Hi Bruno Marchal
Yes, Hume was complaining about slipping modal logic into an argument.
There are indeed some similarities between Hume and van Quine. Hume
was an empiricist while van Quine sxeems to me at l,east to have been a
pragmatist.
Bother woirk from the particular to the general. Theory schmeery.
Roger , rclo...@verizon.net
8/20/2012
Leibniz would say, "If there's no God, we'd have to invent him so everything
could function."
----- Receiving the following content -----
From: Bruno Marchal
Receiver: everything-list
Time: 2012-08-19, 05:56:54
Subject: Re: On comp and the is-ought problem of Hume
On 18 Aug 2012, at 17:08, Roger wrote:
Hi Bruno Marchal
This is probably just my ignorance of what comp is, but there seems to
be a discrepancy between comp, which fits with Plato or Platonism,
and real life, which actually fits more with Aristotle. Plato is
"ought to be" and Aristotle is "is in fact".
You are right. Aristotle is intuitive, and Plato is counter-intuitive.
There is a troubling dualism between the two, that while we live in the
Kingdom of Earth, we strive for the Kingdom of Heaven
("thy Kingdom come.).
This is unreconciliable dualism Hume pointed out between
"is" and "should be". He said he knew of no way to go from
"is" to "should be". Hume is a great prose stylist and thinker
so ihe's worth quoting:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Is%E2%80%93ought_problem
Hume discusses the problem in book III, part I, section I of his work, A
Treatise of Human Nature (1739):
In every system of morality, which I have hitherto met with, I have always
remarked, that the author proceeds for some time in the ordinary ways of
reasoning, and establishes the being of a God, or makes observations concerning
human affairs; when all of a sudden I am surprised to find, that instead of the
usual copulations of propositions, is, and is not, I meet with no proposition
that is not connected with an ought, or an ought not. This change is
imperceptible; but is however, of the last consequence. For as this ought, or
ought not, expresses some new relation or affirmation, 'tis necessary that it
should be observed and explained; and at the same time that a reason should be
given; for what seems altogether inconceivable, how this new relation can be a
deduction from others, which are entirely different from it. But as authors do
not commonly use this precaution, I shall presume to recommend it to the
readers; and am persuaded, that this small attention would subvert all the
vulgar systems of morality, and let us see, that the distinction of vice and
virtue is not founded merely on the relations of objects, nor is perceived by
reason.[1]
Hume calls for caution against such inferences in the absence of any
explanation of how the ought-statements follow from the is-statements. But how
exactly can an "ought" be derived from an "is"? The question, prompted by
Hume's small paragraph, has become one of the central questions of ethical
theory, and Hume is usually assigned the position that such a derivation is
impossible.[2] This complete severing of "is" from "ought" has been given the
graphic designation of Hume's Guillotine.[3]
Implications
The apparent gap between "is" statements and "ought" statements, when combined
with Hume's fork, renders "ought" statements of dubious validity. Hume's fork
is the idea that all items of knowledge are either based on logic and
definitions, or else on observation. If the is杘ught problem holds, then "ought"
statements do not seem to be known in either of these two ways, and it would
seem that there can be no moral knowledge. Moral skepticism and non-cognitivism
work with such conclusions.
The is杘ught problem has been recognised as an important issue for the validity
of secular ethics and their defense from criticism梠ften religiously inspired.[4]
You make me realize that Hume is a bit Quinean. Quine was struggling against
modal logic, or any notion of necessity and possibility. Indeed Modal logic has
been discovered by Aristotle when trying to make clearer its metaphysics, and
modal logic is indeed a technical tool for serious metaphysician.
Quine claimed that modal logic has been conceived in sin.
But, as George Boolos said aptly: G del's incompleteness redeemed Modal logic,
if only by assuring purely arithmetical interpretation of it, made necessary by
arithmetical incompleteness. It is a fact: machines cannot avoid the modalities.
Arithmetical truth does fit well with Quine's idea of "is", and then
incompleteness provides all the internal, modalities as seen by the numbers
(the person associated to them).
This concerns more "is possible" than "ought to". The moral element is more
complex to talk about, but is made possible by the "is possible", and so they
are certainly related.
In the machine's world Hume's Guillotine is bugged. It can't work.
Bruno
Roger , rclo...@verizon.net
8/18/2012
Leibniz would say, "If there's no God, we'd have to invent him so everything
could function."
----- Receiving the following content -----
From: Bruno Marchal
Receiver: everything-list
Time: 2012-08-18, 10:10:58
Subject: Re: Descartes and the turf war between science and religion
On 18 Aug 2012, at 15:35, Roger wrote:
IMHO
Religion deals with the unchanging Kingdom of Heaven: the eternal logic of
Plato, final causes. Eternal truth,
not contingent facts. Either and always Yes or No.
Whoa! You are close to Platonism. Nice (with respect to comp).
Science deals with the Kingdom of Earth: the contingent world of Aristotle and
Lebniz.
Contingent facts, not eternal truth. Sometimes yes, sometimes no.
I can be OK with that. We can be more precise by postulating comp, as many
contingency become absolutely contingent. In particular the computational
states become necessarily contingent. We have
p-> []<>p (p -> necessary possible p): it makes the accessibility relation
among worlds symmetrical, and something physical is something repeatable in
principles.
For a modal logician, Kripke is a big progress on Leibniz, because Kripke
relativizes the modalities to the 'actual world'. Leibniz always works
implicitly in one modal logic (known as S5). S5 is the only modal logic which
cannot be interpreted in arithmetic, at least not in the self-referential
approach to cognition.
There are billions (even a continuum to be exact) of modal logic. Each defines
its o<n notion of contingence and necessity. But both Aristotle, and Leibniz
(and even G?el, arguably) single out S5. More on this later perhaps.
Bruno
The other remarks of yours are mankind's mistaken views of both.
----- Have received the following content -----
Sender: Bruno Marchal
Receiver: everything-list
Time: 2012-08-18, 06:26:11
Subject: Re: Descartes and the turf war between science and religion
On 17 Aug 2012, at 21:06, meekerdb wrote:
On 8/17/2012 11:32 AM, Roger wrote:
Hi guys,
Regarding Descartes.....
There has always been, and still is, a turf war between science and religion,
each wanting to claim superiority over the other. And there's a bit of fear
because most people believe that there's only one truth or that truth comes in
only one form,
either in science or in the Bible.
WHOA! Talk about parochial. I guess Roger hasn't heard of the Quran, the Tao,
the Eightfold Way, Dianetics, Wicca, the Torah,...
The interesting thing is that wars are fought over divine TRUTHs, be not over
scientific knowledge.
It is the same, as you can see through history. Just that scientific knowledge
impose itself in the shorter run than fundamental knowledge.
Science is just an attitude of modesty, religion is the belief that, not
science, but what science tries to handle, makes sense, and it motivates
(fundamental) research.
Of course humans, and even nature, perverts science and religion all the time
for reason of dishonest selfish special local short term interests. That's part
of life.
Bruno
http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/
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