Moliere

Ah, perhaps I'm mistaking your chart for the political compass chart because of their superficial similarity. He is describing a particular kind of an...

I think you're confusing two different strands of communism and trying to fuse them together into one theory. But as your own political chart admirabl...

It'd probably for the better. But who knows? Perhaps we assign too much to philosophical backing. Epicureanism was a popular philosophy in Roman times...

It's in the bottom-left corner.

I'd invite you to present some reasoning, if you wish. If it sparks a comment or thought in me then I'll share. But I'm failing to see where you're go...

I find the private-language argument to be pretty convincing. While I grant that we all have our own subjective realities that we do not share in the ...

Do you not know what counts as a moral statement? I'm hesitant to put necessary and sufficient conditions to the notion. It seems to me that it's not ...

If someone were to come to me, in some hypothetical scenario, and tell me that what I'm seeing is not green, but red, I'd tell them that what I am see...

Sure. After all, it's just a way of arranging theoretical stances. You could graph anything, though. Even quantitative features, like GDP, infant mort...

Yeah, pretty much. Just a different way of saying the same thing.

The two aren't opposed. Anarchy is against hierarchy of any kind. Communism is an economic model where ownership over land, capital, and labor is some...

So, for myself, it seems to me that if meaning is a property of language, and we are competent language speakers, then we should all be able to tell -...

More or less, yes. Something along those lines, regardless of whether said meaning attaches "in the mind" or "on the waves" or what-not, that gets at ...

"with an implication of understanding"? What's that? I'd just say that there's not much more to knowing the meaning than exactly what's said -- if I t...

If that's all you mean by meaning, then I don't think I'd disagree that we all associate things differently. We all have different pasts, different fe...

Sure. I agree that's the end state. But that's not the same thing as associating, yes?

Okay, so it's the relation that's within the fridge, so to speak. We all relate things differently. And this activity is what you call meaning. So how...

I guess what I'm really trying to get at is how we bootstrap from no understanding of language to an understanding of a language. Associating seems to...

So I am keeping scribbles within my fridge?

That's fine. Then we have xRy, where y is the phonic substance or scribbles on a paper or digital shapes. x is whatever is in the fridge. Can you spec...

It seems to me, then, that you think moral statements are primarily tools for influencing the actions of others. Yes?

Alright I think I'm beginning to get a picture of what you're talking about, and I'm ready for more chocolate cake. Plus I feel like I'm getting close...

There is wisdom to that. But it's so much fun. ;) :D

Thanks for the clarification, I wasn't sure which way. Meaning is the act of associating. Associating is putting . . . well, what? into a relation? Or...

And that activity is mental association, right? So if I associate tea with crumpets then I have a meaning, let's just say that I put them in any relat...

So you are saying perception is reserved for the processing of information that is outside of the mind. Let's go with it. Does that perception have a ...

Yes.

Hrmm, well for me at least, then, this still leaves out the sorts of sentences we say that are ethical, yet mean there is a fact to the matter in the ...

Cool. So rather than "Thou shalt not kill" you might say "Killing is wrong"? And the same sort of analysis should then apply?

Heh. I hope I don't come across as too funny. I really don't mean to be. I'm just trying to grapple with the ideas and see where they lead more than a...

Yeah, I see language as attaching to the world in some way. It's not all in our head; so to speak is to speak in a world, of a world, and about a worl...

It just has a Cartesian ring to it -- but It's not like I am in here and the world I experience is out there. I am a part of the world. Further, it's ...

Could it not be the case that we truly feel wrongly about a moral issue, though? Or no? What is truly feeling, as opposed to feeling? Or do you mean t...

Not to just bombard you with questions @"Banno" I'll write what thoughts came to me after you brought up direction-of-fit: So, we could say that the m...

That's a good point. Though would we call commands moral? I suppose some commands are moral commands, so I can go with it. Can such statements be true...

Adaption and survival I can grant. But that transition will not be kind, merciful, or peaceful if we just carry on -- or, given that my crystal ball b...

I'd just say it's something of an outdated model to call the world external, and the mind internal. But I can go along with it. Isn't processing exter...

I think it's appropriate. I had actually began going through the P.I. to reply, to be honest. :D

Cool. So let's go into this account that you have. I'm afraid I do not understand it, or at least that my understanding is minimal. As I get you you'r...

I grant that we do this operation. But the operation eventually terminates. If meaning were identical to other words then there would never be a termi...

I am classifying perception as a mental association -- that is, the sort of thing that has meaning. I am not saying the world makes associations.

Hrrmm, you run the risk of this problem then -- If interpretation is the act of explaining what something means, and the explanation of what something...

What is interpretation?

Well, perception requires a brain -- a sort of association but one which is being applied to what you call the outside world. It's not so much "taking...

A thought, though -- it's interesting to contrast Moore with moral error theory. If I remember correctly, at least, he argued in favor of non-natural ...

Well, I did say previously that you can always bite the bullet. :D For myself, at least, any theory which would say "There ought to be a dead family b...

If Shady Shim the Loan Shark promises to murder your family if you don't pay 50 percent interest, though . . .

It's the idea I keep coming back to and I'm playing with in this thread, at least. It makes a lot of sense. But what would a better way of getting tru...

Well, I don't know if I'd use the word absolutist, but let's just say that absolutist is any position which believes that truth is not relative to sta...

"Giving 5 dollars to a homeless man is good" is true -- we might judge such a statement to be true because we believe that it is always good to give t...