I am so lost here. Where did I assert an absolute criterion? Is that following from the fact that some narratives are acceptable for only one sort of ...
I think I understand your question, but tell me if I've got it wrong. I think you're asking whether the truth of the "Some narratives . . ." statement...
Oh, no, sorry if I wasn't clear. Musicology does much more than try to make aesthetic judgments -- in fact, it rather rarely does that. It's a "human ...
As I said, I think @"Banno" has said most of what I would want to say about that, but perhaps an example will help: Some narratives are acceptable, tr...
You're right, "authoritarian" isn't a very good term for anything other than humans. My "Well, yes" was meant as an answer to the second question, "Is...
Funny! (You do know it's "Consciousness Explained," right?) My point wasn't about agreement -- as I said, I don't agree with him at all -- but rather ...
I don't agree with Dennett's viewpoint any more than you do, but if he was really "irrational beyond words" and showed "utter disregard" for clear evi...
I think Dennett had a great imagination, and I might have agreed he was more imaginative than Chalmers -- until "Reality +" came out a couple of years...
OK, with the mods' permission, here's a link to a song my band did about Zizek, my least favorite philosopher. Just for fun, apologies if you're a Ziz...
Good joke, and just to be clear: We can say more, using language in all of its delightful manifestations, we just can't say more in rational discourse...
Yes, this can get complicated and nit-picky very quickly, and I doubt that we really disagree about assertions. What I'm claiming is that it takes mor...
In this context, I meant philosophically helpful or provocative -- something worth our time to understand. Is there a way you prefer to think of it? -...
Fair enough. My nice division into steps is oversimplistic. I dunno, the aporetic dialogues of Plato seem quite useful. But we may be saying the same ...
What we've seen in the threads about Frege, Kimhi, and Rodl is that we can't rest content with this formulation. Consider what you just "said": "a man...
Yes, and we shouldn't find this surprising or confusing. What philosophy can talk about is not the same thing as what philosophy can mention or acknow...
There's a lot of truth in this, but I want to dwell on why it appears this way. Let's take math. Is math authoritarian? Is it structured to preclude o...
That's plenty good enough for me. So what we'd like to see a lot less of, both on TPF and in general, is the sort of interpretation -- if I can even c...
Yes, I see what you mean, except . . . I really did mean "the barest glimpse," i.e., people who've read a little bit of K or A or W in a class and fee...
And a very good one. Now suppose I ask, "What kind of question is that?" I'm genuinely interested in your answer; for what it's worth, mine is, "It's ...
Sure, and that's why a charitable reading can be important. You can help make the position clearer and more compelling! (And maybe start by discarding...
I hadn't thought about the Tarksi/Kripke angle. The "cost," when it comes to a philosophical Theory of Everything, may be something very much like thi...
Yes, and consider the context: He was speaking to students, young minds, and urging us to develop good habits, not necessarily to practice this kind o...
Glad you liked it. And a thorough understanding of a difficult position you're pretty sure you won't end up agreeing with is really hard! But if you d...
Your OP has already generated a lot of the good discussion it so richly deserves. I'll chime in on two points. The first relates to the quote above. A...
Yet more subtleties, but you're right to bring them up. The first response cashes out to "I call this warm, because I'm comparing it to some even cold...
Ordinarily, just talking, I think we would use the word "wrong": "No, you're wrong, it's freezing out!" I hear you asking what, exactly, is being call...
I don't find the view you're sketching here to be absurd, or impossible, or even implausible. It may even be the case that we don't significantly disa...
Good, and your experience with your granddaughter illustrates it beautifully. That's where I come out too -- "private language" is a bizarre if useful...
Right. One interesting feature of the aha! experience is how strongly it causes us to believe we have understood. I'm guessing this is because, taken ...
And that is by and large a good idea, which I appreciate. We don't want to be taking words like "private" or "mental" to imply some lonely kingdom we ...
"Things are as they are to us." The idea is that "the rock" is a construct, a very useful and non-arbitrary and important one for us. But for all we k...
Our posts just crossed! So, as to this: That's what I'm questioning. Why couldn't it be true that we need reference equally to talk to ourselves? I'm ...
I think this highlights the question we're discussing. I'm just thinking this through myself, but there has to be a difference between "private langua...
That's certainly how it seems to me, and for the same reasons you cite, but I want to understand why @"Banno" might think otherwise. Same point. Surel...
“Everything is relative. There’s no true or false. There’s no right and wrong.” “But I don’t agree with that.” “Then you’re wrong!” In an earlier thre...
I think it's a little more radical than that. Consider any physical object - the ever-useful rock example, let's say. But now wait a minute . . . what...
I'm able to distinguish, in my own mental experience, a type of (purported) understanding that is best pictured as "the light bulb going on." It doesn...
This is interesting, thanks. My question to @"Banno" focused on something a little different. If we say that reference, as a matter of fact, requires ...
Good, I was making the same point -- neither more nor less reliable. I don't think so. The distinction I'm making isn't about degrees of certainty. It...
At least start with "describe," especially if some analysis and discrimination of terms is likely to be needed. Having done that as best we can, I'm f...
Not to put you on the spot, but are you saying that reference in fact requires triangulation, or only that we should reserve the term "reference" for ...
Perhaps it is, rather, but I'm certainly familiar with it. As in my "pile of papers" example (which the bolded addition is meant to capture), I find I...
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