U(x)(x is steam ⊃x is ice)

It's the same as "All cats are mammals, all dogs are mammals, therefore all cats are dogs".

That's a nice and thought-provoking collection of examples. — Ludwig V

I don't agree.

That might be true, but I did specify structure. — AmadeusD

Yes, as did I. The structure of your occipital lobe is very different to mine.

Leave it.

We both have occipital lobes, I assume, however the neuronal connections in your occipital lobe are vastly different to mine.

So we both report that some thing is red, despite having different perceptual systems.

Some hold these views — AmadeusD

Sure, but they are wrong. So what's "unhelpful and lazy" might be allowing them to go ahead unopposed, or allowing their wrong ideas to decide what we do.

Not following your argument, but then I did miss a bit.

These rely on our reports of what they do to our perceptual system though. — AmadeusD

Notice that we - you and I - do not share a perceptual system? We have one each.

What is it that we do share?

, Thought as much. So let's not entertain opinions otherwise. Whether "most" people are against it or not, it's wrong.

So what's all this about?

This response to this thread stands:

The thing is, you started this walk by yourself, and forgot about other people. That's the trouble with idealists - they are all of them closet solipsists." — Banno

We'll continue to use "colour" as we long have, regardless of peculiar and idiosyncratic stipulations of those on Philosophy forums.

Who here thinks honour killings are... honourable?

...this contradiction can easily be resolved. — Ludwig V

What contradiction? Leon seems to think that no relation can be between a thing and itself. But seven is less than or equal to seven, and your phone is the same size as your phone, and you are the same age as yourself. There's no logical problem in something standing in relation to itself.

It seems that people are quite unwilling just to accept the restriction. — Ludwig V

Yep. Quine's contribution was to put the problem in terms of substitution, and hence in terms of extensionality, and so presenting it as a puzzle of logical form as opposed to a physiological issue. It's a change in emphasis, one that greatly clarifies the apparent problem. To talk in terms of believing, knowing, questioning and so on is to set different logical contexts. Mixing those contexts is what leads to our considering the opacity of reference.

So let's look at the example:

a. Superman is Clark Kent. Major
b. Lois believes that Superman can fly. Minor
c. ∴ Lois believes that Clark Kent can fly. a, b =E — IEP

The logical problem is that there are two contexts in this deduction. The first line is in a different context to the other two. There's no problem with:

a. Superman is Clark Kent.
b. Superman can fly.
c. ∴ Clark Kent can fly.

nor with:

a. Lois believes that Superman is Clark Kent.
b. Lois believes that Superman can fly.
c. ∴ Lois believes that Clark Kent can fly.

And indeed this last can be re-written as

Lois believes that:
a. Superman is Clark Kent.
b. Lois believes that Superman can fly.
c. ∴ Lois believes that Clark Kent can fly.

In this last we can see the whole in a single context. The problem - so far as there is one - only arrises when the contexts are muddled together. That's what Quine pointed out.

The context here is not mysterious - it's simply the result of our being able to talk about sentences. The "god's eye view" answer is another muddle, supposing some transcendent truth.

In a forum in which even the logically straight forward puzzle posed by incites page after page of disagreement, such a response will not satisfy everyone. Here's another example that might help make the contexts clear.

a. Ludwig believes that Superman is Clark Kent.
b. Lois believes that Superman can fly.
c. ∴ Lois believes that Clark Kent can fly.

Hopefully folk can see why this is a non sequitur. Ludwig's beliefs are a different context to Lois' beliefs, so the deduction fails.

Notice that the reasons that Ludwig and Lois have different beliefs are irrelevant to the analysis here. Nor do we need to attach a sense to the proper names involved, in the way Frege suggested. Quine's answer is elegant and brief.

I suspect that you, @Ludwig V, are familiar with all this.

You might notice that the "Lois believes..." appears to predicate over sentences. The Problem Davidson set himself was to parse as much as he could of English (and any natural language) into first order logic. Hence, very roughly, his solution of treating the content of beliefs as themselves an individual. "Superman can fly. Lois believes that" where "that" refers to the first sentence.

We might still wish to explain the psychology - why Lois and Ludwig have such different beliefs. But that's a seperate question.

Anyway, that might make clearer what I meant by "sorting out the scope".

See what I mean? — I like sushi

Not really. You have three distinct issues, phenomenology, referential opacity and Anomalous Monism. Bringing them together is no short order.

Cheers.

I'm still not following you. He certainly thinks there are physical causes - laws, if you like. You'd have to explain how what he calls a mental even is always a phenomenological event, if that is what you are claiming - it's not what I understand. He does deny the identity of mental and physical events. He rather infamously accepts extensional first order logic, so he does use substitution.

The position he takes is quite developed, a life's work, so difficult to do justice to it in a few sentences. You seem to be importing a phenomenological gap that Davidson doesn’t actually formulate in those terms.

Might let it go until there is an agreed background?

It has tendency to slip into that. — Punshhh

And when not navel gazing, it's Spinoza for retired engineers. Ok. I supose it keeps them off the streets.

navel gazing — Punshhh

Is that what it is? Ok.

He himself point sout this discrepency between the phenomenological and nomological meanings when appying them to Supervenience. — I like sushi

I don't see that. I don't see what it is you are driving at. I don't think he is doing what you claim; but then, I'm not sure what it is you are claiming.

Indeed, on a search, the word 'phenomenological' does not appear to occur at all in Actions and Events. "Phenomenalism" does, also on p. 217, in "the catalogue of philosophy's defeats".

I hope it is clear that Davidson is rejecting nomological connections between the mental and the physical. That's the very point of the anomalism of the metal.

...flipping tractors is not a good idea... — Janus

That I didn't is clear evidence of divine intervention. God is on my side. Turning and seeing the wheels three feet off the ground was very - sobering.

We were manually running a chain around the Lantana in order to avoid pulling out the natives, then ripping it out with the tractor. Effective but slow. It was off the edge of the escarpment, so pretty steep, I nearly flipped the tractor a few times.

Cheers, Olo.

Yeah, OK. Phenomenological difference is a difference in conceptual role, not a difference in referent, so not following this at all. Have you a phenomenological account of referential opacity?

I spent a summer pulling out lantana when I was seventeen. Not fun. That was further south, near Comboyne. My hippie girl and I got chased out of Lake Cathie, "We don't want your kind 'round here - get a job!". I don't think they had good experiences with the folk from your area.

Nausea is pretty tedious.

I'm thinking it best if I just let you go. Have fun.

Sure. :meh:

I can't see how that links to what I understand about Davidson.

I've no idea what you said here. Sorry.

Nice. I haven't been up that way since I was a kid. I presume you grow a few "herbs"... not need to answer. Ours is a suburban block, carved into multiple beds, so not at all large scale, just enough to feed us in Summer. We host the occasional "herb", which is legal here - or at leat not illegal...

How did you fare in the rain?

I've read Being and Nothingness - as an undergrad requirement, so never completely. I also read Nausea, but I quite like radishes. I don't mind No Exit. Read the Plague and of course the Myth of Sisyphus. Can't think what else. However if I had to pick a fav existential work it would be Waiting for Godot.

Added: Not sure we should count Camus as an existentialist...

The essence of good gardening. — Tom Storm

In the Existential sense, yes - it's what I choose to do, since the existence of the seeds precedes the essence of good gardening. :wink:

...now I have some work to do outside. — Janus

Potted up tomatoes, caps and eggplant seedlings this morning to get going in the greenhouse. Put seeds for celery, cauliflower, cabbage and silverbeet in the heated tray. Hope to start lines for carrot, beetroot and parsnip in a bit.

Is the article mentioned above available to you?

Why alchemists can make gold

I see no problem with the idea of essential qualities or attributes. — Janus

Yep - the issue is what they are. Talk of the properties had by some individual in every possible world is much clearer than "a metaphysical explanation of how anything is anything at all and interacts with anything else" or "is-ness".

...criteria for the identification of things — Janus

How do these differ from just plain properties - that is, we can identify the kettle form others if we specify that it is the one on the stove; but being on the stove is not, I suppose, a part of the essence of being that kettle.

There's a medieval idea of working down the chain of being, specifying each level by genera, sub-genera, species and so on, giving a criteria at each level. Common hereabouts, but problematic.

Banno:

Did Sartre's idea of essence appeal to you? — frank

Essence as a choice? It's an improvement. What is, is not fixed eternally. But again, I'll go with essence being a philosophical invention, petty thoroughly undermined by Wittgenstein yet given a brief reprieve by Kripke. I'd be happy to consider alternatives - if they could be given clearly.

Some data worth reflecting on:

U.S. Image Declines in Many Nations Amid Low Confidence in Trump

I think it is proper to ask for a concise definition of essence. — MoK

Yep. We might even go a step further and ask if the idea of essences is worth keeping.

If you don't mind reading the Devil's works, have a look at Why alchemists can make gold. Let me know if it's paywalled.

If you understand logic, you should be able to address the explanation of "=" given twice, above, as well as in another thread.

But you choose not to.

What are we to conclude?

...but it seems that Count Timothy von Icarus disagrees. — MoK

Yes.

Now, what exactly is an essence for him?

I've asked, but not received a clear answer. Just verbosities such as "... an essence is primarily a metaphysical explanation of how anything is anything at all and interacts with anything else, not how terms refer to things."

I don't find these satisfactory.

Wholly instrumental analytic reason is in a sense diabolical (in both its original and current sense). — Count Timothy von Icarus

Logic as the work of the Devil? The retreat from rationality is the only response left for those who must accept the dogma of the Trinity despite it's incoherence.