An epistemological question

[gerrymanderer]

My simple question regarding the ITOE today deals with a statement, two full paragraphs down from the top on page 66: "From a savage's knowledge of man, which was not much greater than a child's, to the present level... the concept "man" has not changed: it refers to the same kind of entities."

The simple question is this: where does this line of thought sit in the entire Objectivist epistemology? Is it a crucial premise, or an implication of objectivity or some self-evident corollary?

[Grames]

It is crucially important to grasp the fact that a concept is an "open-end" classification which includes the yet-to-be-discovered characteristics of a given group of existents. All of man's knowledge rests on that fact.

The pattern is as follows: when a child grasps the concept "man," the knowledge represented by that concept in his mind consists of perceptual data, such as man's visual appearance, the sound of his voice, etc. When the child learns to differentiate between living entities and inanimate matter, he ascribes a new characteristic, "living," to the entity he designates as "man." When the child learns to differentiate among various types of consciousness, he includes a new characteristic in his concept of man, "rational"—and so on. The implicit principle guiding this process, is: "I know that there exists such an entity as man, I know many of his characteristics, but he has many others which I do not know and must discover." The same principle directs the study of every other kind of perceptually isolated and conceptualized existents.

The same principle directs the accumulation and transmission of mankind's knowledge. From a savage's knowledge of man, which was not much greater than a child's, to the present level, when roughly half the sciences (the humanities) are devoted to the study of man, the concept "man" has not changed: it refers to the same kind of entities. What has changed and grown is the knowledge of these entities. The definitions of concepts may change with the changes in the designation of essential characteristics, and conceptual reclassifications may occur with the growth of knowledge, but these changes are made possible by and do not alter the fact that a concept subsumes all the characteristics of its referents, including the yet-to-be-discovered.

She is explaining how concepts work. The example chosen ("man") could have been something else. Rand's version of concept formation is a critical innovation in Objectivist epistemology, and a central insight. Its status is that of a theory which Rand considered proved. It comes before objectivity in the presention in OPAR.

[softwareNerd]

The simple question is this: where does this line of thought sit in the entire Objectivist epistemology? Is it a crucial premise, or an implication of objectivity or some self-evident corollary?

It is an illustration of an important line of thought. The principle being illustrated is that a concept does not equate with its definition.

We might define man as "rational animal", "social animal" or some more technical biological way that encapsulates the knowledge we have gained about "homo sapiens". However, whatever definition we use, and no matter how different it is from the one used by a savage, the following fact remains true: if he pointed to something walking about and used his term for "man", we would do so to (assuming no errors of misidentification, of course).

In other words, if we were to forget about the definition, and simply point to the things out there in the real world that he calls "man" (or whatever term he uses), then those would be the same entities that we point to. This is what it means for the concept to be the same.

[dubrill]

My simple question regarding the ITOE today deals with a statement, two full paragraphs down from the top on page 66: "From a savage's knowledge of man, which was not much greater than a child's, to the present level... the concept "man" has not changed: it refers to the same kind of entities."

The simple question is this: where does this line of thought sit in the entire Objectivist epistemology? Is it a crucial premise, or an implication of objectivity or some self-evident corollary?

None of the above. The content of a concept is not its definition, but its referents. In that case, a savage's concept of man refers to the same living entity as a civilized European man's concept does, albeit their definition of "man" would be different.

[ruveyn ben yosef]

None of the above. The content of a concept is not its definition, but its referents. In that case, a savage's concept of man refers to the same living entity as a civilized European man's concept does, albeit their definition of "man" would be different.

No, not quite. Concepts have extension and intension. Extension is the set of things that the concept applies to. Intension is the meaning, sense or definition of the concept. Over the course of time extension changes even when intension remains the same. Consider the concept "crow". "Crow" refers to a particular class of birds which changes over time. Old crows die, new crows are hatched. But the definition of the concept "crow" remains.

ruveyn

Edited June 28, 2008 by ruveyn ben yosef

[DavidOdden]

Over the course of time extension changes even when intension remains the same.

That seriously misrepresents extension and concept. The extension of "crow" is not the crows in my room right now, it is all crows. "All crows" is time- and place-invariant.