Vik
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Posts posted by Vik
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I have finished reading this article http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/Supreme_Cou...ory?id=10770402 and I have a question about the proper resolution to this conflict. The conflict should be resolved by property rights (the owner would decide who to let on their property or not). So this is another example of how public property works to destroy our other rights? I am assuming that cemetaries are public property.
David McBride
``Now, all but two state attorneys general have signed a "friend of the court" brief, to be filed tomorrow, that argues the First Amendment should not apply to some "intrusive and harassing" forms of expression.``
This seems to package speech/assembly against the government with speech/assembly against private citizens. That would be a scary precedent.
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"What is knowledge? And what is study, what is observation? It's the discovery of properties in the nature of certain objects, existents, entities. All knowledge consists of learning more and more about the nature - the properties and characteristics - of given objects."
~Ayn Rand, ITOE, pg. 298
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Yes, probably not a good idea to do this, yes?
I'm having a hard time arguing with a Christian. I recognize the fallacies, but I can't really identify what exactly they are. It's regarding DADT.
1. His first argument is that if it shouldn't be a problem to let gays openly serve in the showers, then it shouldn't be a problem to intergrate men and women in the showers. It sounded like a straw man, except I don't think that's quite the accurate term for it. Is there a definition for a fallacy of "If it's okay to take action X, then why isn't okay to take action Y"?
I accused him of making a question-begging analogy. I argued that it doesn't make
2. He says that his anecdotal evidence is empirical evidence. I told him that no, his evidence was not empirical. He argues that empirical evidence, by definition, is based on sensory perception. He referred to it as "his own empirical evidence".
3. When I used a Zogby statistic stating that 73% of soldiers would not mind serving with homosexuals, he claims that's "anecdotal". I told him no, it wasn't anecdotal. He askes me "Why is my polling of the military personnel I know any different than from the polling that Zogby did?". I am about to argue that Zolgby did a national study, and he just studied a few people.
1. The error is called "integration by non-essentials".
2. Some forms of empirical evidence are better than others. The individual in question is correct that anecdotal evidence is perceptual-concrete evidence BUT does not grasp that statistically rigorous evidence is better.
3. I suggest education, such as the meaning and use of sample size, margin of error, and the like.
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If "the thing" you're referring to is human beings, then I agree. But all non-volitional action is predetermined by past actions and the entities that perform them.
Predetermination means that every action is causally determined by the past environment.
This view cannot be reconciled with the Objectivist concept of causality, which is identity-based.
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He is a moral intrinsicist, which puts him rather squarely at odds with Objectivism. I don't really understand his epistemology's response to Gettier problems, but on the face of it it does seem plausibly close to the Objectivist "product of grasping the relation between proposition and reality" perspective. The question of "at all" compatibility is not meaningful, since it's impossible to find a philosophy which entirely denies all tenets of Objectivism in toto. His intrinsicist morality is enough to undermine his entire ethics and politics, even if he has the correct particular view of the state.
There are problems with his epistemology too:
1) his reliance on the concept of invariance
2) his notion of "objective facts"
3) his view on truth, especially his discussion of "contingency" and "the Least Arbitrary Theory"
I will address only the first two as the third is merely a variation of the analytic-synthetic dichotomy. For those who don't know, the analytic-synthetic dichotomy was addressed by Leonard Peikoff in the Introduction to Objectivst Epistemology.
But onto Nozick's epistemology...
(1) his reliance on the concept of invariance
"A property or relationship is objective when it is invariant under appropriate transformations"
~Robert Nozick, Invariance, pg. 79
The language makes me think of "invariance under Lorentz transformations". Nozick even brings up the Lorentz transformations. However, Nozick's invariance has nothing do with trying to formulate a law that applies across certain measurable dimensions.
Furthermore, it is very difficult to identify all the factors that an equation will "survive". Who is to say that we haven't overlooked something? Consider the history of the gas laws. Effectively, he ends up demanding omniscience.
But let's suppose he's merely drawing a very loose analogy and didn't tell us.
Fine. I'll just move onto his characteristization of "objective facts" .
(2) his notion of "objective facts"
"An objective fact is accessible from different angles, there is or can be intersubjective agreement about it, and it holds independently of our beliefs, desires, and observations. It is because an objective fact is invariant under specified transformation that it has these three traits."
~pg. 90
Let's look at the first characteristic:
"An objective fact is accessible from different angles. Access to it can be repeated by the same sense (sight, touch, etc) at different times; it can be repeated by different senses of the same observer"
~pg. 75
Repeatability is nice--if samples are available. Some sciences deal with things that CANNOT be repeated. Consider chemical tests that destroy original samples.
As for "different senses", what on earth justifies the idea that facts MUST be accessible by multiple senses?? Do I have to HEAR color as well as see it? Surely not. But then what does he mean? Maybe he believes that data from multiple senses makes the belief more objective.
But let's look at the second one:
"Intersubjective agreement can be taken as evidence for objectiveness. Different people agree because there is an objective fact that they have access to, and they agree n the results of that access. But there can be intersubjective agreement without an objective fact--everyone else in Salem thinks she is a witch--and there can be objective facts without intersubjective agreement."
~pg. 90-91
"We need to find an objectiveness property such that we can see (at least sketchily) HOW that property produces (or tends to produce) intersubjective agreement"
~pg. 91
If he were just saying that invariance explains agreement, I would be fine with it. But he speaks of "evidence for objectiveness" and invokes the practice of hypothesizing causation.
His third characteristic of "objective facts":
"it holds independently of our beliefs, desires, and observations.
His third characteristic sounds like the Objectivist recognition of the supremacy of reality.
But then elsewhere in the book he says:
"An objective view of things is valuable, but it is not always what is needed or what will serve us best"
So much for Nozick's alleged respect for reality!
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Predestination is the result of failing to apply the Law of Identity to action.
Predestination makes the following argument:
1. Certain things interacted with X.
2. After that, X does action A.
Therefore, the factors caused action A.
First, this is an instance of the post hoc fallacy.
Second, it ignores the thing performing the action.
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"The universe is the total of that which exists" - Leonard Peikoff
"Nature is existence—the sum of that which is." - Leonard Peikoff
Existence is the sum of all existents.
Are they synonymous? And in what context do I use each of them?
"Universe" has a very specific meaning in the sciences. I strongly suggest you avoid it. As an alternative, I propose "totality".
"Nature" has to do with the sum of everything as a system of interconnected parts.
"Existence and identity are not attributes of existents, they are the existents . . . . The units of the concepts “existence” and “identity” are every entity, attribute, action, event or phenomenon (including consciousness) that exists, has ever existed or will ever exist."
~Ayn Rand, ITOE 74
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No, I am referring to the practice of translating sentences into some kind of symbolic notation, so as to remove those aspects of the sentence that give you a 1-to-many relationship between sentences and propositions. That would include some visually-obvious notation that highlights the difference between the meaning of "the dog" in the sentences "The dog is a coward" (a specific dog and there is shared knowledge of the referent) versus "The dog is a mammal" (a universal statement). This leads to traditional formulations like "∀x(D(x)
M(x))" for universal dog statements. The implication of this, though, is that in addition to the natural language(s) that we know and learn as children, there is an underlying metalinguistic "language" for symbolic logic that we also know but didn't have to learn, and that meanings are expressed in this underlying metalanguage. Of course that idea is indefensible. I just do not know what conceptual / symbolic form such propositional knowledge takes. It would surely be related to examples of concepts, the logic of reducing a concept to referents, a statement of measurements omitted, but it isn't the same as that.You mean how we use certain words to narrow the scope of a phrase so that we can classify the sentence, given a set of alternatives:
A specific thing exists.
There exist members of a class.
A specific unit has an attribute.
Members of a class have an attribute.
A specific thing is a member of a wider category.
A class is a subcategory of a wider category.
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Entity and object are synonyms.
In the context of "entity-action-object", the word "object" was used to distinguish things appearing in a predicate from things appearing in a subject, as the subject is what unifies predicates.
If you're talking about physical existents, the concept of "object" is a species of the concept "entity"
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On the one hand, it’s convenient to use some kind of formal calculus for presenting propositions, but on the other hand the integration of conceptual content (where there is something more to propositions like “cats meow” than simply writing words in capital letters) is basically ignored in such an approach, where equating propositions and natural language sentences seems more satisfactory.
Are you referring to things like:
* examples of the concept
* reduction of a concept to its referents in reality
* chain (or tree) of abstractions down to the perceptual level
* list of measurements that have been omitted
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The concept of "action" is compatible with the concept of "entity" in the sense that actions are performed by entities.
Propositions assert or deny that juxtapositions of "compatible" concepts have correspondence.
Their truth depends on both that correspondence AND whether the concepts were defined in terms of essentials
What do you think?
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what I am still working through in my mind is the exact cognitive ontology of a proposition (i.e. “what is semantics really about”). On the one hand, it’s convenient to use some kind of formal calculus for presenting propositions, but on the other hand the integration of conceptual content (where there is something more to propositions like “cats meow” than simply writing words in capital letters) is basically ignored in such an approach, where equating propositions and natural language sentences seems more satisfactory.
We know that a subject specifies an existent or set of units under consideration.
We also know that a predicate has to be compatible with the nature of the units specified in the subject. Consider:
"Cats meow" asserts that a certain type of action is part of the nature of certain units capable of action.
"Cats make arguments" is a false proposition because it specifies an action that is not within the nature of the units specified by the subject.
"Cats with sufficiently large wings fly" is arbitrary because it's unwarranted. But it qualifies as a proposition because the genus of flying is action and animals are certainly capable of action.
"Whiskers flood vigorously" satisfies the rules of grammar but the genii of the concepts are incompatible.
As for language seeming more satisfactory, I think the satisfaction we get stems from the fact that language enables us to think more clearly and more quickly. Specification of units means clarity of subject and speed of accessing conceptual content. It is very difficult to capture the features of a thing when the thing itself hasn't been clearly differentiated.
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“Idea” is very broad and includes things that are not fully-formed assertions. “Proposition” is much narrower. The relevance is to understand the logical relationship between concepts.
As for the others, I’m hoping to avoid endless tail-chasing. So if a proposition is a kind of statement, I first need to know what a statement is. If a statement is a kind of “meaningful declaration” then I need to know first what a “declaration” is. Is a “statement” a species of “sentence”? My opinion is that the distinction between “statement” and “proposition” is not necessary, in fact under your definition, they refer to exactly the same things. The difference that you seem to be suggesting is that with a statement you can declare something without that something being a fact or the opposite of a fact, but with a proposition I suppose you must be requiring there to be a declaration of fact / non-fact. If that is what you mean, I think that is wrong: the concept “declare” entails “declare to be the case”. If a person makes the statement “My coffee cup wrote a symphony”, he’s declaring it to be the case that an inanimate object did something that only man can do, so he has made a false statement. Once you declare something (as opposed to command something or ask something), that something either does describe a fact in which case it is true, or it does not describe a fact in which case it is false.
One crucial distinction between “sentence” and “proposition” is that propositions declare and sentences declare and other things. Declaring includes “declaring to be false” hence “assert or deny” is already entailed by defining a proposition as a declaration. However, there is something significantly missing between sentence and proposition, namely referential binding. The sentence “My brother did that last week” maps to zillions of separate propositions, depending on what referent you bind to “me”, “brother”, “that”, and “last week”. This is why sentences themselves cannot be said to be the bearers of truth. In a context, you may be able to associate the words to specific referents and determine the proposition being asserted, or maybe not, in which case there are multiple propositions that might be intended (from the listener’s “decoding” perspective; but probably not from the speaker’s perspective).
So the problem is that if a proposition is a kind of sentence, it doesn’t necessarily have the requisite property of proposition of having a truth value (because terms may have multiple referents). But we clearly want propositions to have truth values.
Another problem with taking propositions to be actual linguistic forms (i.e. sentences) is that it makes it impossible to talk usefully about synonymy, the fact that many sentences can express a single proposition and describe the same fact of reality. An example is “The cat scratched the sofa”, “The cat scratched the davenport” and “The cat scratched the couch”. These three sentences express the same proposition, and it is a mere linguistic detail that that proposition can map to three (or more) different sentences.
The idea of "likeness"
The idea of "field lines".
The idea of light as EM propagation.
Would you say an "idea" is what you have before you form a proper concept or proposition?
As for the genus of propositions:
I'm not taking propositions to be linguistic forms. After all, concept aren't merely symbols associated with arbitrary collections.
I meant something else by "declaration" but I can't think of a suitable example.
I'll drop "statement" and get at the genus of propositions indirectly.
Concepts integrate units. Every concept implies a set of units. Some of those units are different from the others. They are distinguished by certain measurements that were omitted during the process of concept-formation.
A particular cat can be viewed as a unit in the set of cats.
A particular sofa can be viewed as a unit in the set of sofas.
A particular action of scratching can be viewed as a unit as well.
These units can be "mentally juxtaposed" in several ways. However, the nature of the existents and actions conceptualized determine the validity of such juxtapositions. Actions are done by entities. It isn't in the nature of sofas to run up to a cat and scratch it. That sort of thing.
Also, we aren't talking about scratching as such. We're talking about a specific scratching happening relative to the present. We are specifying the time of the scratching.
"The cat scratched the sofa" asserts that the conceived event actually took place.
It alleges that a particular entity performed a certain type of action on another, different kind of entity.
We conceived of an entity-action-object relationship, and we asserted that it actually took place.
"The sofa was scratched by the cat" focuses on the cause of a state of the sofa.
We conceived of an object-acted-on-by-entity relationship, and we asserted that it actually took place.
So a proposition involves asserting or denying that a relationship among certain units holds for their respective identities.
(Again, I don't have a word to designate the genus of propositions, but I know very well that it isn't a linguistic form)
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It is best to start by grasping the meanings of the basic terms, for example "statement", "proposition", "sentence", also "idea", "concept" to determine what they have in common and especially where they differ.
I can see the need for distinguishing most of those, but I'm not sure about "idea". What's the relevance here?
Moving onto the others.
A "proposition" is a statement that asserts or denies a predication of a subject.
A "statement" is any meaningful declaration--including opinions not intended to be either true or false.
A "sentence" is any series of words that can be interpreted by a language-capable brain to express something. They can be declarations, questions, commands, exclamations for conveying emotions, etc.
"True", "warranted" (vs "arbitrary"), "possible", and "provable" apply to propositions, but they aren't applicable to just any statement.
"Warranted" and "possible" designate assessments about the evidence for a conclusion. There is no such thing as a warranted but impossible proposition. Nor is there such a thing as a provable but unwarranted proposition.
Suppose a light, wooden board hangs off the edge of a table. If an object of sufficient weight goes across the board a sufficient distance, the board will flip. Suppose a mouse is scurrying across the board. We don't know the weight of the mouse. It's possible that the board will flip, but it's arbitrary to say that it will. The lack of evidence means "arbitrary". But such an event is within the nature of what we know of boards and masses. It is possible.
"Provable" designates a judgment about the conditions for drawing a conclusion, given the nature of that conclusion and the channels of information available. If we know the mass of the mouse and the length of the board, including the overhang, we can calculate whether the board WILL flip. THAT proposition is provable.
The following morning, we find the board on the floor. The mouse is nowhere to be found.
It is possible that the mouse flipped the board.
It is warranted that the mouse flipped the board.
But unless we have evidence that the mouse reached a location that WOULD flip the board, it is not provable that the mouse flipped the board.
So warranted propositions aren't necessarily provable.
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I believe because abduction refers to an early step in hypothesizing, namely, generating a pile of hypotheses. When you have narrowed down the field to a favored theory (and presumably an alternative) they you would say "I hypothesize that X", which has a more definite commitment to it.
I haven't seen that concept of "hypothesis" used anywhere else. I'd like to hear more about it.
I've always heard "hypothesis" used more generally, along the lines of "testable proposition held with uncertainty"
This is distinct from "postulate", which is a "proposition taken as a starting point, as if it were true, for the sake of demonstrating other propositions"
Sometimes, the same proposition serves both functions. For example, the invariance of the speed of light is a hypothesis insofar as it makes predictions. But it's a postulate in the sense of being a foundational proposition in the theory of Special Relativity.
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Truth, warrant, possibility, certainty and provability are not attributes, they are reifications of the attributes true, warranted, possible, certain and provable. Those are all properties of propositions. Same with arbitrary. The concept "proposition" is sufficiently high order that I think one can safely say that that is what can be true, certain etc. and then any further refinement reduces to identifying a species of proposition.
There are vast numbers of attributes of propositions.
It is best to start by grasping the meanings of the basic terms, for example "statement", "proposition", "sentence", also "idea", "concept" to determine what they have in common and especially where they differ.
"length" is an attribute, but we don't say "lengthed" or "lengthable".
"weight" is an attribute, so is "weighted", but not "weightable"
Hm... what's different about the concepts I mentioned...
Is it because they have to do with relationships between consciousness and existence while "length" and "weight" designate relationships that do not depend on consciousness?
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also i think an operationalized definition of propositions for the purpose of applying these concepts would be very helpful.
What do you mean by "operationalized"?
By "proposition", I mean a statement that alleges or denies the existence of a conceived state of affairs.
"...the function of a proposition is similar to that of an equation: it applies conceptual abstractions to a specific problem"
ITOE pg75
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I'm not sure what you're trying to find out here. A list of adjectives that can be legitimately applied to propositions? What purpose would that serve? Why do you want one?
They're part of a longer list and a more complicated method for spot-checking my conclusions and evaluating the conclusions of others. But my method isn't rigorous. I think that improving my understanding of them will help me in that at regard.
The Objectivist literature has a lot on concepts but very little on propositions. I am even aware of certain "conceptual fallacies" that Rand points out in the works of others, as appears in The Marginalia. I should post something about that too actually.
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I'm claiming that the following concepts (among other attributes) are applicable to propositions:
1) truth
2) warrant
3) possibility
4) certainty
5) provability
For reference:
"Truth" appears in Galt's speech; ITOE pg63, 65, 136, 150; PWNI pg14
"Arbitrary" appears in ITOE pg110
"Possible" appears in LP's lectures and LP's analytic-synthetic essay
"Certainty" appears in LP's lectures and PWNI pg14
"Proof" and "prove" appear in Galt's speech; "prove" appears in ITOE pg73
3 questions:
Q1: Are these concepts in fact applicable to propositions?
Q2: If so, are there any others that Objectivists have commented on?
Q3: Is there a better way to think about propositions?
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"True" and "truth" are not interchangeable.
Would you say that "true" designates a recognized correspondence to reality?
Would you say that "truth" designates an identification of fact?
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Perception is a non-propositional justification of some facts and non-propositional identification of some truths.
It is a contradiction to consider any fact to be untrue. You were in error if what you thought was certain turns out not to be so.
Perception justifies propositions.
Facts simply are.
Truth is the product of an assessment about the factuality of a proposition.
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All truths of which one is certain are facts, but not all facts are true. Truth (the propositional grasp of fact by a rational consciousness) requires validation by such a consciousness.
What do you think?
Are we talking about Rand's concepts, different concepts, or are you fishing for our understanding of the concepts?
Here is Rand's concept of "truth":
"Truth is the product of the recognition (i.e., identification) of the facts of reality. Man identifies and integrates the facts of reality by means of concepts. He retains concepts in his mind by means of definitions. He organizes concepts into propositions—and the truth or falsehood of his propositions rests, not only on their relation to the facts he asserts, but also on the truth or falsehood of the definitions of the concepts he uses to assert them, which rests on the truth or falsehood of his designations of essential characteristics."
(Ayn Rand, Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, p.63)
And here is Rand's concept of "fact":
"A fact is merely a way of saying "This is something which exists in reality" -- as distinguished from imagination or misconception or error. So you could say "That the American Revolution took place is a fact", or "That George Washington existed is a fact". In the first case you refer to an enormously complex series of events over a period of years. In the second case you refer to just one individual. Both are facts."
Ayn Rand, Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, pg 242
"...when we say something is a fact, we distinguish primarily from error, lie or any aberration of consciousness. And it serves another function: it delimits the concept "existence" or "reality".
Ayn Rand, Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, pg 243
When I plug those into your post, I conclude the following:
1) The clause "of which one is certain" is redundant. If a proposition is true, it's factual.
2) Truth-hood must indeed be assessed, but I wouldn't call it "validation". "Valid" means that a mental product was formed in such a way that it is related to the facts of reality. Truth-hood, however, has to do with correspondence.
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One accounts for those concepts because individuals have the ability to abstract attributes from one entity and combine them with abstracted attributes of other entities.
Also, the ability to specify quantities that were never measured.
Cows jumping over moons come to mind.
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Hume's problem of induction in part states that we need to use induction in order to validate induction as a correct method of reasoning. Is this problem actually not a problem at all? Is induction an axiomatic concept that does not require validation/?
Induction is a prerequisite for all validation.
The process behind induction must be identified, not "validated".
Since you already have a theory of concepts, your next step is to understand propositions and the process that gives rise to them.
Then you need to identify the process that produces a descriptive statement.
Finally, you identify the process that produces a descriptive generalization, i.e. one that accounts for several descriptive statements.
A question about Free Speech and Property Rights
in Political Philosophy
Posted
I know of the following exceptions to freedom of assembly:
In order to determine whether there are any others that can be put into place without infringing on the right of assembly, it will be necessary to identify the similarities among these exceptions.