True, but before no states had abortion bans. It's fine for individual states to get that right, for sure. Sucks bad for those women who can't do much in those 13 states.

If not for the federal ban, then as you say, it is quite progressive in many social aspects, most notably and most importantly, freedom of speech.

That is one area in which the US clearly has the upper hand compared with most other countries. It's an impressive win vs. the state.

Let's hope Trump doesn't squash those freedoms.

I explicitly referred to developed nations. I don't think it makes much sense to compare Germany to Ecuador. You can do so if you want to, but it would be better to compare Germany to France or to Japan.

If you want to compare the US to other countries, then it is most sensible to do so with a Western European countries or Canada. On economic and social issues, the democratic part is to the right of every developed country, so the Democratic party could not run with the platform they have and call themselves "the left".

That's just a fact.

If Roe got re-introduced as law, then you can argue, with some reason that the US is to the left of other countries on social issues.

That's up to people's consideration as to what counts as left or not.

That's my arrogant view.

I risk a reply out of annoyance. But it's best not to waste time with people who believe this

It will be a nightmare.

Lo que nos toca ahora es muy jodido....

I've been reading about it and find myself confused. Even proponents of the EU claim there's a lack of accountability. — frank

Very confusing, Varoufakis and Modi have good books on the EU, but it is a bureaucratic mess. Not all of it is bad by any means, but still, highly perplexing.

Wow.

You are missing the point big time.

Should've expected it.

And ignore the evangelicals at your risk.

Not economically no. Now, or as of the removal of Roe, not even socially. If they manage to get Roe back in, then we can speak about the Democrats being left on world standards.

Of course, the US is not Europe. The US is an outlier in first world countries, failing to provide healthcare as right to everyone, among other scandals.

So yes, the US is to the right of the developed world by these standards. Doesn't mean the people are, but the system is. If you remove comparisons between developed countries, then there is no metric to say what's left or right or anything else.

I mean, for reference, anything to the right of Trump is called "radical left". That's insane.

It's a complex subject. The way it is currently structured is based on a system which basically gives German banks the power to control the value of the Euro based on German elite financial needs.

In an ironic twist, the European Central Bank is worse than the Fed. The only mandate the ECB has is to control inflation. At least the Fed attempts to keep unemployment low as one of its mandates, in addition to controlling inflation.

So yes, it is an Oligarchy - as everywhere else, but it has a very strange dynamic to it.

If they move any further to the left, they would just be centrist or maybe center-right. They would not be left in any European country. Not even the right in Europe would dare privatize health care.

As for Israel, you better be thankful the US donor class "supports" it, because it has no friends left and is a pariah state, for good reason. And your friends those fanatical Evangelicals are the most anti-Semitic of them all

Immediately after your quoted sentence he says:

"It is not new facts about time which we want to know. All the facts that concern us lie open before us."

Let's replace "time" with anything, say a tree or an idea. It is not the case that "all the facts" are open to us, only those facts which we are of aware of at the given time and (crucially) those facts which we may have no access to.

We are limited on our observations about trees relative to the capacity of our senses and the capacity of our cognitive components.

This applies to our mental powers, or mind as well and much else. He is problematizing something like mental mediation here, which is not clear to me what the problem is.

This is an important connection than my merely trying to record the aghast commonly felt at what is seen as removing the self (just, as an object), when he is just following through the categorical error of the ‘strong temptation’ of causality. I would only add that we would be “standing on the outside trying to look in” to ourselves as well if we imagine we can “look into” our own casual object (agent, “self”). Not to move further from the text but to place this in company, the PI will treat the other as opaque and talk of boxes with things hidden, etc. — Antony Nickles

I see him saying that we are not concerned with the "causal connections" here, not that they are a category error. We can discuss this if we want, rather, we are choosing not to do so now.

I would agree that we can't - despite (some of) us wanting - peer more into the nature of the self than something like what Hume describes. In this part, I do agree with the example and the general outlook.

It's a good idea.

But it would go against monied interests, so it can't happen. At least not through Cable News.

The destruction of the Earth's climate? Tax cuts for the super wealthy? Increased hostility towards China, including trade wars?

There is ignorance everywhere. But some of it is quite worse for people at large.

It's a non-trivial matter to distribute culpability here. Clearly, lots of people are gullible and vote against their interests. Yet there is also manifest stupidity and ignorance.

How to make sense of this? For now, answers are pending.

Not a bad reply.

Those are plentiful! Liberals cry about everything. :)

I guess. He kind of did some of this during his last term too.

Well, four more years for them to see everything burn.

That's likely an important element. What % that covers is not entirely clear, but yes, it is a factor.

There are some hints as to why Harris likely lost.

But I don't understand why people think Trump does anything for them.

I don't know what to say, frankly.

That is the prudent thing to do.

But it does not look good in most of those states.

You are technically correct.

Also, I am a total and complete clown. Never take my US political predictions seriously. smh

Welppp. Heh, seems Tobias instincts are very, very good.

You are right, he may well be the winner. For sure.

But beyond a shadow of a doubt, in political philosophy?

That's more than we can know.

Instincts are another matter.

Yes. Very poor sentence, I meant to say, I don't think there are many similarities between Clinton and Harris' situation. The only surprise was turnout for Trump in states assumed to be blue, that went for him.

This time, there is no such complacency in the "blue wall" states. Furthermore, I think that pollsters may for once be over-estimating Trump.

Finally - Selzer's poll aside - it's been a brutal week for Trump.

That is correct. And he could win. It's merely anecdotal and vibes based, which is as good as useless.

But - we are here to talk. EDIT: I think the similarities between Clinton's situation and Harris situation are an exaggeration.

Again, we will see in a few hours.

I don't think Trump will win. And I don't think his stolen claims get as much traction, though tensions will arise, no doubt.

Let's see how my comment ages. My feeling is that he will get trounced in the EC.

Clown on me if I am wrong, as I should deserve it.

Hah!

Well. I am cautiously optimistic. But you can never tell. Hopefully we will be able to see what the heck most pollsters got wrong in assumptions, IF they were wrong, which seems likely given so many .2, .4 and 1% margins.

We will see on Tuesday. But, you made it alive out of that chicken game :)

Oh sure - there are good indications she can win, maybe by a margin which shatters most of the deadlocked polls.

But - it needs to get done and we can't take anything for granted. He *could* win. So, hedge your bets just in case.

It's going to be fascinating to see what all these super tight polls got wrong after the winner is known.

So many margin calls on either side. Selzer's poll was bold if anything, let's see how she stacks up this time. Quite nerve racking honestly...

Yes, but without the flower, judgements about it are meaningless. — Ludwig V

I don't think that's true as a matter of principle.

If we knew enough about the brain, we - the scientists - could stimulate a flower without us - the experimentee - ever having seen one. In this case, the "external object" merely verifies our criteria, the flower itself is not the ground of our judgment (or our asking about it), rather the "red flower" is something which fits our criteria.

I could give you a plastic red flower, indistinguishable from a real red flower, and it would still fit your criteria.

But Wittgenstein's point is that one can bring you a red flower without a visual image. — Ludwig V

I agree, I think it's possible in some cases.

Well, I think you'll find that not everyone interprets that phrase in the same way - especially in philosophy. — Ludwig V

Which is why I said I was a bit surprised to be included in this discussion. I'm well aware I'm quite likely in the minority view.

Nevertheless, Wittgenstein's argument here is ok. I think it's on the right track compared to his earlier views.

Yes, Descartes thought his way through to radical skepticism, but what we are dealing with here is the first part, which is wanting certainty (thinking of the whole world as objects we should be able to “see”, or know, as we do trees, etc.), which is the desire that starts the spinning. — Antony Nickles

Very much so - it is a big problem (certainty). And maybe phrasing it a bit harder that Wittgenstein (so far), certainty (100% no doubts at all) is impossible in the empirical world.

For me "mental image" is just pictorial stuff. The semantic stuff is not inherent in the image, but is the use we make of it. I don't think he denies that there are such things or that we might make use of them. But he does insist that this is only one way that we might find the red flower. — Ludwig V

Well, the most immediate example would be of a blind person asking for a red flower. But then since they can't see, it would be strange for them to ask for a red one, as opposed to just a "flower".

But I asked you to bring me the flower itself. The criteria are only a means to an end. — Ludwig V

And I did. But if I have poor vision, or confused red with pink then you are the one who needs to correct me, right? So, I give you the pink flower, you see the flower and judge it not to be red. It is your judgment of your perception triggered by the flower that corrects my mistake.

The flower is the stimulus, but without judgments ascertaining if what I gave you is correct, then the flower is quite useless.

"Have in mind" is a problematic phrase in this context. Let's say "it is not what you asked me to bring you." The blue flower that I bring you is not a problem in itself. But there is a problem with it in the context of your request to me. It's true that my interpretation of your request is a misinterpretation. Is that what you mean? — Ludwig V

To be clear I do believe in mental content and am a quite fanatical innatist and ardent believer in innate ideas. I am quite skeptical of "externalism" in most areas in philosophy.

I was somewhat surprised to be invited to discuss this, but it is welcome.

So, I don't find the phrase "have in mind" to be particularly problematic in the least.

You can interpret what you say in that manner if you wish, no problems at all from my part.

More than that, there seems to be no guarantee that I have the right mental image or that I do not misinterpret the mental image that I do have. Whatever is going on in my mind, the test is whether I get it right and come up with the red flower I was asked for - and that is not settled in my mind. — Ludwig V

The point is that it is not entirely clear to me what the term "mental image" encapsulates. I don't know if it includes solely pictorial stuff, or if it includes semantic terms as well. I suspect it does play a role.

That last part "and that is not settled in my mind." is tricky. Sure, it's possible that I might bring you a flower that does not match the "red flower" you asked for.

But what actually settles the issue in this case are the criteria you asked for, not the flower itself.

If the flower I give you does not satisfy the conditions you have, then it does not match what you have in mind. The problem is not in the object, but our interpretation of it.

The “queer”-ness is that the nature of the issue has gotten twisted (to have necessity), so the kind of solution (like an object) creates a strange magic that must happen. Imagine “understanding” not as an agreement that allows us to carry on (with someone), but as an epiphany that happens inside your brain when you “know” what they know (the “object” of their understanding), then explaining that seems “queer” (as some modern neuroscience tries to). — Antony Nickles

It seems like a natural(ish) way of thinking about this, assuming necessity, because in ordinary talk, why would it seem different?

People won't even think of necessity, but as soon as you ask them what is a tree?, or what is a car?, they will insist it's those things they can point to.

But once you think about this a bit more carefully, I think you discover, that no necessity is involved.

He's pointing out that whatever is in our minds, it can't do what philosophers have supposed it does. There's a moment of arm-waving and hocus-pocus when we are told that a mental image tells us which flowers are red or an internal map that we follow when we are going to the shops. Whether the image is mental or physical, it has to be read - interpreted. That's his target. — Ludwig V

It's hard to parse out, there is a lot of stuff going on when we speak about a "red flower", which includes not only the words, but the word order, any mental associations we may specifically have, assuming that what is asked for is a "real red flower" as opposed to a "plastic red flower", if you don't know the language and someone asks you for a red flower, you could end up buying a brand that is spelled "red flower", and on and on.

In short, there is a lot going on, and it is not evident to me that mental images don't play an important role. Also, what "mental images" specifically covers can be subtle.

"doesn't mean that the word's meaning isn't of the world."

Not sure I follow. We construct the word, based on stimuli given by objects. We name it something, "apple". Is our word referring to what that stimulus is in the world (photons, reflection and absorption of light, etc.) or are we referring to the object?

We are referring to the object usually. Is the object part of the world? Parts of it, sure - other parts are constructions. It's not trivial to tease these apart for me.

we can think of words as already of the world, as practices engaging interactively with it. — Joshs

How does that account for differences in how languages have very different sounding, looking, written words for the same object?

The word varies, the object does not.

I am not reading it as closely as you are, I am reading, but somewhat more akin to a hard novel than a proper reading of a philosopher due to having to save that mental energy for other material. So, take my comments with a grain of salt, or several of them.

As I read what he is saying, it's that we likely make a mistake when we take a word to necessarily refer or signify necessarily to an object of some kind.

There seems to be a lack of necessity between our using words like "red", "book" and so on, and assuming there has to be something in the world which is "captured" by these words. But we seem to act as if this does happen; that a "book" is necessarily means that thing made of think wooden pulp with letter in it.

If this is part of what he is saying, then I think that's correct.

What's unclear to me is why this would be particularly "queer", to think or use some mental process of some kind. I say this because it's just as queer to think that we need mental content as to say that we don't need it, or that we can see the world without eyes, and rely on echolocation instead.

In short, anything I can think is bound to be "queer" by those standards. And in a sense, it is queer.

But I would point out that there actually is a way to how identifying and naming objects works, and that is word—thing (flower; though yes the word is not the flower), but that is exactly why we want it to work that way in every case. — Antony Nickles

Is this a factual claim?

(in each of the above pencil cases, they are NOT “ostensibly the same thing”, though the words are). Though, of course, if the circumstances are looser, you still play some part: in identifying a banjo or grouping it as a general string instrument (p.2 (though not in interpreting what identifying is, or how it goes wrong). — Antony Nickles

Yes, in the example he uses, different aspects of a pencil are being examined or looked at.

But when I say, “THIS is a pencil” after you show me your new mechanical pencil, and as I bring out what I take to be the ultimate pencil, you may take this as condescending or true, but how are the underlying facts and how this situation does what it does here dependent on us? — Antony Nickles

I take it that pencils don't exist in the extra-mental world. So, if I show you a mechanical pencil or you show me an ultimate pencil, the issue remains similar to my mind, we are speaking about pencils.

What he is saying is that the image could be mental or physical, like a patch of the color. That the physical patch of color serves the same purpose as the “mental” image of color (that it is mental is inessential). — Antony Nickles

I am not seeing the difference in terms of mental or physical terms. If the framework is presented as ostensive vs non-ostensive, then that makes sense.

Also, it is this wanting to be “sure” at all times that you express which Witt is saying creates the need for the object (fears its “lack”). — Antony Nickles

This is fine. I think he is correct if he is arguing that this "certainty" cannot be attained, which is what I think he is getting at.

He is not “removing” mental content; he is beginning to show that we unnecessarily picture it in the framework of an object (as a thing we can be as sure of as seeing a flower), while pointing out there is a larger, pre-existing world out there than us, and also picking at the feeling that we must have it or we “lack” something, which he says later turns into something we feel we “cannot” do. — Antony Nickles

I look forward to that part. It sounds like a critique of the given in experience, which I agree with and makes sense.

I'm doing this to show an actual involvement, to not lazy my way out of at least some of this.

1) I am foggy brained right now but will attempt to reply to what I think is interesting.

2) I am assuming that the pages you mentioned are the ones that show up in the document you shared.

First, a comment on a few things you said, then a quote I take form him, to see what I end up with.

One other point is his discussion of method, which a lot of this book introduces and explains. He says we can be “cured” of the temptation (to need objectivity) by “studying the grammar [ workings ] of the [ an ]expression”. As if, when we saw each things’ different rationality, we would let go of the desire to impose the framework (and standard) of an object. — Antony Nickles

My question is, who is the one who is looking for this "objectivity"? Philosophers? Ordinary people?

Maybe if someone holds on to a variety of a referential doctrine in which a word "flower" literally "means" that thing we see in our garden, then I can see his point of this being a misleading way of thinking about words.

Do ordinary people think this? It's not clear to me.

He calls them here “interpretations”, not meant as ‘perceived’ differently, but taken to apply to a different context, under the associated kinds of facts that matter (to the related criterion) in that circumstance.

The already-established associations (criteria, practices) are the reason why we do not usually make a separate decision (unless and until we do; his example: “interpreting before obeying” (p.3)). The example of getting the red flower is evidence that with “the usual way” we don’t have any reason to deviate from or reflect on our life-long patterns (like searching, and matching colors), as we do in politics, and philosophy. — Antony Nickles

If you have a different interpretation of what is ostensibly the same thing, say, these words you are reading right now, or maybe the crying tree outside my window, how is this not a different perception?

I don't see a difference between interpretation and perception, in so far as differing interpretations lead to different perceptions.

This is how I am reading you now and is just to see if we are on similar pages of thought or not.

Ok, on to what he says that I find interesting:

" ... he went to look for a red flower carrying a red image in his mind, and comparing it with the flowers to see which of them had the colour of the image. Now there is such a way of searching, and it is not at all essential that the image we use should be a mental one. ...

[an option is] ...We go, look about us, walk up to a flower and pick it, without comparing it to anything. To see that the process of obeying the order can be of this kind, consider the order "imagine a red patch". You are not tempted in this case to think that before obeying you must have imagined a red patch to serve you as a pattern for the red patch which you were ordered to imagine."

Not essential, the image? Hmmm. Perhaps it is not this way exactly. It's not as if "red flower" produces an extremely intense red image in my mind. It's relatively weak (in terms of intensity at this moment), but if I lacked it, I'm not sure I'd get a "red" flower, rather than some other flower (yellow, blue, etc.).

Yes, we can go in a non-reflexive mode, as we do when we get into a routine in which we do things without explicit thinking, and here you can do all kinds of things. But I think these are moments in which we are already familiar with what we are doing. If I get a red flower without explicitly thinking about the red, then in all likelihood I did it unconsciously, because I am accustomed to getting red flowers all the time.

I can't see removing all mental content being useful here at all, IF that's even what the issue may be.

I'll do better next time.

Which is fine. But the task is to say what is unique to physical stuff alone, which cannot include mind.

The problem is in arguing why the physical cannot be mental without it turning into stipulation: the physical is not mental because physical stuff cannot be mental stuff.

You'd have to show how this could be possible. That's the problem. And it's far from trivial.

But OK, please let me know what you think of this baby step. Even if so called concrete things turn out to be other than as they appear, perhaps also evasive, etc. Are they not yet, all of them together, bodies, trees, oceans, and rocks, something physics explores differently than it does the ideas which appear to shape our experiences and are not constructed out of matter. I get that we have dreamed that they might be, but if we are being fair, a thought might require matter to generate it, but once projected and gone, it is gone. Because it never really was. — ENOAH

Physics does not explore oceans, trees, rocks, that belongs to oceanography, arborists and geologists respectively. If we are going to use physics in applied form, then we do an abstraction to apply it to things like rocks. Ocean movement and trees are way too complicated for physics.

We can't use physics to study ideas. That's in part because these are different domains: physicists study the simplest things and ask difficult questions about these. Ideas or at least, the consequence of some ideas might fall on the psychologist, even though they deal with behavior, strictly speaking.

The issue is: are our ideas different in kind to the nature of the stuff physics says there is?

Here I am probably and outlier. Physics tell us a bit about the structure of matter but leaves its intrinsic nature untouched.

I think we just don't know enough about the nature of matter in general to say conclusively if there is a difference in kind between our ideas and physics or not.

Not I think therefore I am, but rather it thinks therefore it exists...but what is it? Whereas body lives, therefore it is. The latter can at least be shared with the rest of the universe. It is this oddity, Mind, that only humans seem to have, and that has 'fooled' us 'narcissistically, into wanting it to be special, more real, the being within the being etc — ENOAH

Ok. So, it's kind of like trying to push down or put into context that in having minds, we are not "extra special" and so those features of the world that lack mind - which you are calling body - are "me", more so than this mysterious mind, which is misleading.

You can say that I would only note that you are mentalizing the body with properties which are not clear it could possess absent minds - me-ness and being "central".

I would add that it is very far from evident if we can say that the stuff physics describes "bodies" of being made up of, fundamental particles and quantum phenomenon are like or unlike minds. It's very obscure, and I don't think it's a trivial answer (if one can even be given at all).

Because there is no language accessible to precisely express the point, these metaphors might be helpful, although also tricky.

In my metaphor Mind doesn't point, it's the finger (body) which points. Mind isn't even the thing it is pointing to. Mind is the direction in which it is pointing. That is how mind is empty. And in that sense is the body 'more' real. The finger is more real than the direction in which it is pointing. — ENOAH

Yep, it is hard to talk about this stuff, for sure. Here's how I see it, I don't think it's true to say that "fingers point", because they don't. People point, using fingers and many other gestures. A pointing finger absent an interpreter like us, is quite meaningless, so far as I can see.

Ah, ok, so the finger is "more real" because a kind of more "concrete" feeling, as bodies appear to have.

Well, I'd say that "concrete things", things that can be touched with our hands, are almost absent in the universe, especially if you consider how many things exists which we cannot touch, which is almost everything.

The issue is that body is being treated here as if you are attempting to give properties to bodies which belong to them, independent of what we attribute to them (nervous system, synapses, etc.) and somehow saying that this makes it "more real" or more concrete or something along these lines.

I'm not sure what this amounts to. A body being more real than mind is a sentence I can't make sense of.

As for the mind being an empty thing, something that merely points, I don't think this is factually true. That is, the very fact that it even points to something is already an activity the mind has. So, it can't be empty in this way.

I suppose the question to ask would be, what are you attempting to prove or what would be advanced or made clearer by supposing that body and mind are so different?

Isn't that inescapably the case? Some adopted by convention for various reasons, including, as you say, proof; some fringe applications of the terminology, and not adopted. That is a mammoth question, I know. My point brings me back to what is the body? Not a thing to best access with knowledge, but rather the thing we are [isolated from knowledge]. — ENOAH

We could, if we so choose, go back and use Descartes definition of body, which is extended substance. And mind would be non-extended.

The problem is that we now know that a body is not an extended substance, it no longer holds.

What should be done is to say which are properties unique to bodies and how these properties cannot be mental in any way. Then you could have an argument.

Incidentally, this is for philosophy. In ordinary talk, when we are talking to other real-life people, we use "body" and "mind" rather loosely, but it serves the purposes of the everyday.

That's not what we are doing here, which is being technical and trying to get at what a body is. As I've said, I don't think we know what it is.

That would have to be proved, not stipulated.

Or you can make the terminological choice of putting things this way, which is fine.