Hi DMB,
> Steve said: > I know what Pirsig says. I'm wonderring how his arguments stand up to > arguments that others have made. Aren't you also wonderring why, if these > questions have been so thoroughly dissolved, that people keep asking about > them? > > > dmb says: > > Well, that's just it Steve. I don't see Pirsig's arguments in anything you're > saying. I'm suggesting that the distinction is pretty meaningless in the MOQ. > Can you explain how this has any relevance to what Pirsig says? Steve: I'm pretty sure that RMP would see a difference between asserting "X is true" and "One ought to do X." There is a difference between saying "DMB thinks this distinction is meaningless" and "DMB should see this distinction as meaningless." > Steve: > > > What would one person who had never had a conversation with anyone else know > about how to construct a good argument and what sorts of arguments ought to > convince her? What could "good argument" even mean under such conditions? > > > dmb says: > > Huh? I thought we were talking about deriving oughts from ises? Steve" Don't ask me. You are the one that dragged Rorty and epistemology into this. > > > Steve said: > > Rorty does not hold that morality is just what society lets us say, > nevertheless, there is a social [] component to the practice of > justification. You keep bringing up radical empiricism as though experience > answers all questions about justification. I've asked you many times how > empirical reality provides us not only with experience in each moment but all > the standards for justification for evaluating what reality is supposed to be > telling us at each moment. Where do standards for justification come from, > DMB? > > > > dmb says: > > This question doesn't make any sense to me. Steve: Don't get discouraged. I think you are smart enough to wrap your mind around these concepts if you really try. If you want to run with the big boys, these are the sort of questions that I suspect you'll need to seriously think about. DMB: Empiricism is an answer to the question of justification. Empiricism says our knowledge and truth claims are tested by experience. Steve: I'm asking for more specifics here. Though our truth claims await future justification or falsification, reality doesn't just hand us the standards for deciding what sorts of expriences ought to be considered support for our claims and what sorts of experiences should count as evidence against our claims. Sometimes such standards seem obvious. The warranted assertibity of my claim to be an expert horseman will be tested based on whether or not I can actually ride a horse. What about my claim that Jesus actually existed about 2000 years ago? What about my claim that the square root of two cannot be expressed as the ratio of two integers? What about my claim that there is probably intelligent life elsewhere in the universe? How are such claims "tested by experience"? I'm not saying that they are not in some way. I don't know how else such claims could be tested if not in the course of human inquiry. But you recite the refrain "tested by experience" as though reality sets up parameters and does the testing for us and then communicates to us the outcome of the test. DMB: Radical empiricism does not claim to answer ALL questions about justification but it is an epistemological theory with its own set of standards for justification. Steve: I'm wonderring what these standards are and where you think they come from. DMB: So you seem to be asking for the standards of justification that can justify my standards of justification. Wha? Steve: This question of second order justification is also quite relevent. Until you can make sense of this question, you shouldn't get on Rorty's case for saying "no nonconversational constraints on knowledge" because second-order justification (how we can be justified in our standards for justification) is what Rorty is talking about in that quote. He doesn't think that there is anything nonhuman we can appeal to in a conversation to say what ought to count as a good justification. I'm pretty sure that you agree with Rorty on this point. Don't you? DMB: > And frankly, your question, "how empirical reality provides us not only with > experience in each moment but all the standards for justification for > evaluating what reality is supposed to be telling us at each moment" is quite > ridiculous. Steve: I don't think it is my question that is ridiculous but rather the implication in your claim that the premise of my question is so when you say that reality tests our truth claims for us. DMB: > Who ever said we want or need or can have standards at each moment of > reality? And in the MOQ worrying about standards and justifications at each > moment would keep you out of touch with reality at each moment. Steve: I have good news for you. Philosophy is nothing to fear. Being critical of your standards for justification won't take you out of reality. If thinking did take you out of reality, where would it be taking you? Best, Steve Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
