From: Chris Hibbert (chris@pancrit.org)
Date: Tue Aug 06 2002 - 22:34:21 MDT
I feel like I started this, by responding to Dan's aside about an unrebutted
article he wrote explaining why PCR is insufficient. I haven't had as much
time to contribut as I would have liked, but I have been following the thread.
On the whole I agree with Lee (even to the point of expostulating "so what?"
at some of Dan's points. In this message, I'll wade back in, only to duck out
again and see what happens.
Technotranscendence wrote, in reply to Lee Corbin:
> > Why, no. You recall that I was the one who pointed out the wasted
> > verbiage making CR into PCR. The PCR reading I really like is its
> > explanations of phenomena in terms of evolutionary like processes.
> > Not the endless quibbling.
>
> However, if, by your lights, it's wasted, than why not stick with
> critical rationalism?:)
The main reason to prefer PCR to CR is that it answers some of the critics of
Popper's version, and it fits well with the rest. The point of PCR is to say
that the epistemology itself is criticizable. If you think that's true of
Critical Rationalism (as Popper didn't), then I'm willing to call it critical
rationalism when talking to you. Likewise, I'm willing to pose as either an
agnostic or an atheist, depending on which one my interlocutor defines as
lacking certainty.
> Then you implicitly accept my foundation of sense perception.:)
You keep coming back to this. It apparently seems to you as some kind of
foundation for reasoning. I think of perception as a conduit, like language.
There are some things I can figure out without language, but most of my
reasoning is done using language. I make use of perception and language,
realizing that they are imperfect tools. There are results one can reach with
impeccable use of language, and experiments one can witness directly that give
wrong answers. You have to use the rest of your bag of tricks to evaluate
them and decide what's correct. Perception isn't foundational, it's just the
main way I interact with the world.
> most evolutionary epistemologists and pancritical
> rationalists are representationalists. This means [they] accept a radical
> split between the mind and reality
The mind is part of reality. Dennett starts to provide an explanation for how
consciousness can be built on non-conscious meat.
> I was _not_ presenting it as an argument against pancritical
> rationalism, but as one of its shakey 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 lost me here. I don't accept the "radical split" as essential to PCR. If
you think I must in order to be consistent, please explain why. (And polling
authors of works on PCR isn't convincing.)
Do you argue that I have to choose one of those alternatives if I reject the
split between mind and reality? Maybe what you mean by "a complete skeptic"
bears some resemblance to being pan-critical?
> If you don't accept
> this representational view of the mind, then there's no reason to find
> substitutes for observation and inductions based on observation. (This
> does not entirely clear up the matter of induction, that it does remove
> a major obstacle in its path.
I don't know whether you're charging me with an additional burden here or
relieving me of one.
> Sense perception is pretty easy. There's nothing underneath it. It
> just is. Existence exists, as Rand put it. There ain't nothing else.
> Sense perception is nonpropositional, so it can't be analyzed into
> further concepts or propositions. It's the foundation.
In order to understand perception, we study it's strengths and weaknesses.
The reason that optical (and other) illusions get big play at places like the
Exploratorium isn't just that they're fun, but also because they illuminate
the use of one of our major tools for understanding the world.
Chris
-- Pictures from my trip to the Four Corners area: http://discuss.foresight.org/~hibbert/Canyon02/canyon.html Chris Hibbert http://discuss.foresight.org/~hibbert chris@pancrit.org
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