You are viewing the historical archive of The Philosophy Forum.
For current discussions, visit the live forum.
Go to live forum

Metaphysician Undercover

Comments

Right, you can interpret without verification, but the point is that there is no truth or falsity without verification of the interpretation. Perhaps ...
August 28, 2018 at 16:41
That's not the law of identity, that's equivocation. The law of identity is used to identify specific things, it is distinct from a definition. Logic ...
August 28, 2018 at 12:13
This is irrelevant to the fact that the words "it is raining", or "il pleut", if used as a proposition, require an interpretation in order that there ...
August 28, 2018 at 11:52
Yes, to prove that the ideal for goodness exists is to prove that God exists. Your approach is the same as Aquinas', it is based in the assumption tha...
August 27, 2018 at 11:05
Lame.
August 27, 2018 at 10:21
Really, it need not be like this. One might say "this is the way I see things, do you see them in the same way?", instead of pronouncing the truth Thi...
August 27, 2018 at 01:16
I don't think the argument from gradation is properly represented here, P1 seems a little simplistic. The argument is that in order for things to be g...
August 26, 2018 at 13:44
No, absolutely not. A proposition consists of two aspects, the words or symbols, and the meaning. The truth or falsity of a proposition is relative to...
August 26, 2018 at 13:15
That depends on how you look at things. Some might say that truth requires judgement, that to be true requires a judgement of truth. Ever heard the sa...
August 25, 2018 at 11:32
That's right, two pennies are "the same" in the sense of the same type of thing. But they are not the same in the sense of the law of identity which w...
August 25, 2018 at 10:59
The Arostotelian formulation of the law of identity is that a thing is the same as itself. It may be that "a is a" is a representation of this. The th...
August 24, 2018 at 11:50
I understand it, it's not very complicated at all. I just don't agree with it, and that's why I point out the inherent contradictions. The only true a...
August 22, 2018 at 10:39
Sounds just like a relative presupposition then. No I haven't it doesn't sound very interesting, and full of contradiction according to how you and ti...
August 22, 2018 at 01:11
I think we're talking about "absolute" as opposed to relative. That is to say "absolute", as distinguishable from "relative". This would mean "absolut...
August 21, 2018 at 19:48
If it's absolute, it cannot be relative to temporal existence in this way. Being relative to temporal existence is what makes it about something parti...
August 21, 2018 at 11:00
Why do you say that an absolute presupposition "never answers a question" then give examples, each of which is an answer to a question. You make such ...
August 21, 2018 at 01:16
i What do you mean no contradiction? You said "they cannot, even in principle turn out to be true or false". Clearly that contradicts "we hope that th...
August 20, 2018 at 11:02
We need to ask then, in what sense are they "undecidable". If it's as per the quote you gave me from Peirce, "we hope that there is some ascertainable...
August 20, 2018 at 00:46
OK, so you do not believe that immaterial things exist. I assume also that you do not believe that they are real. So I have assigned the name "materia...
August 19, 2018 at 23:11
Clearly I recognize the difference between an absolute presupposition and a proposition. We describe propositions in terms of certainty, truth and fal...
August 18, 2018 at 12:29
OK, an absolute presupposition is different from a proposition in the sense that the distinction of truth or falsehood does not apply to them. Why wou...
August 18, 2018 at 01:12
Dfpolis, I'm finding it very hard to understand the logic behind the assertions you make. You make assertions which appear to be illogical, and when I...
August 18, 2018 at 00:20
How low can you go? Coin that, you've just designed the worst possible insult. Let me be succinct. To describe a proposition, assumption, or presuppos...
August 17, 2018 at 14:51
If the truth or falsity of a matter is undecidable then thoughts about that matter are uncertain thoughts. That's not a third option, it's the second ...
August 17, 2018 at 11:12
OK, so let's suppose that we assume that nature is invariant, for the purpose of investigation. Either we assume that such is true, In which case it's...
August 17, 2018 at 01:18
Yeah, that's relevant. My point was that science really is not based on "absolute presuppositions", it's based on descriptions and definitions, and th...
August 17, 2018 at 00:14
Notice I quoted twice where the word "hope" was used. That we "hope" there is such an ascertainable truth indicates that we are uncertain as to whethe...
August 16, 2018 at 10:58
Yes the truth or falsity clearly is in question, according to that quoted passage. Did you read it? We hope to someday resolve it as to truth or falsi...
August 16, 2018 at 01:57
OK, but it's still nothing more than an uncertain thought under your definition
August 16, 2018 at 01:40
What do you mean, "we all know what axioms are"? An axiom in mathematics exists by a completely different standard from an axiom in philosophy. And I ...
August 16, 2018 at 01:22
The symphony stops when I fall asleep.
August 15, 2018 at 11:24
The problem with this argument is that the Bible is a collection of writings, not one single writing by one single person. When we collect together a ...
August 15, 2018 at 11:21
OK, if we can't speak of them in terms of whether they are true or false, why not identify them for what they are then? They're uncertain thoughts. Co...
August 15, 2018 at 11:10
Trump is racist? Shocking news!
August 15, 2018 at 11:00
But the form is separable from the matter, that's how we know things through abstraction, the form of the vase is brought into the mind. If the form o...
August 15, 2018 at 02:09
Yes, you have denied this, not explicitly but implicitly. That's what I've been trying to explain to you, the implications of what you stated, that th...
August 14, 2018 at 02:31
OK, let me go back to your question. The "material body" is a composite of matter and form. When the body changes the old form is replaced by a new fo...
August 13, 2018 at 16:29
I fully apprehend this issue and it's a difficult one. When "prior to" is analyzed for meaning, it can only be grounded in the temporal sense. So "ori...
August 13, 2018 at 12:11
Yes, I think "telos" is the key point. Notice Aristotle's comparison between natural and artificial things. It is clear, in the case of artificial thi...
August 13, 2018 at 02:17
It must necessarily be temporally prior, because it concerns the coming-to-be of the thing. This is the generation of the thing. Aristotle is asking w...
August 13, 2018 at 00:37
It refers to the individual. Sorry, I didn't notice the ambiguity when I wrote the sentence. Any material thing, as an individual, a particular thing,...
August 13, 2018 at 00:09
I think you misrepresent signification here. For something to be a sign, for it to signify, all that is required is that it has meaning. So there is n...
August 12, 2018 at 23:59
This is why apokrisis' semiotic approach to the act of perception is much more realistic. What the mind constructs, the so-called "image", is only a r...
August 12, 2018 at 17:48
That's not a straight forward question, but I think you'll find the answer in Metaphysics Bk.7, specifically ch.6. I believe that in the case of mater...
August 12, 2018 at 16:51
OK, but the usage in the analogy is other than your usage, so it doesn't actually explain your claimed convention. In the analogy there is a God who i...
August 12, 2018 at 14:19
This topic is discussed in Metaphysics. As Aristotle described, when an individual thing changes, the form which comes to be in the material object, m...
August 12, 2018 at 13:18
Actually what you have shown me is illogical. Rather than accept Aristotle's definition, and his general overall usage of "matter", which renders it i...
August 11, 2018 at 18:36
An end in itself, is something which is sought for the sake of itself. Doesn't "entertainment" fulfill this description. It is not sought for a furthe...
August 11, 2018 at 11:48
Isn't sport a form of entertainment? And isn't entertainment sought for the sake of being entertained? Perhaps baseball doesn't entertain you. But we ...
August 11, 2018 at 11:38
You may stretch your imagination in which ever direction you want, describe it, and stick an "if" in front. When you get good at it you can remove the...
August 11, 2018 at 11:34