I didn’t address the ability to extrapolate because the issue is a red herring**. A computer very well may come up with a novel response, be “creative”, but a capability is not what makes us a “moral agent”. Picturing a moral act as a decision comes from the desire to have it be something we can be right about (win or lose), so we imagine a moral situation as one that simply hasn’t been solved yet, or, because of the lack of rules guiding us, that there must be a novel act (a new or further rule). But in these desires we just really want to know (beforehand) that our choices (because right, true, just, selfless, imperative, etc) will exempt us from being judged. But being moral is not a capacity, it is a relation to others, a position we take on. We call it the ability to judge, to show judgment, because it is an act of placing ourselves in relation to others. We are responsible not as a function of some “sense”, or an answer I conclude, but in being (continually) answerable for what we do (even to ourselves). Now we may grant this position in relation to us (of judge, say) to a machine (as we might anthropomorphize our judgment by animals, or the earth, or the State), however, this is the ceding of authority (which there may already be a case for with testing and valuation algorithms), but not because of anything inherent (similar or analogous) in the machine’s capabilities, because nothing about it in our own.

**At #143 in the PI, Wittgenstein discusses continuing a series of numbers based on a rule. The point is not the continuing (although it is under scrutiny) but the light it sheds on the relation between student and teacher. That the student may “come to an end” (#143), change their approach (#144) be “tempted” or “inclined” to speak or act (#143, or, notably: #217). The important part is they are prepared to react to each other (#145) because understanding is judged; claiming it is announcing a readiness to be judged (#146-154).

My point is that the 'AGI', not humans, will decide whether or not to impose on itself and abide by (some theory of) moral norms, or codes of conduct. — 180 Proof

I agree that AGI could be capable of imposing rules, norms, codes, laws, etc. on itself (as I was trying to acknowledge in bringing up the social contract, pictured as a decision). Preservation or perfection were merely examples of limits or goals we put on ourselves—I’m not claiming to understand what AGI would decide to choose. Our fear is that we do not have control over the rationale and outcomes of AGI; that, as you say, “How or why 'AGI' decides whatever it decides will be done so for its own reasons”. But that fear is a projection of the skeptical truth that all our talk of rationality and agreement on what is right can come to naught and we can be lost without knowledge of how to move forward.

My claim is that being moral (not just following rules) only comes up in a situation where we don’t know what to do and have to forge a path ahead that reflects who we will be, creates a new world or builds new relations between us. But AGI is limited to knowledge, and so, structurally, it can only decide and choose based on information already made explicit that it is told or learns. And, as I put it to @ToothyMaw here, knowledge cannot encapsulate the history of our lives together and our shared interests and judgments, and so any extrapolation from knowledge is insufficient in a truly moral situation. So the question is not whether AGI can be self-aware—they would be omnipresently “conscious” of why they were doing something—but they do not live a human life. I would say you were halfway right; they are incapable of human responsibility. Not that they wouldn’t have reasons, but that those can’t answer for their actions the same way humans must. Thus my solution to tie a person to the outcomes of any AGI process, linking accountability, but also identity to what you author, knowingly or not, much as we are bound to what we say.

I suspect we will probably have to wait for 'AGI' to decide for itself whether or not to self-impose moral norms and/or legal constraints and what kind of ethics and/or laws it may create for itself – superceding human ethics & legal theories? – if it decides it needs them in order to 'optimally function' within (or without) human civilization. — 180 Proof

I was discussing “deciding” and self-imposing norms, as you mentioned, and the difference between that picture of morality and the idea of responsibility I am suggesting.

I don’t know if that’s an expression of a lack of interest or an inability to follow, but, assuming we’re here to understand each other, I was pointing out again that imagining “deciding” as the basis for moral action narrow-mindedly frames it as a matter of knowledge or goals like “optimal function”. This way of looking at acting comes from a desire for constant control and a requirement for explicit rationality that we would like have for ourselves (rather than, in part, our personal and shared interests). Imagining our power over action this way is what feeds the idea that AI could be “human” because it could fulfill this fantasy. But without any interest in explaining where and how you got lost, I can’t really help.

but I am the only one who can bind me to my word. if you bind me to my word, you still do not know what is going to come out of my mouth. — Arne

Well of course you can says things like “that’s not what I meant” or “I’m sorry you took it that way” or “that’s just your perspective” but when someone says something in a specific situation, there is only so many ways it can having any import. So it is not me that ties you to the implications of your expression, but the whole history of human activity and practice. And so whether a threat or a promise is also an actual difference apart from you, not created by your desire or intention. Thus why we can know that you were rude despite your being oblivious, or that you’ve revealed that you are jealous in what you said.

I don't believe that ethics is characterized by rule following — 013zen

I was characterizing deontological morality, and roughly attributing the desire we have for it to be rational certainty so that I don’t have to be personally responsible because I followed a rule, which, in this case, is the only form of morality that AI is capable of, thus the need for another option since it may not care if it is personally responsible.

Now, I agree that this overlooks an actual moral situation, as you say, “when faced with ethically challenging situations”. But I would point out that describing our navigation of “uncertainty” in “knowing” “good and bad” or the “best situation” plays into the desire to have certain knowledge of judgment and at the same time concede that we can’t have it, which makes it seem like we lack something we should have. My point is that this seeming lack shows that the nature of morality is different than knowledge in that we step into ourselves (possibly a new world) in acting in an unknown situation. Thus the need for a thread to the user in order that who they are is tied to what they do (or do with AI, or is done in their name).

If an AI ever feels something that we might characterize as an internal conflict regarding what makes the most sense to do in a difficult situation, that will affect people's lives in a differing but meaningful manner, then perhaps I might consider it capable of moral agency. — 013zen

And this is why there is discussion of whether AI is or could be “human”, because we associate morality with knowledge and choice. But, even if we assume that your example could happen (and why not)—that AI would find itself in a moral situation (beyond rules) and weigh options that affect others—my point is that it cannot be responsible to the future nor extrapolate from the past like a human. So it’s “agency” is not a matter of nature, but of categorical structure.

But then your argument seems reducible to putting safeguards in place so we can all sleep better at night. . . and relieve ourselves of any moral responsibility for the results of bad actors. — Arne

I’m not saying self-monitoring is the only means, but, without being bound to your word, who knows what is going to come out of your mouth. Though without user-identity it wouldn’t matter, yes, we could look and say: “This is a bad outcome. Let’s make a law.” But with AI, playing catch up and whack-a-mole is untenable because the outcomes are almost unimaginable and the effects could be devastating, and could be even with a user picturing the world watching. So I’m not saying we rely on everyone behaving themselves, but, that only a human has the capacity to be responsible in a void of criteria for judgment when what action is itself is up for grabs.

I suspect we will probably have to wait for 'AGI' to decide for itself whether or not to self-impose moral norms and/or legal constraints and what kind of ethics and/or laws it may create for itself – superceding human ethics & legal theories? – if it decides it needs them in order to 'optimally function' within (or without) human civilization. — 180 Proof

Not attributing an inherent nature to AI is something Hobbes of course famously also assumed about humans, which anticipates moral agreement only coming from mutually-assured destruction (the state of nature as the Cold War), or accepting limitation of freedom for self preservation. I don’t think it takes something only “human” to know what annihilation is, nor to “fear” it, or, alternatively, what perfecting oneself is (nor do I take that as evidence for “consciousness” of a “self”, which I would simply pin on a desire to be special without working at it).

But AI does not love and hate, which is not to say, “have emotions”, but that it does not become interested or bored, which is the real basis of the social contract: not just “self interest”, but personal interests (not rationality so much as reasons). Thus AI would only be able to make the social contract (in avoiding death or reaching for a goal) as an explicit choice, one that is decided, as with Mill, or when Rawls tries to find the best position from which to start, rather than falling into sharing the same criteria for an act because of a history of our human interests in it, as with Locke or Wittgenstein (thus the need to “remember” our criteria, as Plato imagines it). As AI is not part of the weave and warp of human life, everything must be calculated, and, as is its limitation, from what is already (and only) known.

That [ AI ] can only consider novel situations based on already established laws is no different from how a human operates. — ToothyMaw

It seems there are at least two important differences. The first is epistemological (and ontological I guess for the AI). AI is limited to what already is known, yes, but it is also limited to knowledge, as in the type of information that knowledge is. Putting aside that it sucks at knowing the criteria for judgment—which are different, and of different types, for almost every thing—it is stuck outside of a history of curiosity, mistake, triumph, reprimand, habit, experiences, etc. and shared culture and practices that shapes and inhabits all of us without the need of being known. Even if it is able to be canonized as knowledge (because that is philosophy’s job: explicating intuition), there is no “telling” anyone that kind of wisdom (how basic do you have to get to completely explain an apology, and all the undying and attendant acts, must less: leading someone on). Also, even if AI could gather all the data of a changing present, it would still miss much of the world we instinctively take in based on training and history, much less biology. And I know we want moral decisions to be made on important-seeming things like rules or truth or right or knowledge, but we do things for reasons that don’t have that same pedigree. This doesn’t make them immoral, or self-interested (but not, not those), it’s just redemption or self-aggrandizement are complicated enough, much less just fear or something done without thinking.

I don't see anything preventing an AI from wanting to avoid internal threats to its current existence from acting poorly in the kind of situation you consider truly moral. — ToothyMaw

But if it is a truly moral situation, we do not know what to do and no one has more authority to say what is right, so without the (predetermined, certain) means to judge what “acting poorly” in this situation would be. But AI cannot hold itself up as an example in stepping forward into the unknown in the way a person can. Or run from such a moment; could we even say: cowardly?

I don't quite agree that many moral philosophers would consider you moral for following just any self-imposed rule, if you are saying that. — ToothyMaw

I was trying to allude to Kant’s sense of duty and moral imperative, with my point being that, even in that case, the desire is for impersonal rationality (certainty, generality, etc.).

Doesn't it matter though if the AI can choose between affecting a moral outcome or a less moral outcome like one of us? …shouldn't we treat it like a human, if we must follow through with holding AIs responsible — ToothyMaw

I may not have been clear that the “identity” I take as necessary to establish and maintain is not the identity of the AI, to make the AI responsible, but to tie a particular human to the outcomes of the AI.

And, while it may be that AI could curtail its actions to already-established law (as AI can only use existing knowledge), only a human can regulate based on how they might be judged in a novel situation (as I pointed out that the only truly “moral” situation is when we are at a loss as to what to do, or else we are just abiding by rules, or not). In other words, the threat of censure is part of conscience (even if not ensuring normativity), as we, in a sense, ask ourselves: who do I want to be? (In this sense of: be seen as). Anonymity diminishes cultural pressure to whatever remains of it as a voice inside me, with the knowledge that I may never be judged perhaps silencing that entirely.

we can just change the programming so that it chooses the moral outcome next time, right? Its identity is that which we create. — ToothyMaw

But the distinct actual terror of AI is that our knowledge can not get in front of it to curtail it, to predict outcomes, because it can create capabilities and goals for itself—it is not limited to what we program it to do. It’s not: build a rocket. It’s: design a better rocket. And it can adopt means we don’t anticipate and determine an end we do not control nor could foresee.

It seems to me that we are the ones who need to be put in check morally, not so much the AIs we create. That isn't to say we shouldn't program it to be moral, but rather that we should exercise caution for the sake of everyone's wellbeing. — ToothyMaw

I agree; my point is that, in the way morality works, tying the AI and its outcomes to who let it loose is the best way to put us “in check morally”—like a serial number on a gun which can tell us who shot someone. My last paragraph is just to say that if we have anonymity, we don’t have any incentive to check ourselves, as, say, in the example of words, I can’t be held to what I say, judged or revealed in having said it.

I agree that an ‘act’ (especially speech) involves not only me, and that that condition is not appreciated enough by philosophy. But he is not focused on what we physically do, nor translating anything into “physical terms”, as if what happens in the body matters in our considering something a threat or a promise. Again, we are not talking about actions, but participating in activities, accomplishing their execution. That there are actions, even speech, in a practice, does not mean that describing how the actions happen explicates our practices. The “acts of saying something” is not a breakdown of how saying works, it is how words are deemed to have achieved something, like a statement or an apology—and in this sense, “doing” something.

He is describing how these activities, “acts”, work (or fail)—at all. I do not, for example, intend acts, I conduct them (though some do require deliberateness). I may do my best to make a good (or sufficient) act (say, apology) but whether I do is judged by whether my offering meets the criteria (requirements for identity, completion, failure, etc.) inherent in the living practice of seeking forgiveness. These threshold conditions, measures, mechanics, etc., are the external, the codification of the judgment of others (even to myself); they are the “consequences thereafter” that Austin refers to as separate from the physical (e.g., the illocution, the saying). So the occurrence of the other “understanding” what we say is also a matter of judgment, whether they exhibit what is considered important in being understood in that case, which you actually partly draw out in saying “how one takes the words, uses them, and applies them in his conduct….” This is a demonstration and expression that we understand because these are what understanding consists of.

@Banno @baker @Dawnstorm

Only imagining an “act” as like a physical movement comes from the desire to insert the question of intentionality. But you don’t even make a movement an act; raising your arm is judged to be waiving down a taxi, or signaling a question. Thus , the possibility of something being multiple different acts (even, as raising your arm).

First though, Austin does not normally limit himself to acts of speech; including thinking, understanding, etc. “Speech acts” are not anything special and here are just examples of other things that words can do than just be: true or false. He wants to show that we (philosophers especially) minimize the world to things we know, things we can be certain about (true or false), as we imagine we can be certain of “our intention”, creating the seeming primacy of physical movement.

However, for example: claiming a truth and making a promise both accomplish something. One proposes something to be true, the other makes a commitment.Yes, a proposition is stated by me, but my intention is only occasionally relevant (as clarifying, not a casual necessity), though the particulars of time, place, and the audience (maybe) may matter. More universally, what I say ties me to the judgment others can make of it, and of me through it (so we are “observing the actor” not just “sifting through… expressions”). Similarly, the important part in me making a promise is that it’s me that answers for it when it’s due.

Third, a promise is meaningful to us in the same way claiming truth is, which means: a promise has its worth as what it is (differentiated from other relations between us) by criteria that necessarily, essentially, make it (judged as) what a promise is. As truth is right or wrong, a promise is binding or not, and fulfilled or reneged on. Also, a promise does have truth value: in the integrity of its criteria; either something fits into the criteria of a promise, or it is not a promise (it’s an aspiration).

Having criteria different than certainty (or physicality, or intention) does not make promising less of an act. What makes up both exists outside of, and before, us. The important part is not that the words are the consequence of me. The way it works is that I submit myself to (or avoid) the responsibility for, and the consequences of, what my acts are judged as.

@Banno @Ludwig V

I continue to struggle with Chapter 2 unfortunately. I can’t seem to see the truth or confused conflict between the two “positions”. I feel like Ryle does not do sufficient justice to developing the position of Determinism, even by drawing it out, as Austin does, only on the terms of ordinary criteria, nor by getting at why the Determinist wants or needs to hold the view they do, as Wittgenstein would. Ryle appears simply to subject Determinism to the judgment of common opinion, as a refutation, which simply overlooks what is important about or to Determinism. It does seem he thinks it is small potatoes; however, if Determinism is of little import, Free Will is trivialized as well (and isn’t the real dilemma between those two?). Maybe I will come back to it, as I am at a loss to tie the discussion to any greater point, even though he did promise that the argument between the dilemmas themselves were not the matter at hand.

@Ludwig V @Banno (if anyone else is actually reading this book, please let me know.)

Without having read the whole of Lecture I, I want to point out that Ryle is actually using Austin’s and Wittgenstein’s methods. As I have not gotten to the part where Ryle points out how two arguments which we take to clash are merely answering different questions, as alluded to in the introduction, I don’t think it is important (or it is at least premature) to consider the arguments themselves.

He is, however, making claims about the ordinary ways we—in the quote below—help (or hurt) ourselves, contrary to fatalism’s conclusion.

this argument… that nothing can be helped…goes directly counter to the piece of common knowledge that:
some things are our own fault,
some threatening disasters can be foreseen and averted, and
there is plenty of room for precautions, planning and weighing alternatives. — Ryle, p.16, broken apart by me

He is asking that the description of the mechanics of these acts be accepted on their face. Not that they are unassailable (foundational, undoubtable), say: because they are “common sense” or the opinion of “ordinary people”, but that the rationale to be made for these claims can only be done by yourself, to see for yourself; or to reject them, which is to say: point out how “fault”, “forseeing”, and actions to mitigate the foreseen, do not work this way, or that help in the face of destiny does not refute determinism.

He is pointing to what Wittgenstein will call the “grammar” of our activities (“practices” Witt says). And the method involves drawing out what we do by looking at what we would say, when…

Very often, though certainly not always, when we say 'it was true that ... ' or 'it is false that ... ' we are commenting on some actual pronouncement made or opinion held by some identifiable person…. — Ryle, p.17 emphasis added

Thus he is claiming that how our relation to the future works is dependent on an individual (and not a force) making a guess. (Wittgenstein points out that “belief”, in one sense, works as a guess (a hypothesis, PI p.190) and not as an unjustified lesser claim to knowledge.)

If you make a guess at the winner of the race, it will turn out right or wrong, correct or incorrect, but hardly true or false. These epithets are inappropriate…. — Ryle, p.18

You will note that the claim is that true and false are “inappropriate”, which is to say their implications do not apply, their criteria have nowhere to measure against, because our relation to the future is not a matter of knowledge (outside of science, which is based on repeatability, predictability; as maybe determinism would like itself to be).

Ryle is not as generous and skilled at drawing out the details of the argument for determinism as Austin was with perception (nor are these examples as various and in-depth), so I think there will be more to do in working out on what terms Ryle takes these views to stand, and thus how they miss each other from different perspectives, if that is the case.

@Banno I am reading Lecture 1 still but your welcome to move forward.

@Banno

Just catching up with the preface. I find it ironic that the book is entitled Dilemmas when Ryle says his examples are only when two thinkers have “divergent goals” “from the beginning” (p. 1, emphasis added). Ryle wants to say philosophers only take themselves as conflicting when (unbeknownst to them it would seem) they are actually addressing two different problems (answering two different questions). Ryle does say it is not our logic, but our relationship to others that is the problem. (p.1)

We learned in reading Austin that we paint a picture as black-and-white in only taking into consideration one example rather than first looking at a variety of cases. Wittgenstein felt the same as Austin about variety but starts one step back to say that it is “having a goal” at all before you start (say, a requirement for crystalline purity. PI #107) that forces your mind into one picture (and maybe in this case, against another). Perhaps Ryle will say that we see others as rivals because of our pushing an agenda (“goal”) from the start, much as we fixate only on the example that makes our best case (pain, illusion, etc.) Hegel would say we are programmed to see things as dichotomies, and that the trick is to let things be what they are on their own (as will Heidegger) and from a larger perspective (as will Wittgenstein).

First Ryle describes the (imagined) fight of, let’s call it, the skeptic, who takes there to be an “unbridgeable crevasse” (p. 2) between us and the world, and the naturalist, who picks up their utensils without doubt. But Ryle is not concerned about the minutiae of the supposed disagreement, only to find out why the two feel they are at odds (or perhaps why we take them to be at odds). Ryle does hint at how they can’t actually connect enough to conflict because the skeptic’s case is based on reason (“theoretical”, p. 3), and there are no arguments for accepting the world.

Second is the argument without victor between free will vs. causation. He says “no one wants further evidence” (p.5) of either position but it is philosophy’s job to understand the “rights and obligations” (id) of the positions. He appears to be doing this in saying that a question about whether we can be moral is different than a question about whether an act was (morally) mine or determined by circumstances. (Id) In the same way a question of how we sensed something in a certain case is not answered by asking the question of how we sense at all. (p.5-6) I would venture that Ryle is highlighting confusion between a generalization and particular cases, but, too early to tell.

Lastly, he separates theology and science from tangling over “truth” by putting them in different “categories” because not only are their subject matters different, but also “the kinds of thinking they require” (p.8), meaning that their questions are different in their “terms and concepts”. (p.9) Ryle though is only saying that one question is not judged the same as another, because a ”category” is only generally created “by showing in detail how the metiers in ratiocination [means of reasoning] of the concepts under pressure are more dissimilar from one another or less dissimilar from one another”. (p.11)

The most important thing here seems to be “what is at stake” (different than what each litigant feels is) and what “considerations” should matter in each case. (p.12), which appears will be a matter of the concepts of the “highway”, the “underlying non-technical concepts employed as well in [technical theories] as in everyone else's thinking.” (Id) So, @Ludwig V, I do take the focus on particulars, dichotomies, goals, means of reasoning, criteria of what matters, similarities and differences, case-specific categories, and considerations in each case, to be right up the same alley as Austin and Wittgenstein. But we shall see.

Responsible to whom? Answer to whom? To make it intelligible, clarify, qualify, be read to/by whom? Judged by whom? — baker

Anyone? Myself included. Like if I make a claim and you question it; I clarify, or provide evidence, stand by my words, or rescind them, try to weasel out of the implications, etc. And we judge based on the criteria for a thing (or make it personal). I’m not sure what to say as I don’t know what the confusion or contention is.

I just don’t agree that it is objective. I would say it is inter-subjective. Something can be independent of me and still be subjective, and it can be independent of any randomly selected person and still be subjective. — Bob Ross

If you consider what actually makes up the criteria of "objective" (and not just the picture), then what I am describing can be reasoned and intelligible (not "arbitrary"--"real" in that it matters, has impact), and not emotional or self-interested or intuitive (what you term, "subjective"). Moral choices are not like an "Inter-subjective" contract, and, by their nature, unlike science or math, they do not always lead to agreement, but are nonetheless subject to judgment just as other rational acts.

Something can be independent of me and still be subjective, and it can be independent of any randomly selected person and still be subjective. — Bob Ross

Again, it is the fact that it is dependent on me (that I am defined and held to my acts) that makes moral choices not subjective (as I take you to mean "arbitrary" or, not based on a fact).

I don’t think morality is completely arbitrary. I think that morality is either objective (exists mind[stance]-independently) or it does not (e.g., subjective, inter-subjective, etc.). — Bob Ross

If you force a dichotomy it makes it impossible to take into consideration how things actually are (as does requiring a specific standard), as Hegel, Nietzsche, and Austin discuss. Again, the meat of what “objective” is would be the actual mechanics of how we judge based on what criteria.

But would you say that this ‘fact of our position in the world’ exists mind(stance)-independently and has ‘moral’ signification? I wouldn’t. Having importance or power doesn’t make something a fact. — Bob Ross

The fact of it is not because of its import. The “reality” of it is the structure of our relation to ourselves and society following the limitation of knowledge (to answer independent of us). The fact is that what creates our moral responsibility is that our words and acts speak to who we are; that our responsiveness to others is a duty beyond trying to decide and be sure (know, be certain) what is to be done. So, although I don’t understand the terms you are couching this in, I would say that, yes, our human condition exists apart from me and has significance because it is the possibility of the moral realm at all (and not just rules or impulse).

I take it you imagine the choice is that morality is either tied to something certain (the world, etc), or at least not me, because we are arbitrary. What I am saying is that moral choices are not arbitrary (necessarily) because they are tied to me (at a certain point, beyond society’s ordinary norms and expectations).

Anyway, I wanted to thank you both for making this thread far more interesting, informative and certainly longer than I expected. — Banno

:up:

Facts about psychology do not entail the existence of moral facts. — Bob Ross

But what I was describing is not a fact about our “psychology”. That we are responsible for what we say and do is a fact of our position in the world and in relation to each other (even though we may not be held to it), which is real in the sense it has importance and power; it creates who we are going to be. A moral moment is when we do not know what to do and no one is in a better position to know what is right. The reality of that position does not make the fact of what I do next “relative” or “subjective”, though it might need to be individual and revolutionary (adverse to conformity).

@Banno

On the other hand, Austin does not claim that ordinary language may not need reform (p. 63), though admittedly his description of the process, especially the phrase "tidy up", could be described as an understatement and does largely ignore the practicalities of making the changes he is contemplating. — Ludwig V

Wittgenstein refers to this as well, but what I take it to mean is that sometimes OLP’s method does not work because the things we say in a particular situation distort the mechanics of that practice, rather than reflect the criteria we ordinarily judge it by (which is OLP’s means of insight). So, when they talk of “tidying up” or “rearranging” (PI #92), they are not talking about word politics, but simply using the means of OLP, say in “substituting one form of expression for another” (#90). Sometimes this just means simply drawing out multiple examples to see a wider view of how it is that a practice works despite first impressions given only one way of speaking about it. Other times we’ve taken one way of speaking and created metaphysics.

How seriously should we take the possible conservatism of OLP? — Ludwig V

On the face of it, OLP seems to be pitting what we usually say against what philosophy says. The interpretation that OLP is conservative (usually taken from Moore) is that it is just common sense refuting skepticism. Austin will appear conservative because of his snobbishness about how language is just being used clumsily, lazily, haphazardly, etc. In both cases there is the underlying condescension that skepticism is folly or abnormal. Wittgenstein shows us how our fear is warranted (that we cannot know the other, know for certain what is right). In all, I take the suggestion that we look around at the variety of the world to be license to explore our own interests, and that it is democratic to think anyone can reflect and learn.

It might be more relevant to ponder why their work has been so widely disregarded. — Ludwig V

I don’t take OLP as wanting to end philosophy (nor refute skepticism). I think Austin thought he had finally found a way to get started (though in his mind this was just going to be a kind of cataloguing). Wittgenstein took on the same nemesis, however, seeing that the skeptic was part of himself, he realized the desire for certainty is a reoccurring part of all of us, thus, the battle was not to kill the hydra, but only cut of (charm?) each snake as it comes up. And in the face of our fundamental fear and desire, to merely offer as alternative the vast complex flawed variety of the world, is rather like saying eat your veg and exercise to someone who just wants a pill.

There is a practical issue. Simply, that the style of argument that Ryle, Austin and Wittgenstein deploy is much, much harder than it looks. — Ludwig V

Austin and Wittgenstein both make what they are doing look obvious, so people take the point as simple, or trivial.

I get really annoyed about the examples one sees that are tiny thumbnails, which are treated as the whole story, when it is clear that a wider context would reveal complexities that are ignored. — Ludwig V

The fact that taking into consideration further or wider circumstances (and even responses) can change what is meaningful about an expression shows that the expression itself is just kind of “ya know what I mean?” and whether you do is based on so much more that came before it and is happening around it and what happens after, if necessary. There are times when the actual words matter, but much of the time they are as if a cue in a particular direction of what can already be expected in that situation. Thus why our words seem to move right past each other when we don’t take into consideration we might be standing in different worlds (of interest, implication, anticipation).

It seems to me that a form of words always suggests a context, no matter how tiny the thumbnail sketch… Context isn't everything, but it isn't an optional extra. — Ludwig V

And I agree but would double the bet. Words not only “suggest a context”, they require it. If I am going to say “I’m sorry” and there is no harm done, the expression itself here can only move along the attendant earmarks of an apology; so that we all know what the next thing is that will be said in this instance, as if it were required—as if it must be said. It’s not the words here that have the power, which seems even to overwhelm our free will in only being able to respond “Sorry for what?”. So maybe we could say the context isn’t always everything, but we definitely do not have certainty in what we “perceive” nor control over what is said in what we express.

What do you mean here by "responsibility"? — baker

Responsibility for what you say and do; to answer for it, to make it intelligible, clarify, qualify, be read by it, judged by it, held to it, make excuses for it, etc. That words not only do not stand outside of the circumstances in which they are spoken, but that an expression is an event that has an afterwards, to which you are tied.

Ditch Sophie’s World. It makes the error of requiring a certain answer which twists the “inquiry” into the issues. I would also skip summaries and histories as you’ll think you know something when you shouldn’t. You are much better off going to the library and pulling original philosophy texts and reading a bit to see if you can make sense of it and are interested in the subject. You want something readable and relatable. And focus on your thoughts and questions while reading it—don’t automatically assume they are right. You don’t have to start at the beginning but some writing is responding to earlier texts (avoid Kant, Wittgenstein, Descartes, Nietszche, early Heidegger, and Hegel for now). I find Plato, Aristotle, Hume, Dewey, J.L. Austin easier. You could also avoid the technical stuff and stick with more social reflection like Hannah Arendt, Foucallt, etc. Good luck.

Just to throw a curveball out there, Stanley Cavell makes the claim that it is our shared lives that are normative, in that we have (implicit) criteria to judge each other, which come from what we are interested in (as a culture), what matters to us as a society. So, our actions are not constrained by facts, but conformity. That is not to say that others’ judgment is our moral condition. A moral situation is just when we run out of rules and norms (the “ought”), in which case our responses dictate our character; we are morally obligated, responsible as a (real) fact of the limitation of knowledge.

Can we know what is best ahead of time? No. Does anything anyone decides or argues for have power over what we do? No. Nevertheless, we act and learn, excuse, refine, better ourselves, and these things are not individual, necessarily based on whim, emotion, irrationality, unintelligibility—it is “real” in that it matters and is subject to judgment. Those are facts of our human condition, but outside the realism/anti-realism distinction, which is just the desire to avoid our responsibility for our acts by making it about just doing what is right, what we “ought” to—made certain (apart from me) by “facts”.

Switching to newer discussion.

@Banno

Possible wrong assumptions are not a matter of propositions/sentences (i.e forms of words) but of forms of words in the circumstances of their use, i.e.statements. — Ludwig V

I feel this might be misunderstood if we don’t make clear that the circumstances are of greater importance than any “form of words”. Yes, there are expressions that take a particular form, like a statement (or “empirical proposition”), but it is the attendant circumstances which make stating a fact important; whether that it is true, or hurtful, or both. More than that, there are also expressions that do not take a “form of words” at all, because they are simply a threatening gesture, but also because we don’t judge by the words (or the word’s “use”; or my “use” of them) but by the place the expression (or practice) holds in the circumstances, i.e., its sense or “use” (which is here what Wittgenstein is referring to) e.g., a plea, an overture, an apology, pointing, seeing, mocking, etc. To some expressions, the form (or practice) is crucial, like a knock-knock joke, to others, it is the deviance from any form that makes the expression what it is, like modern art, or its singularity, say, the cry of pain from me.

But we don’t hedge unless there’s some reason for doing so. The best policy is not to ask the question. — Ludwig V

This harkens back to Lecture X (p.112), when Austin pointed out that Ayer was pulling back behind “precise” sense-data to allow us to be uncommitted to our expressions. Here “hedging” our claims about the world qualifies our relation in order to mitigate our liability as well. Austin is claiming that our ordinary expressions do not inherently need to be hedged, unless there “is something strange or a bit off-colour about the particular situation.” (P.142) But Austin is not championing the status quo, as if it was more entitled or that it naturally has more solidity. We can unreasonably question another, but in doing so we put ourselves out (too familiar perhaps), or put them out (opening ourselves to calls of libel). In any case, we subject ourselves to judgment, and it is that responsibility Austin wants to be certain we understand.

OLP couldn't exist without definitions — RussellA

I’ll grant you that, but it does not rest on definitions; Austin is drawing out how we judge their use, distinctions, application, possibilities, the circumstances they come up in, etc., so that we understand the variety and logic of more than one case or dichotomy.

Does it mean either 1) the OLP uses ordinary language when analysing ordinary language or 2) the OLP analyses ordinary language but doesn't use ordinary language? — RussellA

Num 2, except it’s technically “what we say when”, like the different kind of things we say on instances of, in this case: “seeing” something, but, also, he’s not just imagining instances of what we say in ordinary use, but also trying to flesh out the criteria and circumstances for philosophical use as well.

@Banno @javi2541997

My point is only that if one remembers the roots of philosophy in ordinary language, it might seem less of an extraordinary aberration to those who don't see the point. — Ludwig V

Yes, and I think it’s also good to point out that the goal is not to negate everything that Plato, Descartes, Kant, Hume, metaphysical philosophers, did (or are doing) because the search for truth, the tendency to doubt and the desire for certainty are clearly part of the human condition, and the work they did obviously has merit. And I mean not in as a theory or summary (knowledge, to tell), but the example they set and the reward in reading those texts.

So long as that voice is hopeful rather than dogmatic… The accusation of arrogance, in both cases, is the response of those who don't recognize the voice or don't find the expected lesson in the book. — Ludwig V

I like to think of it as provisional, speculative. Unfortunately, people always just want something to take away, so any hint that they are generalizing something and we take that as all the value they have, rather than to show us a practice which we continue with our own interests and examples. Austin used performatives utterances as just one example of how not everything is true or false, and now he is forever just the “performative” guy as if that was meant as an entire theory of language.

I assume you mean the whole of the book. — Ludwig V

I meant the whole discussion, but there are a few essays in Must We Mean What We Say by. Cavell that set it out better than I can.

I had taken a rather different direction, thinking about the "ordinary" in philosophy. Descartes starts his meditation from ordinary life. — Ludwig V

Descartes, Socrates, Hume, etc., they all start from ordinary examples

If I look out of the window and see men crossing the square, as I have just done, I say that I see the men themselves, just as I say that I see the wax; yet do I see any more than hats and coats that could conceal robots? I judge that they are men — Descartes, 2nd Meditation

But when they see the possibility of error they just jump to the conclusion that we must not be able to “know” the way they want and then they project the skeptical/metaphysical picture from there. Here, Descartes takes it that we do not have ordinary criteria for identification, and, out of his desire for unassailable knowledge to solve everything, does not see that we also “judge” a person as a person (“see” them as a person, or not), which is a different matter then just information and conclusion. So Descartes falls back on the picture that “judgment” must be a process of the “mind” that is mysterious and thus without the foundation he presets which drives the whole picture. As Wittgenstein and Austin say, the first step is the killer.

Berkeley makes great play of his respect for "vulgar opinion" and "what is agreed on all hands", yet rejects "universal assent". — Ludwig V

Cavell, in Problems in Modern Aesthetics, points out that Kant (in his critique of judgment) says that we make aesthetic claims, like OLP’s descriptions of its examples, in a universal voice, which is to say “Do you see what I see?” for yourself, coming to it on your own. Thus why Austin sounds so arrogant, and Wittgenstein is always leaving things unfinished, asking questions you have to change your perspective in order to answer. We, of course, may not agree, and agreement is only to the case, to the circumstances imagined.

I would like to add, however, that it is at its best when it actually analyses the uses. — Ludwig V

Most people take it that the examples are the point, as if they are to argue within the same old classic philosophical framework for the same end. But drawing out the examples are evidence or data from which they do make claims about philosophical issues (truth, “reality”, the other, knowledge, ethics, essence, etc.) and, of course, critique the practice of philosophy.

In contrast, his dissection of "vague" and "precise" is effective enough, but doesn't take that step — Ludwig V

Clearing up how those work is not only to take one more chink out of Ayer, but to show, as his diversity of other examples are meant to elsewhere, that our ordinary ways of judging things, etc., can be precise and clear and thorough and explicit and sufficient and of import to philosophy just not foundational, universal, ensured of agreement, etc., which is not to say they are just claiming it is “good enough” (simply practical).

The Merriam Webster dictionary definition of the word "see" includes i) to perceive by the eye and ii) to imagine the possibility. — RussellA

OLP is not about definitions. In trying to understand seeing (“perceiving”) the method is to find examples of the kinds of things we would say in a particular situation.

But we must look, of course, for the minuter differences; and here we must look again at some more examples, asking ourselves in just what circumstances we would say which, and why.
Consider, then: (1) He looks guilty. (2) He appears guilty. (3) He seems guilty. — Austin, p. 36

The point is to draw out from there the implications, expectations, and how we judge, how mistakes are made, distinctions drawn, corrections, i.e., how seeing works. This isn’t an argument that we should use language a certain way, or for one type of language (“ordinary”) against another.

As OLP is the position that philosophy should be carried out using words as ordinarily used by competent speakers of the language, — RussellA

So it’s not that philosophy should “use” ordinary usage. It looks at ordinary usages in individual cases to inform philosophical claims because what we are interested in about a subject, it’s essence, is reflected in how we judge it, which is captured in the kinds of things we say about it in particular cases.

But Austin in Sense and Sensibilia is saying that Ayer is wrong, in that we don't see sense-data but do see the material object. — RussellA

Austin is specifically not claiming we see directly or indirectly (bottom of p. 3), but that the whole thing is made up, including the picture of “material objects”, metaphysics’ “reality”, etc.

I'm beginning to think that "ordinary language philosophy" is a misnomer. It's a lot closer to philosophy than it seems to be if one reads the programmatic description. Perhaps the project would be better understood if one talked about "natural language". Logicians seem to have a generally accepted concept, which seems at least close to ordinary language. — Ludwig V

It absolutely is not named by them. It isn’t about language (although Wittgenstein looks at “meaning” as an example to investigate); it’s getting at the criteria and mechanics of, here, seeing (“perceiving”), by looking at examples of what we say (judge, identify, imply, expect, etc.) in particular situations. Some of these are fantasies (with Wittgenstein). Again, it isn’t an argument to say we should use ordinary language, nor is it trying to be “normative” about how we practice seeing; even dry old Austin is inevitably making claims about truth, metaphysics, etc. I did try to explain it here though it’s almost like you have to read the whole huge conversations, as I get something’s wrong and misstated at least initially.

OLP is a movement that believes philosophy must lose its grand metaphysical aspirations in asking such questions "what is truth" and "what is essence" — RussellA

Well OLP is not a movement, nor a belief-system, it’s a method, but Austin is not abandoning either truth, as I discuss here nor is OLP giving up on the essence of things, as I argued in the last paragraph here.

The absence of explicit Ethics in Austin is regrettable — Banno

I agree, though I don’t think it is absent entirely. Part of what I take Austin to be doing is to defend the practice of philosophy, thus, not what we should conclude, but the way we should conduct ourselves. Thus his bristling at the paucity of examples, the manufactured dichotomies, the inattention to detail, the exclusion of our ongoing responsibility, etc. And, although he does not directly alude to this, the import is that, without fixed standards or preset goals, everyone could benefit from such diligence.

@Ludwig V @javi2541997

to defend versions of emotivism elsewhere — Banno

This is how I take Austin’s “How to Do Things With Words”. Of course, with him, he is not so much “defending emotivism” as showing how judging only by the criteria of “true or false” of only “statements” excludes all the other various criteria we have that matter to us with similar importance and consequence, depending on each different practices (and their attendant circumstances), including ethics and aesthetics which positivism explicitly ruled out from being able to be rationally addressed at all (thus emotions, or moral intuition, or some other mysterious process).

@Banno @javi2541997

But-and this is his difficulty-there is no definite and finite set of statements about sense-data entailed by any statement about a 'material thing'.

Austin on Ayer, p, 119

I agree the above doesn’t track, but what I thought was interesting was that Austin does again hint at the fact there are “expectations” (p.119) in a situation (involving anything), and so rather than what Ayer’s classifies as “statements” that I would (or must) make, or that must be the necessary fallout (not sure on this exactly), we are subject to the implications of what type of thing is said or done, qualified non-systematically by the particular circumstances. So, we need not meet a predetermined standard of evidence, nor is there a level and nature to what is “entailed”, but “entailment” and “implication” appear to be in the same ballpark (which may satisfy @Ludwig V’s interest in continuing what “entailment” stands for or does).

it was Apple who invented this keyboard command. — Banno

Window-brain on a Mac at home: thus my shame.

As no method is unbiased, using OLP as a method to investigate the philosophical nature of reality will inevitably come up with a biased answer, an answer biased by the very method being used. — RussellA

OLP proposes to try to reach an unbiased take on each example (not, somehow, generally, entirely), subject to acceptance by you, so also subject to correction, refinement, further cases, additional attention to the circumstances. This focus is to strip away any “bias” as in a hidden agenda or prerequisite, like having a standard or goal ahead of time (like incorrigibility) which is thought only needs to be explained, proven. Instead it examines the lay of the land of what we would agree we would say in a particular circumstance to understand the criteria we use, the implications, the distinctions, etc., in that case, and only then using that data to make any philosophical claims.

On the one hand, the metaphysical problem of sense-data is independent of language, yet on the other hand, the metaphysical problem of sense-data can be discussed within language. — RussellA

I am not talking about the “metaphysical problem” (whether it exists in or out of language, or can or can not be discussed), but the metaphysician’s use of words (knowledge, intent, real, direct, etc.) in comparison to our ordinary use of those words, which reveals how and why metaphysics wants to remove context and generalize only one type of case.

@Banno @Ludwig V @javi2541997

I find Austin a refreshing example of how to productively do philosophy, no matter what the conclusions he comes to; the method is satisfying—the possibility of it (for common ground) is heartening. But when Austin says Ayer & Co “provide the best available expositions of the approved reasons for holding [this position: of the world as, say, hidden]… more full, coherent, and terminologically exact”, I feel like this is a little cagey. He proceeds to tear to pieces what seem clearly strange arguments pieced together like toothpick scaffolding. The only thing I can think is that Austin realized that Ayer throws himself into every part of the position unreservedly, and is detailed and deliberate at every step, however confused. So Austin uses him as a great example of every misstep that metaphysics makes. It’s not that Ayer is a worthy opponent, but that he explicitly hits every touchstone of errors that manifest from the desire for something incorrigible.