From: Lee Corbin (lcorbin@tsoft.com)
Date: Tue Aug 06 2002 - 14:42:53 MDT
Technotranscendence writes
> ...then why not stick with critical rationalism?:)
If it had been up to me, then I suppose we might have. But it
doesn't matter. PCR is what this set of ideas and approaches
goes by now.
> >> First of all, how do you know of an
> >> outside world? How do you know conjectures match against it?
> >
> > Because I have common sense, because I'm practiced getting results
> > from the outside world just like any auto mechanic, hair stylist,
> > farmer, detective, teacher, newspaper delivery boy, and
> > finger-painting
> > five year old. The little kid tries some colors, gets some effects,
> > tries other things, gets yelled at.
>
> Then you implicitly accept my foundation of sense perception.:)
No.
> The eight year old got his knowledge through using sense perception. If
> sense perception did not work, then she or he could not even read and
> trust what was read. So, this knowledge does presuppose that.
> [They] think that heavier objects fall faster, and often believe
> Mom and Dad to be near omniscient.
I *do* believe in the existence of a priori knowledge, (which
fails to fit your tidy scheme). Why should evolution present
homo sapiens with a tabula rasa? It's been found that newborn
babies have mathematical knowledge, for example.
But even without that, your point is nearly a tautology. I
confess that I'm afraid to grant your point because it will
only reinforce your unfortunate foundationalist tendencies.
Recall my point about "math envy". Where does this urge to
*base* everything on something prior come from? It's a bad
idea most of the time.
> > Back in the 20th century it wasn't moronic to question the
> > existence of an "outside world"
>
> Actually, the questioning of such started long before
> the 20th century and continues to this day.
8-D Perhaps you missed my point that while ill-advised as
recently as the 20th century, it's definitely moronic now.
> My point in bringing this up was that I thought you were more familiar
> with the pancritical rationalist material I've read, such as Bartley's
> works or the collection _Evolutionary Epistemology, Rationality, and the
> Sociology of Knowledge_, edited by Radnitzky and Bartley.
Funny you mention that book. I have had it next to my computer
while replying to your last couple of emails!
> Why would this matter? Well, most evolutionary epistemologists
> and pancritical rationalists are representationalists.
One of the passages I underlines is on page 359, where Peter Munz
"explains" why knowledge cannot represent. I've never understood
that. So, yes, I am guilty as charged with being a representionalist.
> This means that accept a radical split between the mind and
> reality, seeing the mind as a sort of inner theater that may
> or may not be related to anything outside it.
I didn't know that it means that. To me, it's merely obvious
that if one were to, say, memorize the geography of the Grand
Canyon (perhaps merely by living in it a few years), then one's
brain obviously contains an encoded representation of same.
("Bah, I speak baby stuff." -Count Alfred Korzybski)
> I was _not_ presenting it as an argument against pancritical
> rationalism, but as one of its shaky presumptions. (I don't mean an
> essential one, but ditching it would involve either becoming a complete
> skeptic or embracing some form of perceptual realism. If the latter,
> we're back to foundationalism.)
YOU are back to "foundationism". I couldn't care less. Such arcanery
keeps intruding on what's important in philosophy.
> Why does one need a foundation is a good question. Since humans are
> fallible -- as you point out below - -they can make mistakes in their
> knowledge. They can build on the wrong ideas, which is especially easy
> to do when relying on ideas and information supplied by others. (Think
> about, e.g., the division of intellectual labor today....
Okay. So??? Surely you're not suggesting that by attending to
fine details of foundationism or having his head up his ass in
some other way will help a scientist avoid error? Or a detective
to solve a case sooner? Remember that some of the greatest
scientists who ever lived were extremely clueless about philosophy.
So, no, you're probably not saying this. But where are you going
here?
> > (2) All we can do is ask if an assertion is true in that it agrees
> > with the facts (Cp. Tarski's Correspondence Theory of Truth).
>
> Which means? Sense perception, no? So the ultimate authority here is
> agreement with the facts, which means agreement with experience. Am I
> right here?
Actually, clinging to the simple Correspondence Theory is only
a way of seeking refuge from all the other silly theories out
there. (At least it is for me.) Since you brought up a lot of
math in some of your examples, you might be interested in the
very clean way that truth and validity are handled in mathematical
logic (if you aren't already familiar with it). It accords very
well with common sense.
> > (5) Knowledge cannot start from nothing (i.e., not from tabula rasa)
> > and knowledge cannot start from observation. The advancement of
> > knowledge comes from modification and correction of earlier knowledge
> > (the basis for traditional beliefs).
>
> Knowledge of what, I would ask?:)
Of course, I grant your point. Knowledge to me means that the structures
in one's brain are good maps of some part of the universe. But
only having good taste will, IMNSHO, keep one from jumping from there
into a lot of silliness, such as "is unjustified belief true knowledge?",
or "how can the knower know itself?", etc. A good chess program, for
example, has a fair amount of knowledge about the chess tree. Bah,
I speak baby stuff.
> > (7) Absolute precision is impossible. Definitions and meanings lead
> > to the fallacy of infinite regress, therefore cannot be important.
>
> Not so. Absolute precision might be impossible
> (how would you know this?)
It's like, just a *conjecture*, you know
> but definition and meaning are not -- unless one assumes
> definition and meaning can only be absolutely precise. You're
> cardstacking here. You're loading all sorts of bad traits into the
> views your argue against to make your case.
No, I happen to agree with you here. **SOMETIMES** definitions
are very important. Especially in math, as your examples belabor.
It's even important to agree what we mean by "profiling". I should
have caught that (7) is pretty dubious.
> The point Saum was making is that Rand's question forces us
> to see if our ideas are grounded in facts or if they're just
> floating abstractions. This is kind of like forming a concept
> of something, including giving it a working definition, then
> afterward making sure you have not erred by seeing if it picks out real
> things on some level and makes the proper distinctions. (Of the latter,
> defining 'whale' as a 'swimming animal' places it in the same category
> as shrimp, shark, squid, and water snake. Thus, such a definition needs
> revision given our knowledge of such other swimming animals.)
This is where IMO you are wasting a lot of effort. "Forces us
to see if our ideas are grounded in facts or they're just
floating abstractions."
Well, that sounds very nice, but few humans outside academia
and mental institutions do much of that. :-) Perhaps you can
give some examples of scientists, bricklayers, teachers, policemen,
computer scientists, sensible philosophers, or real estate agents
are guilty of that. (Yes, I suspect that some art historians,
psychoanalysts, alternative medicine practitioners, and most post-
moderns probably are guilty, but what examples are you thinking of?)
> > Perhaps here we have our basic disagreement: I don't think
> > it's wise to regard anything as "primary". And you do, eh?
>
> My point is not that I'm a foundationalist -- something I've never had a
> problem with -- but that pancritical rationalism is also covertly
> foundational. Foundations by any other name...
All I care about is that PCR appears to me much better grounded
in reality, to use a foundation metaphor 8-), than its competitors.
The list we discussed has many good points, and in addition, as
I said, PCR appears to speak against foundationism (even if you
are right and some practitioners fall into that trap), and
explains why the rough, pragmatic way 99% of humans operate
works and is adequate.
Lee
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