RE: [PEIRCE-L] Re: [biosemiotics:6912] Re: Natural Propositions,
Jerry, List, The usual reason beauty and truth are taken to be teleological terms is that they are values. They can't be given a purely descriptive definition that doesn't require empirical justification. That means that they can't be given nontrivial definitions. The inability to define truth has been known for some time (it leads to paradoxes). I can provide references if you need. For beauty, suppose that I claim that beauty is harmony, and don't mean this trivially to mean that I will use the words in the same way, and that I claim harmony is a descriptive property. My claim would be open to various possible empirical counterexamples (dissonance used in contemporary music, for example). Peirce, of course, thought that both were values. This isn't quite enough, since someone might be able to recognize truth or beauty, but not value it. Peirce argues, though, that if you want to pursue inquiry, then you must pursue truth, so there is a hypothetical imperative, not a categorical one. In Peirce's article, The Fixation of Belief, he offers the method of stubbornly holding on to what you believe, but you can do this only if you (at least implicitly) don't value truth. I doubt very much that one can legitimately hold that truth and beauty are required by reason alone to be valued (though many have claimed that), but this doesn't mean that they are not values. I may not value hatching eggs, but I can easily recognize that it is in the nature of eggs to be hatched, and that it is a value for eggs. Likewise, it is only in the context that truth an beauty are recognized as values (something to be pursued, and end) that they can be fully understood, hypothetically, as it were. John From: Jerry LR Chandler [mailto:jerry_lr_chand...@me.com] Sent: September 28, 2014 6:05 AM To: Stephen C. Rose Cc: Peirce-L Subject: Re: [PEIRCE-L] Re: [biosemiotics:6912] Re: Natural Propositions, Stephen: You simply state: Beauty and truth are teleological terms I wonder why. Cheers Jerry On Sep 26, 2014, at 1:05 PM, Stephen C. Rose wrote: Beauty and truth are teleological terms and valuable as objectives that continuity heads toward and fallibility clouds. @stephencrosehttps://twitter.com/stephencrose On Fri, Sep 26, 2014 at 1:58 PM, Gary Richmond gary.richm...@gmail.commailto:gary.richm...@gmail.com wrote: Stefan, all, I think that there's much to be said for your suggestion of our jettisoning 'truth' and replacing it with 'knowledge', at least in science. There are, I believe, strong hints of this notion in Peirce as well, for example, here: When our logic shall have paid its devoirs to Esthetics and the Ethics, it will be time for it to settle down to its regular business. That business is of a varied nature; but so far as I intend in this place to speak of it, it consists in ascertaining methods of sound reasoning, and of proving that they are sound, not by any instinctive guarantee, but because it can be shown by the kinds of reasoning already considered, especially the mathematical, of one class of reasonings that they follow methods which, persisted in, must eventually lead to the truth in regard to those problems to which they are applicable, or, if not to the absolute truth, to an indefinite approximation thereto, while in regard to another class of reasonings, although they are so insecure that no reliance can be placed upon them, it will be shown in a similar way that yet they afford the only means of attaining to a satisfactory knowledge of the truth, in case this knowledge is ever to be attained at all, doing so by putting problems into such form that the former class of reasonings become applicable to them. This prospectus of how I am to proceed is sufficient to show that there can be no ground of reasonable complaint that unwarranted assumptions are made in the course of the discussion. Nothing will be assumed beyond what every sincere and intelligent person will and must confess is perfectly evident and which, in point of fact, is not really doubted by any caviller (CP2.200, emphasis added). These hints follow naturally from the principle of fallibility, and from the knowledge that pragmatism is offered by Peirce as but a method of asymptotically approaching the truth of any matter being inquired into, the communities of scientists correcting errors along the way. Still, on the way to scientific knowledge societies may discover laws invaluable for developing tools of at least potential value to humanity and to the earth and its inhabitants, for example, the technologies which led to the development of the internet or, my personal favorite, modern plumbing. That we can misuse these tools and technologies, and do so today as we have throughout human history, is an ethical matter (quite distinct from the ethics of scientific inquiry which Peirce addresses). Best, Gary . Gary Richmond Philosophy and Critical Thinking Communication Studies
Re: [PEIRCE-L] Re: [biosemiotics:6912] Re: Natural Propositions,
Why did I simply state beauty and truth are teleological terms - because I was responding to Gary R's suggestion that we replace truth as a term. I meant to say the terms have a standing whether anyone says so. They should not be replaced. Clearly there is more to say including the fact that we can use both truth and beauty as standards and aims right now. As John C. says, they are values. We can consciously evoke them and we do. In the same way for example agape is teleological but used in the present. Keats combined knowledge, truth and beauty in by suggesting they are all we know on earth and all we need to know. He saw them as the same thing. I wonder if Peirce did or would have. *@stephencrose https://twitter.com/stephencrose* On Sun, Sep 28, 2014 at 6:51 AM, John Collier colli...@ukzn.ac.za wrote: Jerry, List, The usual reason beauty and truth are taken to be teleological terms is that they are values. They can't be given a purely descriptive definition that doesn't require empirical justification. That means that they can't be given nontrivial definitions. The inability to define truth has been known for some time (it leads to paradoxes). I can provide references if you need. For beauty, suppose that I claim that beauty is harmony, and don't mean this trivially to mean that I will use the words in the same way, and that I claim harmony is a descriptive property. My claim would be open to various possible empirical counterexamples (dissonance used in contemporary music, for example). Peirce, of course, thought that both were values. This isn't quite enough, since someone might be able to recognize truth or beauty, but not value it. Peirce argues, though, that if you want to pursue inquiry, then you must pursue truth, so there is a hypothetical imperative, not a categorical one. In Peirce's article, The Fixation of Belief, he offers the method of stubbornly holding on to what you believe, but you can do this only if you (at least implicitly) don't value truth. I doubt very much that one can legitimately hold that truth and beauty are required by reason alone to be valued (though many have claimed that), but this doesn't mean that they are not values. I may not value hatching eggs, but I can easily recognize that it is in the nature of eggs to be hatched, and that it is a value for eggs. Likewise, it is only in the context that truth an beauty are recognized as values (something to be pursued, and end) that they can be fully understood, hypothetically, as it were. John *From:* Jerry LR Chandler [mailto:jerry_lr_chand...@me.com] *Sent:* September 28, 2014 6:05 AM *To:* Stephen C. Rose *Cc:* Peirce-L *Subject:* Re: [PEIRCE-L] Re: [biosemiotics:6912] Re: Natural Propositions, Stephen: You simply state: Beauty and truth are teleological terms I wonder why. Cheers Jerry On Sep 26, 2014, at 1:05 PM, Stephen C. Rose wrote: Beauty and truth are teleological terms and valuable as objectives that continuity heads toward and fallibility clouds. *@stephencrose https://twitter.com/stephencrose* On Fri, Sep 26, 2014 at 1:58 PM, Gary Richmond gary.richm...@gmail.com wrote: Stefan, all, I think that there's much to be said for your suggestion of our jettisoning 'truth' and replacing it with 'knowledge', at least in science. There are, I believe, strong hints of this notion in Peirce as well, for example, here: When our logic shall have paid its *devoirs* to Esthetics and the Ethics, it will be time for it to settle down to its regular business. That business is of a varied nature; but so far as I intend in this place to speak of it, it consists in ascertaining methods of sound reasoning, and of proving that they are sound, not by any instinctive guarantee, but because it can be shown by the kinds of reasoning already considered, especially the mathematical, of one class of reasonings that they follow methods which, persisted in, must eventually lead to the truth in regard to those problems to which they are applicable,* or, if not to the absolute truth, to an indefinite approximation thereto, while in regard to another class of reasonings, although they are so insecure that no reliance can be placed upon them, it will be shown in a similar way that yet they afford the only means of attaining to a satisfactory knowledge of the truth, in case this knowledge is ever to be attained at all, doing so by putting problems into such form that the former class of reasonings become applicable to them.* This prospectus of how I am to proceed is sufficient to show that there can be no ground of reasonable complaint that unwarranted assumptions are made in the course of the discussion. Nothing will be assumed beyond what every sincere and intelligent person will and must confess is perfectly evident and which, in point of fact, is not really doubted by any caviller (CP2.200, emphasis added). These hints
Re: [PEIRCE-L] Re: [biosemiotics:6912] Re: Natural Propositions,
Stefan, Excuse me for asking a silly question: You wrote . . . are unable to destinct their own dreams . . . Can you use distinct as a verb ? Or did you mean distinguish ? With all the best. Sung Ben, Gary, R., Gary F., i've got to start from the end of your post. You speak of the society rewarding diciplines and this sheds a light on your idea of sociology in this discussion. Your sociology consists of conscious actors who reward, strive for power, wealth or status. This is more a rational choice approach which is not the thing i was trying to hint at with my Fleck example. And thats also not the thing sociology of knowlede is interested in. It's about the knowledge underlying societal habits. There are so many things we take for granted and we should explore why we (did) take them for granted. And this not only the case in society it is also the case in the sciences. Why did microbiologist search for syphillis in the blood? They searched there because for centuries it was taken for granted that there is something like syphillitic blood. Was it possible to reproduce the results? No, it was almost impossible to stabilize the results. Nowadays we would stop researching with results like this. But they kept on trying and trying until Wassermann found a way to stabilize the experiment. Why did the retry and retry? Because it was clear that it had to be there! The snake example: The snake example is so trivial and easy to understand that we don't have to discuss it. Yes, it bites you - you are dead in tradtion A or B. There is no incompatiblity. But this is not a real world example of a living science. Sciences are complex, they consist of assumptions, crafting in the lab/the field, cognitive training etc.. They are much more than the simple if A then B of logic. Much knowledge and training is needed to come to the point where one can write down a proposition like if A then B. Nobody doubts that when you do exactly the same as another person that the same will happen. Experiences whose conditions are the same will have the same general characters. But since scientific paradigms are such complex structures it is not an easy task to create the same conditions. You think its easy, just go to a lab and try to re-cook a Wassermann-test! You say opinion and truth are not the same thing. Yes, sure ,but how should we deal with the idea of the syphillitic blood? Is it opinion or truth? They found it in the blood! And the idea to find it in the blood is certainly a cultural import into science. But there are different Problems: a) Can there be different truths about one object of investigation b) are there cultural imports into science that influences the content of science and not only the organizational context of research. What is organizational context? Org. context is for me all the stuff you named: funding, rewarding, strive for power, money etc.. An influence on the content instead is everything which is part of the how we see the object of investigation. Karl Mannheim uses in Ideology and Utopia a good metaphor. He says that we can look at a object from different perspectives and objectivation is for him to take different positions relative to the object. Trying to investigate the object beyond this is an absurdity like seeing without perspective. You distinct between opinion and truth. Do you have the truth? No you don't, like i don't. We both have beliefs we are willing to put on test. But when you write somthing like: Conflating opinion with truth seems to produce some light pseudo-hallucinatory fun, at least that has been my consistent experience since I was a teenager (as I said I do look at other perspectives). It's the fun of absurdity. Yet, to build a theory on the acceptance of that conflation is to build on broken logic, inquiry with its bones broken, inquiry more susceptible than ever to social manipulation, inquiry less likely than ever to be fruitful. it seems to me that you have the truth and you are able to destinct between pseudo-hallucinations and non-hallucinations. You talk like you are one of those who has left the cave and reached the light. Ben, i don't really insinuate this, because it was written by you in the heat of the moment. We are not far away from each other, but nonetheless this paragraph shows we are still standing on different sides of a water devide. There is a hair between us. My impression is you are trying to pull the long-run-perspective on truth into the /now/ to safe some kind of non-perspective-truth in science. Now, truth is for me a perfect sign which incorporates all possible perspectives on an object. But we will be there only at the end of all times. As long as we are not there we only have beliefs we are willing to act upon. And as long we have not reached the all-perspectives-mode we take in positions on objects and phenomena that are influenced by our societal position,
Re: [PEIRCE-L] Re: [biosemiotics:6912] Re: Natural Propositions,
List, John: Thank you for your clear exposition of your views. Better than most. Never the less, I find the assertion: The usual reason beauty and truth are taken to be teleological terms is that they are values. They can’t be given a purely descriptive definition that doesn’t require empirical justification. to be a bit of an over statement. As with the concept of identity, these terms are given to us at such a level that extension to a class seems rather difficult. My experience suggests to me that your facile notion of extension to the class of values cheapens the meaning that I would attribute to these terms. For example, keeping my shoes polished and choosing what color of shirt to wear express my values. Your further assertion: The inability to define truth has been known for some time (it leads to paradoxes). I can provide references if you need. suggests that the science of chemistry generates paradoxes. Could you provide the examples you have in mind? Crisp examples would require that your examples are expresses in terms of the chemical symbol system as a class of values. Please keep in mind that the examples must include the values of the atomic numbers. Cheers Jerry On Sep 28, 2014, at 5:51 AM, John Collier wrote: Jerry, List, The usual reason beauty and truth are taken to be teleological terms is that they are values. They can’t be given a purely descriptive definition that doesn’t require empirical justification. That means that they can’t be given nontrivial definitions. The inability to define truth has been known for some time (it leads to paradoxes). I can provide references if you need. For beauty, suppose that I claim that beauty is harmony, and don’t mean this trivially to mean that I will use the words in the same way, and that I claim harmony is a descriptive property. My claim would be open to various possible empirical counterexamples (dissonance used in contemporary music, for example). Peirce, of course, thought that both were values. This isn’t quite enough, since someone might be able to recognize truth or beauty, but not value it. Peirce argues, though, that if you want to pursue inquiry, then you must pursue truth, so there is a hypothetical imperative, not a categorical one. In Peirce’s article, The Fixation of Belief, he offers the method of stubbornly holding on to what you believe, but you can do this only if you (at least implicitly) don’t value truth. I doubt very much that one can legitimately hold that truth and beauty are required by reason alone to be valued (though many have claimed that), but this doesn’t mean that they are not values. I may not value hatching eggs, but I can easily recognize that it is in the nature of eggs to be hatched, and that it is a value for eggs. Likewise, it is only in the context that truth an beauty are recognized as values (something to be pursued, and end) that they can be fully understood, hypothetically, as it were. John From: Jerry LR Chandler [mailto:jerry_lr_chand...@me.com] Sent: September 28, 2014 6:05 AM To: Stephen C. Rose Cc: Peirce-L Subject: Re: [PEIRCE-L] Re: [biosemiotics:6912] Re: Natural Propositions, Stephen: You simply state: Beauty and truth are teleological terms I wonder why. Cheers Jerry On Sep 26, 2014, at 1:05 PM, Stephen C. Rose wrote: Beauty and truth are teleological terms and valuable as objectives that continuity heads toward and fallibility clouds. @stephencrose On Fri, Sep 26, 2014 at 1:58 PM, Gary Richmond gary.richm...@gmail.com wrote: Stefan, all, I think that there's much to be said for your suggestion of our jettisoning 'truth' and replacing it with 'knowledge', at least in science. There are, I believe, strong hints of this notion in Peirce as well, for example, here: When our logic shall have paid its devoirs to Esthetics and the Ethics, it will be time for it to settle down to its regular business. That business is of a varied nature; but so far as I intend in this place to speak of it, it consists in ascertaining methods of sound reasoning, and of proving that they are sound, not by any instinctive guarantee, but because it can be shown by the kinds of reasoning already considered, especially the mathematical, of one class of reasonings that they follow methods which, persisted in, must eventually lead to the truth in regard to those problems to which they are applicable, or, if not to the absolute truth, to an indefinite approximation thereto, while in regard to another class of reasonings, although they are so insecure that no reliance can be placed upon them, it will be shown in a similar way that yet they afford the only means of attaining to a satisfactory knowledge of the truth, in case this knowledge is ever to be attained at all, doing so by putting problems into such form that the former class of reasonings become
Re: [PEIRCE-L] Re: [biosemiotics:6912] Re: Natural Propositions,
Stephen: You simply state: Beauty and truth are teleological terms I wonder why. Cheers Jerry On Sep 26, 2014, at 1:05 PM, Stephen C. Rose wrote: Beauty and truth are teleological terms and valuable as objectives that continuity heads toward and fallibility clouds. @stephencrose On Fri, Sep 26, 2014 at 1:58 PM, Gary Richmond gary.richm...@gmail.com wrote: Stefan, all, I think that there's much to be said for your suggestion of our jettisoning 'truth' and replacing it with 'knowledge', at least in science. There are, I believe, strong hints of this notion in Peirce as well, for example, here: When our logic shall have paid its devoirs to Esthetics and the Ethics, it will be time for it to settle down to its regular business. That business is of a varied nature; but so far as I intend in this place to speak of it, it consists in ascertaining methods of sound reasoning, and of proving that they are sound, not by any instinctive guarantee, but because it can be shown by the kinds of reasoning already considered, especially the mathematical, of one class of reasonings that they follow methods which, persisted in, must eventually lead to the truth in regard to those problems to which they are applicable, or, if not to the absolute truth, to an indefinite approximation thereto, while in regard to another class of reasonings, although they are so insecure that no reliance can be placed upon them, it will be shown in a similar way that yet they afford the only means of attaining to a satisfactory knowledge of the truth, in case this knowledge is ever to be attained at all, doing so by putting problems into such form that the former class of reasonings become applicable to them. This prospectus of how I am to proceed is sufficient to show that there can be no ground of reasonable complaint that unwarranted assumptions are made in the course of the discussion. Nothing will be assumed beyond what every sincere and intelligent person will and must confess is perfectly evident and which, in point of fact, is not really doubted by any caviller (CP2.200, emphasis added). These hints follow naturally from the principle of fallibility, and from the knowledge that pragmatism is offered by Peirce as but a method of asymptotically approaching the truth of any matter being inquired into, the communities of scientists correcting errors along the way. Still, on the way to scientific knowledge societies may discover laws invaluable for developing tools of at least potential value to humanity and to the earth and its inhabitants, for example, the technologies which led to the development of the internet or, my personal favorite, modern plumbing. That we can misuse these tools and technologies, and do so today as we have throughout human history, is an ethical matter (quite distinct from the ethics of scientific inquiry which Peirce addresses). Best, Gary . Gary Richmond Philosophy and Critical Thinking Communication Studies LaGuardia College of the City University of New York C 745 718 482-5690 On Fri, Sep 26, 2014 at 5:52 AM, sb peirc...@semiotikon.de wrote: Ben, Garys, list, seems i took some things down the wrong pipe (see my post to Gary). There is not much in what you say that I'd disagree with. But there is still the truth-problem, but maybe this is just a problem of labeling. For me truth has no little errorbars, but i'm apodictic here like god doesn't throw dices. What is true now, can't be false later. Yes, truth is not changeable. And we don't have this truth. But by introducing the distincton between opinion and true opinion it seems to me you are trying to reintroduce truth under a new flag. Something is true or not true, do we know with absolute certainty that something is true or not true? No, we can't and therefore you have to introduce the errorbars. But errorbars and truth don't fit together, something is true or not and not possibly-maybe-a-little -less-than-true. Samples can have errorbars but not truth and hence true opinion as something actual existent doesn't seem sound to me. This Foucault quote shows the paradox Mendel said the truth but he wasn't within the biological truth of his time you are already adressing. Now exchange Mendel with Newton. Is Newtons mechanics true or false? Hmm, i would say neither, it works under certain circumstances. So yes, inquiry can be succesful! In this little example we had three meanings of truth: as actual opinion, truth as better viable opinion and truth as true opinion at the end of all time. That's the reason why i wouldn't use truth and opinion as opposites. I belief the better distinction is knowledge and opinion like the greece doxa and episteme. Important is wether you can give a sound justification for your belief or not. Knowledge is justified belief and opinion unjustified belief. Is there
Fwd: Re: [PEIRCE-L] Re: [biosemiotics:6912] Re: Natural Propositions,
Ben, Garys, list, seems i took some things down the wrong pipe (see my post to Gary). There is not much in what you say that I'd disagree with. But there is still the truth-problem, but maybe this is just a problem of labeling. For me truth has no little errorbars, but i'm apodictic here like god doesn't throw dices. What is true now, can't be false later. Yes, truth is not changeable. And we don't have this truth. But by introducing the distincton between opinion and true opinion it seems to me you are trying to reintroduce truth under a new flag. Something is true or not true, do we know with absolute certainty that something is true or not true? No, we can't and therefore you have to introduce the errorbars. But errorbars and truth don't fit together, something is true or not and not possibly-maybe-a-little -less-than-true. Samples can have errorbars but not truth and hence true opinion as something actual existent doesn't seem sound to me. This Foucault quote shows the paradox Mendel said the truth but he wasn't within the biological truth of his time you are already adressing. Now exchange Mendel with Newton. Is Newtons mechanics true or false? Hmm, i would say neither, it works under certain circumstances. So yes, inquiry can be succesful! In this little example we had three meanings of truth: as actual opinion, truth as better viable opinion and truth as true opinion at the end of all time. That's the reason why i wouldn't use truth and opinion as opposites. I belief the better distinction is knowledge and opinion like the greece doxa and episteme. Important is wether you can give a sound justification for your belief or not. Knowledge is justified belief and opinion unjustified belief. Is there much difference between what you and i said except not using the word truth? Best Stefan P.S.: Introducing the errorbars into this topic is problematic, because it assumes bayesian statistics. But yes it is important to argue for the reasonableness of a knowledge claim and to point at possible shortcomings but this just means to justify. Stefan, Gary R., Gary F., list, I'm not sure how much there is in what you say that I'd disagree with. I'd point out that I wasn't attempting to describe social influences on research in real depth, but just to indicate that I believe that they exist and that I had given them at least a little thought. Light pseudo-hallucinatory fun was just my way of referring to fanciful fun in the mind. I wasn't jumping to the end of the long run or of sufficient investigation except in that sense in which every one of us does in asserting a proposition, making a declarative statement. To assert a proposition is to say that anybody who _/were/_ to investigate it far enough _/would/_ find it to be true. Note the conditional modal 'would' as per Peirce's repeated formulation of truth as the end of inquiry. All this idea of truth as _/only/_ at the end of the longest run, as attainable _/only/_ by a perfect sign incorporating all possible perspectives at the end of all times, goes against Peirce's idea that inquiry can succeed without taking forever or almost forever. When you think that you've reached the truth about something, then you think that your actual opinion coincides with the final opinion that would be reached by sufficient investigation. That final opinion to which sufficient research would be destined is not affected by any person's or group's actual opinion. The idea of the final opinion is a way of defining truth pragmatically in relation to investigation. You can't have absolute theoretical certainty that your actual opinion coincides with the final opinion that would be reached; but you can have strong reasons to think that it does. But even then, being scientifically minded, you would not _/define/_ the truth as yours or anybody's actual opinion. Now, statisticians add error bars to their graphs. One way, pointed out by Peirce, to close a suspected gap between actual opinion and the ideal final opinion is for one's actual opinion to include a confession of its own possible error, its being merely plausible, or likely, or whatever, so that, in asserting your opinion, you're asserting that anybody who were to investigate far enough would find it likely that such-and-such is the case; or even that anybody who were to investigate far enough would find it likely that anybody who were to investigate far enough would find it likely that such--such is the case. The proposition that I asserted was that conflating the ideas of truth and opinion, making them the same thing in the mind, leads, like by having a drink or a toke or both, to fanciful fun in the mind, the thought of somehow having one's cake and eating it too, for example, some idea of people's conflicting opinions/truths as involving conflicting realities, various actual worlds, somehow intersecting, maybe in a somewhat magical
Re: Re: [PEIRCE-L] Re: [biosemiotics:6912] Re: Natural Propositions,
Stefan Would it not be an act aiming toward truth and beauty to stop using the word pragmatism entirely when seeking to articulate CP's thought and instead say pragmaticism even if in doing so one has to explain why? *@stephencrose https://twitter.com/stephencrose* On Fri, Sep 26, 2014 at 5:52 AM, sb peirc...@semiotikon.de wrote: Ben, Garys, list, seems i took some things down the wrong pipe (see my post to Gary). There is not much in what you say that I'd disagree with. But there is still the truth-problem, but maybe this is just a problem of labeling. For me truth has no little errorbars, but i'm apodictic here like god doesn't throw dices. What is true now, can't be false later. Yes, truth is not changeable. And we don't have this truth. But by introducing the distincton between opinion and true opinion it seems to me you are trying to reintroduce truth under a new flag. Something is true or not true, do we know with absolute certainty that something is true or not true? No, we can't and therefore you have to introduce the errorbars. But errorbars and truth don't fit together, something is true or not and not possibly-maybe-a-little -less-than-true. Samples can have errorbars but not truth and hence true opinion as something actual existent doesn't seem sound to me. This Foucault quote shows the paradox Mendel said the truth but he wasn't within the biological truth of his time you are already adressing. Now exchange Mendel with Newton. Is Newtons mechanics true or false? Hmm, i would say neither, it works under certain circumstances. So yes, inquiry can be succesful! In this little example we had three meanings of truth: as actual opinion, truth as better viable opinion and truth as true opinion at the end of all time. That's the reason why i wouldn't use truth and opinion as opposites. I belief the better distinction is knowledge and opinion like the greece doxa and episteme. Important is wether you can give a sound justification for your belief or not. Knowledge is justified belief and opinion unjustified belief. Is there much difference between what you and i said except not using the word truth? Best Stefan P.S.: Introducing the errorbars into this topic is problematic, because it assumes bayesian statistics. But yes it is important to argue for the reasonableness of a knowledge claim and to point at possible shortcomings but this just means to justify. Stefan, Gary R., Gary F., list, I'm not sure how much there is in what you say that I'd disagree with. I'd point out that I wasn't attempting to describe social influences on research in real depth, but just to indicate that I believe that they exist and that I had given them at least a little thought. Light pseudo-hallucinatory fun was just my way of referring to fanciful fun in the mind. I wasn't jumping to the end of the long run or of sufficient investigation except in that sense in which every one of us does in asserting a proposition, making a declarative statement. To assert a proposition is to say that anybody who _*were*_ to investigate it far enough _*would*_ find it to be true. Note the conditional modal 'would' as per Peirce's repeated formulation of truth as the end of inquiry. All this idea of truth as _*only*_ at the end of the longest run, as attainable _*only*_ by a perfect sign incorporating all possible perspectives at the end of all times, goes against Peirce's idea that inquiry can succeed without taking forever or almost forever. When you think that you've reached the truth about something, then you think that your actual opinion coincides with the final opinion that would be reached by sufficient investigation. That final opinion to which sufficient research would be destined is not affected by any person's or group's actual opinion. The idea of the final opinion is a way of defining truth pragmatically in relation to investigation. You can't have absolute theoretical certainty that your actual opinion coincides with the final opinion that would be reached; but you can have strong reasons to think that it does. But even then, being scientifically minded, you would not _ *define*_ the truth as yours or anybody's actual opinion. Now, statisticians add error bars to their graphs. One way, pointed out by Peirce, to close a suspected gap between actual opinion and the ideal final opinion is for one's actual opinion to include a confession of its own possible error, its being merely plausible, or likely, or whatever, so that, in asserting your opinion, you're asserting that anybody who were to investigate far enough would find it likely that such-and-such is the case; or even that anybody who were to investigate far enough would find it likely that anybody who were to investigate far enough would find it likely that such--such is the case. The proposition that I asserted was that conflating the ideas of truth and opinion, making them the
Re: [PEIRCE-L] Re: [biosemiotics:6912] Re: Natural Propositions,
Stephen, in germany we have a saying I am not more papal than the pope. There are times of loose thinking/speaking and there are times of strict thinking/speaking. When the setting is right people will understand you even if use the wrong words. Best Stefan Am 26.09.14 13:24, schrieb Stephen C. Rose: Stefan Would it not be an act aiming toward truth and beauty to stop using the word pragmatism entirely when seeking to articulate CP's thought and instead say pragmaticism even if in doing so one has to explain why? *@stephencrose https://twitter.com/stephencrose* On Fri, Sep 26, 2014 at 5:52 AM, sb peirc...@semiotikon.de mailto:peirc...@semiotikon.de wrote: Ben, Garys, list, seems i took some things down the wrong pipe (see my post to Gary). There is not much in what you say that I'd disagree with. But there is still the truth-problem, but maybe this is just a problem of labeling. For me truth has no little errorbars, but i'm apodictic here like god doesn't throw dices. What is true now, can't be false later. Yes, truth is not changeable. And we don't have this truth. But by introducing the distincton between opinion and true opinion it seems to me you are trying to reintroduce truth under a new flag. Something is true or not true, do we know with absolute certainty that something is true or not true? No, we can't and therefore you have to introduce the errorbars. But errorbars and truth don't fit together, something is true or not and not possibly-maybe-a-little -less-than-true. Samples can have errorbars but not truth and hence true opinion as something actual existent doesn't seem sound to me. This Foucault quote shows the paradox Mendel said the truth but he wasn't within the biological truth of his time you are already adressing. Now exchange Mendel with Newton. Is Newtons mechanics true or false? Hmm, i would say neither, it works under certain circumstances. So yes, inquiry can be succesful! In this little example we had three meanings of truth: as actual opinion, truth as better viable opinion and truth as true opinion at the end of all time. That's the reason why i wouldn't use truth and opinion as opposites. I belief the better distinction is knowledge and opinion like the greece doxa and episteme. Important is wether you can give a sound justification for your belief or not. Knowledge is justified belief and opinion unjustified belief. Is there much difference between what you and i said except not using the word truth? Best Stefan P.S.: Introducing the errorbars into this topic is problematic, because it assumes bayesian statistics. But yes it is important to argue for the reasonableness of a knowledge claim and to point at possible shortcomings but this just means to justify. Stefan, Gary R., Gary F., list, I'm not sure how much there is in what you say that I'd disagree with. I'd point out that I wasn't attempting to describe social influences on research in real depth, but just to indicate that I believe that they exist and that I had given them at least a little thought. Light pseudo-hallucinatory fun was just my way of referring to fanciful fun in the mind. I wasn't jumping to the end of the long run or of sufficient investigation except in that sense in which every one of us does in asserting a proposition, making a declarative statement. To assert a proposition is to say that anybody who _/were/_ to investigate it far enough _/would/_ find it to be true. Note the conditional modal 'would' as per Peirce's repeated formulation of truth as the end of inquiry. All this idea of truth as _/only/_ at the end of the longest run, as attainable _/only/_ by a perfect sign incorporating all possible perspectives at the end of all times, goes against Peirce's idea that inquiry can succeed without taking forever or almost forever. When you think that you've reached the truth about something, then you think that your actual opinion coincides with the final opinion that would be reached by sufficient investigation. That final opinion to which sufficient research would be destined is not affected by any person's or group's actual opinion. The idea of the final opinion is a way of defining truth pragmatically in relation to investigation. You can't have absolute theoretical certainty that your actual opinion coincides with the final opinion that would be reached; but you can have strong reasons to think that it does. But even then, being scientifically minded, you would not _/define/_ the truth as yours or anybody's actual opinion. Now, statisticians add error bars to their graphs. One way, pointed out by Peirce, to close a suspected gap between actual opinion and the ideal final opinion
Re: Re: [PEIRCE-L] Re: [biosemiotics:6912] Re: Natural Propositions,
Stefan, all, I think that there's much to be said for your suggestion of our jettisoning 'truth' and replacing it with 'knowledge', at least in science. There are, I believe, strong hints of this notion in Peirce as well, for example, here: When our logic shall have paid its *devoirs* to Esthetics and the Ethics, it will be time for it to settle down to its regular business. That business is of a varied nature; but so far as I intend in this place to speak of it, it consists in ascertaining methods of sound reasoning, and of proving that they are sound, not by any instinctive guarantee, but because it can be shown by the kinds of reasoning already considered, especially the mathematical, of one class of reasonings that they follow methods which, persisted in, must eventually lead to the truth in regard to those problems to which they are applicable,* or, if not to the absolute truth, to an indefinite approximation thereto, while in regard to another class of reasonings, although they are so insecure that no reliance can be placed upon them, it will be shown in a similar way that yet they afford the only means of attaining to a satisfactory knowledge of the truth, in case this knowledge is ever to be attained at all, doing so by putting problems into such form that the former class of reasonings become applicable to them.* This prospectus of how I am to proceed is sufficient to show that there can be no ground of reasonable complaint that unwarranted assumptions are made in the course of the discussion. Nothing will be assumed beyond what every sincere and intelligent person will and must confess is perfectly evident and which, in point of fact, is not really doubted by any caviller (CP2.200, emphasis added). These hints follow naturally from the principle of fallibility, and from the knowledge that pragmatism is offered by Peirce as but a method of *asymptotically approaching the truth* of any matter being inquired into, the communities of scientists correcting errors along the way. Still, on the way to scientific knowledge societies may discover laws invaluable for developing tools of at least potential value to humanity and to the earth and its inhabitants, for example, the technologies which led to the development of the internet or, my personal favorite, modern plumbing. That we can misuse these tools and technologies, and do so today as we have throughout human history, is an ethical matter (quite distinct from the ethics of scientific inquiry which Peirce addresses). Best, Gary . *Gary Richmond* *Philosophy and Critical Thinking* *Communication Studies* *LaGuardia College of the City University of New York* *C 745* *718 482-5690* On Fri, Sep 26, 2014 at 5:52 AM, sb peirc...@semiotikon.de wrote: Ben, Garys, list, seems i took some things down the wrong pipe (see my post to Gary). There is not much in what you say that I'd disagree with. But there is still the truth-problem, but maybe this is just a problem of labeling. For me truth has no little errorbars, but i'm apodictic here like god doesn't throw dices. What is true now, can't be false later. Yes, truth is not changeable. And we don't have this truth. But by introducing the distincton between opinion and true opinion it seems to me you are trying to reintroduce truth under a new flag. Something is true or not true, do we know with absolute certainty that something is true or not true? No, we can't and therefore you have to introduce the errorbars. But errorbars and truth don't fit together, something is true or not and not possibly-maybe-a-little -less-than-true. Samples can have errorbars but not truth and hence true opinion as something actual existent doesn't seem sound to me. This Foucault quote shows the paradox Mendel said the truth but he wasn't within the biological truth of his time you are already adressing. Now exchange Mendel with Newton. Is Newtons mechanics true or false? Hmm, i would say neither, it works under certain circumstances. So yes, inquiry can be succesful! In this little example we had three meanings of truth: as actual opinion, truth as better viable opinion and truth as true opinion at the end of all time. That's the reason why i wouldn't use truth and opinion as opposites. I belief the better distinction is knowledge and opinion like the greece doxa and episteme. Important is wether you can give a sound justification for your belief or not. Knowledge is justified belief and opinion unjustified belief. Is there much difference between what you and i said except not using the word truth? Best Stefan P.S.: Introducing the errorbars into this topic is problematic, because it assumes bayesian statistics. But yes it is important to argue for the reasonableness of a knowledge claim and to point at possible shortcomings but this just means to justify. Stefan, Gary R., Gary F., list, I'm not sure how much there is in what you say that I'd disagree with. I'd
Re: Re: [PEIRCE-L] Re: [biosemiotics:6912] Re: Natural Propositions,
Beauty and truth are teleological terms and valuable as objectives that continuity heads toward and fallibility clouds. *@stephencrose https://twitter.com/stephencrose* On Fri, Sep 26, 2014 at 1:58 PM, Gary Richmond gary.richm...@gmail.com wrote: Stefan, all, I think that there's much to be said for your suggestion of our jettisoning 'truth' and replacing it with 'knowledge', at least in science. There are, I believe, strong hints of this notion in Peirce as well, for example, here: When our logic shall have paid its *devoirs* to Esthetics and the Ethics, it will be time for it to settle down to its regular business. That business is of a varied nature; but so far as I intend in this place to speak of it, it consists in ascertaining methods of sound reasoning, and of proving that they are sound, not by any instinctive guarantee, but because it can be shown by the kinds of reasoning already considered, especially the mathematical, of one class of reasonings that they follow methods which, persisted in, must eventually lead to the truth in regard to those problems to which they are applicable,* or, if not to the absolute truth, to an indefinite approximation thereto, while in regard to another class of reasonings, although they are so insecure that no reliance can be placed upon them, it will be shown in a similar way that yet they afford the only means of attaining to a satisfactory knowledge of the truth, in case this knowledge is ever to be attained at all, doing so by putting problems into such form that the former class of reasonings become applicable to them.* This prospectus of how I am to proceed is sufficient to show that there can be no ground of reasonable complaint that unwarranted assumptions are made in the course of the discussion. Nothing will be assumed beyond what every sincere and intelligent person will and must confess is perfectly evident and which, in point of fact, is not really doubted by any caviller (CP2.200, emphasis added). These hints follow naturally from the principle of fallibility, and from the knowledge that pragmatism is offered by Peirce as but a method of *asymptotically approaching the truth* of any matter being inquired into, the communities of scientists correcting errors along the way. Still, on the way to scientific knowledge societies may discover laws invaluable for developing tools of at least potential value to humanity and to the earth and its inhabitants, for example, the technologies which led to the development of the internet or, my personal favorite, modern plumbing. That we can misuse these tools and technologies, and do so today as we have throughout human history, is an ethical matter (quite distinct from the ethics of scientific inquiry which Peirce addresses). Best, Gary . *Gary Richmond* *Philosophy and Critical Thinking* *Communication Studies* *LaGuardia College of the City University of New York* *C 745* *718 482-5690 718%20482-5690* On Fri, Sep 26, 2014 at 5:52 AM, sb peirc...@semiotikon.de wrote: Ben, Garys, list, seems i took some things down the wrong pipe (see my post to Gary). There is not much in what you say that I'd disagree with. But there is still the truth-problem, but maybe this is just a problem of labeling. For me truth has no little errorbars, but i'm apodictic here like god doesn't throw dices. What is true now, can't be false later. Yes, truth is not changeable. And we don't have this truth. But by introducing the distincton between opinion and true opinion it seems to me you are trying to reintroduce truth under a new flag. Something is true or not true, do we know with absolute certainty that something is true or not true? No, we can't and therefore you have to introduce the errorbars. But errorbars and truth don't fit together, something is true or not and not possibly-maybe-a-little -less-than-true. Samples can have errorbars but not truth and hence true opinion as something actual existent doesn't seem sound to me. This Foucault quote shows the paradox Mendel said the truth but he wasn't within the biological truth of his time you are already adressing. Now exchange Mendel with Newton. Is Newtons mechanics true or false? Hmm, i would say neither, it works under certain circumstances. So yes, inquiry can be succesful! In this little example we had three meanings of truth: as actual opinion, truth as better viable opinion and truth as true opinion at the end of all time. That's the reason why i wouldn't use truth and opinion as opposites. I belief the better distinction is knowledge and opinion like the greece doxa and episteme. Important is wether you can give a sound justification for your belief or not. Knowledge is justified belief and opinion unjustified belief. Is there much difference between what you and i said except not using the word truth? Best Stefan P.S.: Introducing the errorbars into this topic is
Re: [PEIRCE-L] Re: [biosemiotics:6912] Re: Natural Propositions,
Ben, Gary, R., Gary F., i've got to start from the end of your post. You speak of the society rewarding diciplines and this sheds a light on your idea of sociology in this discussion. Your sociology consists of conscious actors who reward, strive for power, wealth or status. This is more a rational choice approach which is not the thing i was trying to hint at with my Fleck example. And thats also not the thing sociology of knowlede is interested in. It's about the knowledge underlying societal habits. There are so many things we take for granted and we should explore why we (did) take them for granted. And this not only the case in society it is also the case in the sciences. Why did microbiologist search for syphillis in the blood? They searched there because for centuries it was taken for granted that there is something like syphillitic blood. Was it possible to reproduce the results? No, it was almost impossible to stabilize the results. Nowadays we would stop researching with results like this. But they kept on trying and trying until Wassermann found a way to stabilize the experiment. Why did the retry and retry? Because it was clear that it had to be there! The snake example: The snake example is so trivial and easy to understand that we don't have to discuss it. Yes, it bites you - you are dead in tradtion A or B. There is no incompatiblity. But this is not a real world example of a living science. Sciences are complex, they consist of assumptions, crafting in the lab/the field, cognitive training etc.. They are much more than the simple if A then B of logic. Much knowledge and training is needed to come to the point where one can write down a proposition like if A then B. Nobody doubts that when you do exactly the same as another person that the same will happen. Experiences whose conditions are the same will have the same general characters. But since scientific paradigms are such complex structures it is not an easy task to create the same conditions. You think its easy, just go to a lab and try to re-cook a Wassermann-test! You say opinion and truth are not the same thing. Yes, sure ,but how should we deal with the idea of the syphillitic blood? Is it opinion or truth? They found it in the blood! And the idea to find it in the blood is certainly a cultural import into science. But there are different Problems: a) Can there be different truths about one object of investigation b) are there cultural imports into science that influences the content of science and not only the organizational context of research. What is organizational context? Org. context is for me all the stuff you named: funding, rewarding, strive for power, money etc.. An influence on the content instead is everything which is part of the how we see the object of investigation. Karl Mannheim uses in Ideology and Utopia a good metaphor. He says that we can look at a object from different perspectives and objectivation is for him to take different positions relative to the object. Trying to investigate the object beyond this is an absurdity like seeing without perspective. You distinct between opinion and truth. Do you have the truth? No you don't, like i don't. We both have beliefs we are willing to put on test. But when you write somthing like: Conflating opinion with truth seems to produce some light pseudo-hallucinatory fun, at least that has been my consistent experience since I was a teenager (as I said I do look at other perspectives). It's the fun of absurdity. Yet, to build a theory on the acceptance of that conflation is to build on broken logic, inquiry with its bones broken, inquiry more susceptible than ever to social manipulation, inquiry less likely than ever to be fruitful. it seems to me that you have the truth and you are able to destinct between pseudo-hallucinations and non-hallucinations. You talk like you are one of those who has left the cave and reached the light. Ben, i don't really insinuate this, because it was written by you in the heat of the moment. We are not far away from each other, but nonetheless this paragraph shows we are still standing on different sides of a water devide. There is a hair between us. My impression is you are trying to pull the long-run-perspective on truth into the /now/ to safe some kind of non-perspective-truth in science. Now, truth is for me a perfect sign which incorporates all possible perspectives on an object. But we will be there only at the end of all times. As long as we are not there we only have beliefs we are willing to act upon. And as long we have not reached the all-perspectives-mode we take in positions on objects and phenomena that are influenced by our societal position, tradtions and our culture. The point is now that modern science with its non-prespective-truth tries to erase these influences in its representation. Part of this strategy is to make influences, where
Re: [PEIRCE-L] Re: [biosemiotics:6912] Re: Natural Propositions,
Stefan, Gary F., list, I was indeed addressing the snakebite example, just not mentioning it by name. If two traditions, two people, two of anything, arrive at incompatible conclusions about snakebites, then at most one of their conclusions is true. That's what incompatible conclusions means. It doesn't take Peircean semiotics or pragmatism to see it, it's elementary definitions and logic. I haven't ever argued or believed that judgments, that two given traditions' conclusions are incompatible, are infallible. I haven't ever argued or believed that society does not influence, help, or hinder inquiry, or contribute to focusing it in some directions rather than others. This sort of thing will result in society's influencing the opinions that result from actual inquiry. But opinion and truth are not the same thing. Conflating opinion with truth seems to produce some light pseudo-hallucinatory fun, at least that has been my consistent experience since I was a teenager (as I said I do look at other perspectives). It's the fun of absurdity. Yet, to build a theory on the acceptance of that conflation is to build on broken logic, inquiry with its bones broken, inquiry more susceptible than ever to social manipulation, inquiry less likely than ever to be fruitful. A challenge for inquiry and society is to overcome capricious or mischievous skews produced by society's influence on inquiry, without keeping society from helping inquiry thrive and vice versa. It's one thing for society to reward some disciplines more than others. In various cases there can be good reasons for that, bad reasons for that, and so on. The economy of inquiry itself may sometimes impoverish inquiries that would not have been all that costly and whose findings would have corrected and improved the inquiries that do proceed, but people can't know everything in advance, and people need to make choices. So inquiry will tend, even when going comparatively well, to have defects. But it can also correct and improve itself. It's another thing for society to reward disciplines with power, wealth, glamour, status, only for producing conclusions that suit society's preconceptions. And so on. Best, Ben On 9/23/2014 5:20 AM, sb wrote: Gary F., Ben, List, yes, it is an extremist position. Ludwik Fleck in some of his texts about the /Denkkollektive/ (thought collectives) comes close to this point. But his microbiological bench research maybe prevented him to fall prey to such solipcism. Also Latours (maybe polemic) can be read this way, but even he says now, facing the threat of climate change deniers, that he has gone to far. Apart from these two (and alleged epigones of social constructivism of different strives) i would say this is a crude misrepresentation of social constructivism. Yes, you may be right that you and Ben are just responding, but i have the imression that Stans polarization fell on just too fertile ground. Maybe it activated an already existent resentiment?! Now when Gary and Cathy applaud Bens post, i would follow them if it was not under the label of social constructivism. If we call it solipcism/relativism/culturalism i'd be fine. Nevertheless i feel uncomfortable with Bens post since it doesn't try to understand Stans position. Stan braught up the example one must not tease certain snakes. If you tease the snake, it bites you, injects enough poison and there are no lucky circumstances that safe you, then you will die! These are the plain facts. But there can be different mythologies/theories arround this snake type. At this point i always remember the end of Ecos Name of the Rose when Adson and William discuss retrospective what has happend. Adson says to William: Over the whole investigation we had the false premisses and the false hypothesis' but we came up with the right conclusion. Important in this example is now that they start with predjudice which turns out to be false. In the same manner scientists start with personaly, socially or tradionally conditioned predjudices. All scientific theories have a social import which is not forced upon us by reality. E.g. Fleck shows in his book that until the 20th century and the discovery of the Wassermann-reaction the syphillis research was influenced by the religious idea of the syphillitic blood as a punishment of god. In an enlightment perspective it is important to understand and explore such imports. Ben argues in his response only from an epistemological standpoint and ignores the importance of the sociologcal view Stan brings in. Sociologically the claim of truth as truth and the will to act upon this truth is a interesting phenomenon. At the same time Stan mixes up the epistemological and the sociological perspective and thinks we can conclude from the sociology of knowledge to epistemology. Once again, i do follow Bens critique, but it should also pick up the sociological perspective.
RE: [PEIRCE-L] Re: [biosemiotics:6912] Re: Natural Propositions,
Stefan, I think you have a well-balanced position here, and I’m copying your post to the biosemiotics list, because I think it contributes a lot to a discussion that’s been going round and round on the biosemiotics list for years. The same goes for Ben’s contributions, but he’s already posted them on the biosemiotics list. (One of them included your post that I’m copying here, but some might have missed it.) Your concluding point, about pragmatism, is especially important. Taking Stan’s snake example, if two cultures construct different “mythologies” around the snake, but the difference makes no difference to their habitual interactions with that snake on either side, then from a pragmatic point of view, there is no difference in meaning between the two “mythologies”. And yes, pragmatism delivers the right epistemology for the sociology of knowledge, i.e. for inquiry into the subject (as opposed to construction of competing mythologies about it), because it is the right “epistemology” for inquiry in general. gary f. From: sb [mailto:peirc...@semiotikon.de] Sent: 23-Sep-14 5:21 AM To: Gary Fuhrman; peirce-l@list.iupui.edu Subject: Re: [PEIRCE-L] Re: [biosemiotics:6912] Re: Natural Propositions, Gary F., Ben, List, yes, it is an extremist position. Ludwik Fleck in some of his texts about the Denkkollektive (thought collectives) comes close to this point. But his microbiological bench research maybe prevented him to fall prey to such solipcism. Also Latours (maybe polemic) can be read this way, but even he says now, facing the threat of climate change deniers, that he has gone to far. Apart from these two (and alleged epigones of social constructivism of different strives) i would say this is a crude misrepresentation of social constructivism. Yes, you may be right that you and Ben are just responding, but i have the imression that Stans polarization fell on just too fertile ground. Maybe it activated an already existent resentiment?! Now when Gary and Cathy applaud Bens post, i would follow them if it was not under the label of social constructivism. If we call it solipcism/relativism/culturalism i'd be fine. Nevertheless i feel uncomfortable with Bens post since it doesn't try to understand Stans position. Stan braught up the example one must not tease certain snakes. If you tease the snake, it bites you, injects enough poison and there are no lucky circumstances that safe you, then you will die! These are the plain facts. But there can be different mythologies/theories arround this snake type. At this point i always remember the end of Ecos Name of the Rose when Adson and William discuss retrospective what has happend. Adson says to William: Over the whole investigation we had the false premisses and the false hypothesis' but we came up with the right conclusion. Important in this example is now that they start with predjudice which turns out to be false. In the same manner scientists start with personaly, socially or tradionally conditioned predjudices. All scientific theories have a social import which is not forced upon us by reality. E.g. Fleck shows in his book that until the 20th century and the discovery of the Wassermann-reaction the syphillis research was influenced by the religious idea of the syphillitic blood as a punishment of god. In an enlightment perspective it is important to understand and explore such imports. Ben argues in his response only from an epistemological standpoint and ignores the importance of the sociologcal view Stan brings in. Sociologically the claim of truth as truth and the will to act upon this truth is a interesting phenomenon. At the same time Stan mixes up the epistemological and the sociological perspective and thinks we can conclude from the sociology of knowledge to epistemology. Once again, i do follow Bens critique, but it should also pick up the sociological perspective. Science is not only brought forward by empirical research and new theories, it is also brought forward by the critique of its own social boundedness. Sure, the sociological is from a different sphere but since it is from a different sphere it could and should inform science. From my point of view social constructivism/ sociology of knowledge and pragmatism are complementary, means pragmatism delivers the right epistemology for the sociology of knowledge. Best Stefan - PEIRCE-L subscribers: Click on Reply List or Reply All to REPLY ON PEIRCE-L to this message. PEIRCE-L posts should go to peirce-L@list.iupui.edu . To UNSUBSCRIBE, send a message not to PEIRCE-L but to l...@list.iupui.edu with the line UNSubscribe PEIRCE-L in the BODY of the message. More at http://www.cspeirce.com/peirce-l/peirce-l.htm .
RE: [PEIRCE-L] Re: [biosemiotics:6912] Re: Natural Propositions,
Stefan, I haven’t read enough of the authors you cite (except Berger and Luckmann) to answer this question, but I think that position would be an extreme one even among social constructivists. That’s why I refer to Stan’s argument as “radical” social constructivism, because he likes (or feels compelled) to polarize the issue. And Ben was responding in kind (appropriately, I think). gary f. From: sb [mailto:peirc...@semiotikon.de] Sent: 21-Sep-14 5:41 PM To: peirce-l@list.iupui.edu Subject: Re: [PEIRCE-L] Re: [biosemiotics:6912] Re: Natural Propositions, Dear Ben, Gary R., Gary F., List wich social constructivists with some reputation do hold the position that the objects or findings of inquiry are unreal and mere figments? Schütz, Berger Luckmann, Piaget, von Foerster, Latour, Bloor or Knorr-Cetina? Foucault, Mannheim or Fleck? I wonder Best Stefan Am 21.09.14 23:10, schrieb Gary Richmond: Ben, lists, A most excellent post, and one of the strongest arguments against constructivist epistemology that I've read, having the added virtue of being succinct. Best, Gary Gary Richmond Philosophy and Critical Thinking Communication Studies LaGuardia College of the City University of New York C 745 718 482-5690 On Sun, Sep 21, 2014 at 12:28 PM, Benjamin Udell bud...@nyc.rr.com wrote: Stan, If you think that five minutes' investigation would likely at best reach a trivial truth about a kind of phenomenon, then substitute 'five days' or 'five months' or 'five decades', etc. The point is the sooner or later, not an incompletable long run. You're simply not distinguishing between truth and opinion. If two traditions arrive at contrary conclusions about the same kind of phenomenon, the normal logical conclusion about the contrarity is that at most one of the conclusions is true and true for sound reasons, at most one is the result of sufficient investigation even though both traditions claim sufficiency. Peirce's semiotics is logic studied in terms of signs. You don't distinguish between sufficiency and claims of sufficiency, truth and claims of truth, and reality and claims of reality. Both traditions' conclusions might be false, results of insufficient investigation. They might both be mixes of truth and falsehood, various inaccuracies, and so on. Simply accepting contrary conclusions as reflecting two realities because two traditions arrived at them is a defeatist method of inquiry, a form of 'insuccessibilism'. Imagine the swelling mischief if courts treated widely discrepant testimony from various witnesses as reflecting different realities rather than different perspectives or mistaken or differently limited observations or memories, or lack of honesty or candor, and so on. Imagine being an accused defendant in such a court, with one's money, career, freedom, life, hanging in the balance. Waiting for the conflicting traditions to resolve their conflicts and hoping that their resultant conclusion will be the truth, is a method of inquiry of last resort, that to which a pure spectator is confined. To go further and _define_ truth as the conclusion of any actual tradition or actual dialogue among actual traditions, underlies the method of authority, a form of infallibilism. If two traditions don't resolve their argument and if you for your part have no way to investigate the question itself and arrive at a conclusion about the subject of their argument, then your normal logical conclusion would be that you won't know the answer to the question, not that there are conflicting true answers to the question. I disbelieve that you ever did physics in either way. I don't see why you'd want to impose such weak methods on philosophy, or have a semiotics in which contrary signs about the same object merely reflect different realities; such would turn logic and semiotics into mush. Peirce's theory of inquiry, which seems to reflect the attitude of scientific research, does not boil down to 'poll the experts' or 'poll the traditions', instead it boils down to 'do the science,' by a method actively motivated and shaped by the idea of putting into practice the fallibilist recognition that inquiry can go wrong (because the real is independent of actual opinion) and the 'successibilist' recognition that inquiry can go right (because the real is the cognizable). To argue about this, as you do, is to presuppose that there is a truth about this very matter under discussion, a truth that can be found and can be missed. Best, Ben On 9/20/2014 3:46 PM, Stanley N Salthe wrote: Ben -- Replying to: The main idea is not that of a long run. Instead the idea is that of sufficient investigation. Call it 'sufficiently long' or 'sufficiently far-reaching' or 'sufficiently deep' or 'sufficiently good' or 'sufficiently good for long enough', or the like, it's stlll the same basic idea. S: Then two different traditions might
[PEIRCE-L] Re: [biosemiotics:6912] Re: Natural Propositions,
Dear Stan, lists, The problem here is a bit as when Collier thought all the world was in the head - for where is that head? in the world? in another head? The same holds here: the world will be constructed by each [tradition] via different models - now, WHERE are those traditions? Seems to be two possibilities: 1) the traditions are NOT in the world they construct- but where are they then? - in somebody's head - and then where is that head? 2) the traditions ARE in the world - but then Stan does not have the direct access to them which he pretends - he must approach the traditions in the world via other traditions, and those, again, via still other traditions, in an infinite regress. Best F : S: I would not think NO cases, but, given different language traditions surviving simultaneously, the world will be constructed by each via different models. So, given the learned fact one one must not tease certain snakes, different traditions will construct different mythologies about this. Our own tradition, involving concepts of evolution and chemistry is particularly elaborate, requiring a highly educated priesthood to come up with an -- or even more than one -- understanding. - PEIRCE-L subscribers: Click on Reply List or Reply All to REPLY ON PEIRCE-L to this message. PEIRCE-L posts should go to peirce-L@list.iupui.edu . To UNSUBSCRIBE, send a message not to PEIRCE-L but to l...@list.iupui.edu with the line UNSubscribe PEIRCE-L in the BODY of the message. More at http://www.cspeirce.com/peirce-l/peirce-l.htm .
[PEIRCE-L] Re: [biosemiotics:6912] Re: Natural Propositions,
Ben, lists, A most excellent post, and one of the strongest arguments against constructivist epistemology that I've read, having the added virtue of being succinct. Best, Gary *Gary Richmond* *Philosophy and Critical Thinking* *Communication Studies* *LaGuardia College of the City University of New York* *C 745* *718 482-5690* On Sun, Sep 21, 2014 at 12:28 PM, Benjamin Udell bud...@nyc.rr.com wrote: Stan, If you think that five minutes' investigation would likely at best reach a trivial truth about a kind of phenomenon, then substitute 'five days' or 'five months' or 'five decades', etc. The point is the sooner or later, not an incompletable long run. You're simply not distinguishing between truth and opinion. If two traditions arrive at contrary conclusions about the same kind of phenomenon, the normal logical conclusion about the contrarity is that at most one of the conclusions is true and true for sound reasons, at most one is the result of sufficient investigation even though both traditions claim sufficiency. Peirce's semiotics is logic studied in terms of signs. You don't distinguish between sufficiency and claims of sufficiency, truth and claims of truth, and reality and claims of reality. Both traditions' conclusions might be false, results of insufficient investigation. They might both be mixes of truth and falsehood, various inaccuracies, and so on. Simply accepting contrary conclusions as reflecting two realities because two traditions arrived at them is a defeatist method of inquiry, a form of 'insuccessibilism'. Imagine the swelling mischief if courts treated widely discrepant testimony from various witnesses as reflecting different realities rather than different perspectives or mistaken or differently limited observations or memories, or lack of honesty or candor, and so on. Imagine being an accused defendant in such a court, with one's money, career, freedom, life, hanging in the balance. Waiting for the conflicting traditions to resolve their conflicts and hoping that their resultant conclusion will be the truth, is a method of inquiry of last resort, that to which a pure spectator is confined. To go further and _*define*_ truth as the conclusion of any actual tradition or actual dialogue among actual traditions, underlies the method of authority, a form of infallibilism. If two traditions don't resolve their argument and if you for your part have no way to investigate the question itself and arrive at a conclusion about the subject of their argument, then your normal logical conclusion would be that you won't know the answer to the question, not that there are conflicting true answers to the question. I disbelieve that you ever did physics in either way. I don't see why you'd want to impose such weak methods on philosophy, or have a semiotics in which contrary signs about the same object merely reflect different realities; such would turn logic and semiotics into mush. Peirce's theory of inquiry, which seems to reflect the attitude of scientific research, does not boil down to 'poll the experts' or 'poll the traditions', instead it boils down to 'do the science,' by a method actively motivated and shaped by the idea of putting into practice the fallibilist recognition that inquiry can go wrong (because the real is independent of actual opinion) and the 'successibilist' recognition that inquiry can go right (because the real is the cognizable). To argue about this, as you do, is to presuppose that there is a truth about this very matter under discussion, a truth that can be found and can be missed. Best, Ben On 9/20/2014 3:46 PM, Stanley N Salthe wrote: Ben -- Replying to: The main idea is not that of a long run. Instead the idea is that of sufficient investigation. Call it 'sufficiently long' or 'sufficiently far-reaching' or 'sufficiently deep' or 'sufficiently good' or 'sufficiently good for long enough', or the like, it's stlll the same basic idea. S: Then two different traditions might come up with differently sufficient understandings about one object. I accept that, and it implies nominalism. Sufficiency might be quite different for different traditions. If in a given case you believe that you've reached the truth about a given kind of phenomenon after five minutes of investigation, then you believe that you have reached, after five minutes, the opinion that anybody sufficiently investigating, over whatever length of time, would reach about that kind of phenomenon. It's far from automatically preposterous to believe that. S: But, I think, pretty 'shallow' and unsophisticated. There is no absolute assurance that actual inquiry on a given question will not go wrong for millions of years, remaining insufficient for millions of years and leaving the actual inquirers not only ignorant but also erroneous all along the way. S: OK if the knowledge in question is not important to survival!
Re: [PEIRCE-L] Re: [biosemiotics:6912] Re: Natural Propositions,
Dear Ben, Gary R., Gary F., List wich social constructivists with some reputation do hold the position that the objects or findings of inquiry are unreal and mere figments? Schütz, Berger Luckmann, Piaget, von Foerster, Latour, Bloor or Knorr-Cetina? Foucault, Mannheim or Fleck? I wonder Best Stefan Am 21.09.14 23:10, schrieb Gary Richmond: Ben, lists, A most excellent post, and one of the strongest arguments against constructivist epistemology that I've read, having the added virtue of being succinct. Best, Gary *Gary Richmond* *Philosophy and Critical Thinking* *Communication Studies* *LaGuardia College of the City University of New York* *C 745* *718 482-5690* On Sun, Sep 21, 2014 at 12:28 PM, Benjamin Udell bud...@nyc.rr.com mailto:bud...@nyc.rr.com wrote: Stan, If you think that five minutes' investigation would likely at best reach a trivial truth about a kind of phenomenon, then substitute 'five days' or 'five months' or 'five decades', etc. The point is the sooner or later, not an incompletable long run. You're simply not distinguishing between truth and opinion. If two traditions arrive at contrary conclusions about the same kind of phenomenon, the normal logical conclusion about the contrarity is that at most one of the conclusions is true and true for sound reasons, at most one is the result of sufficient investigation even though both traditions claim sufficiency. Peirce's semiotics is logic studied in terms of signs. You don't distinguish between sufficiency and claims of sufficiency, truth and claims of truth, and reality and claims of reality. Both traditions' conclusions might be false, results of insufficient investigation. They might both be mixes of truth and falsehood, various inaccuracies, and so on. Simply accepting contrary conclusions as reflecting two realities because two traditions arrived at them is a defeatist method of inquiry, a form of 'insuccessibilism'. Imagine the swelling mischief if courts treated widely discrepant testimony from various witnesses as reflecting different realities rather than different perspectives or mistaken or differently limited observations or memories, or lack of honesty or candor, and so on. Imagine being an accused defendant in such a court, with one's money, career, freedom, life, hanging in the balance. Waiting for the conflicting traditions to resolve their conflicts and hoping that their resultant conclusion will be the truth, is a method of inquiry of last resort, that to which a pure spectator is confined. To go further and _/define/_ truth as the conclusion of any actual tradition or actual dialogue among actual traditions, underlies the method of authority, a form of infallibilism. If two traditions don't resolve their argument and if you for your part have no way to investigate the question itself and arrive at a conclusion about the subject of their argument, then your normal logical conclusion would be that you won't know the answer to the question, not that there are conflicting true answers to the question. I disbelieve that you ever did physics in either way. I don't see why you'd want to impose such weak methods on philosophy, or have a semiotics in which contrary signs about the same object merely reflect different realities; such would turn logic and semiotics into mush. Peirce's theory of inquiry, which seems to reflect the attitude of scientific research, does not boil down to 'poll the experts' or 'poll the traditions', instead it boils down to 'do the science,' by a method actively motivated and shaped by the idea of putting into practice the fallibilist recognition that inquiry can go wrong (because the real is independent of actual opinion) and the 'successibilist' recognition that inquiry can go right (because the real is the cognizable). To argue about this, as you do, is to presuppose that there is a truth about this very matter under discussion, a truth that can be found and can be missed. Best, Ben On 9/20/2014 3:46 PM, Stanley N Salthe wrote: Ben -- Replying to: The main idea is not that of a long run. Instead the idea is that of sufficient investigation. Call it 'sufficiently long' or 'sufficiently far-reaching' or 'sufficiently deep' or 'sufficiently good' or 'sufficiently good for long enough', or the like, it's stlll the same basic idea. S: Then two different traditions might come up with differently sufficient understandings about one object. I accept that, and it implies nominalism. Sufficiency might be quite different for different traditions. If in a given case you believe that you've reached the truth about a given kind of phenomenon after five minutes of investigation, then you believe that you have
