macrosoft

Yeah, I'd say that of course the external world exists. My point is maybe that it doesn't exist as a theoretical object. It's not like we have complic...

Right. And for me this is the real ground. And it's not an exact ground. It is a fuzzy darkness, though we can always shine a light here or there when...

Oh, OK. Then yes. I like that. I would just add that we don't have to 'have them in mind.' They are there like a dark background for the most part. Ju...

If you mean that all the facts are entangled in a system, then that is my cup of tea. If you mean that the world is 'primordially' intelligible, then ...

Agreed, and the light that hits are eyes is not the tree. But one can say that we see the tree, that the light reveals the tree to us through our eyes...

I'm not even saying I disagree, but what is a fact for you? Merely offering the phrase out of context doesn't say much. This is my tedious meaning hol...

I don't think this does justice to what we mean and experience. I can totally relate, though, to relating our experiences of being a brain to measurab...

I love the later Wittgenstein, though the aesthetic/ethical thrust of the TLP is great. To me it's not particularly useful to say that the world is th...

No. But I've read lots of Rorty, if that helps. I think he's pretty great, and I also have lots of respect for instrumentalism, pragmatism, etc. Holis...

If one wants philosophy to address the 'highest' things, then one is naturally going to be drawn to existentialism, the philosophy of religion and art...

My understanding of humans includes that they will die without water and feel pretty bad on the way to that thirsty grave. It also includes the idea t...

Oh, I agree with that, roughly or sufficiently. (I think it's pretty much always possible to qualify, qualify, qualify --but not always appropriate, e...

For me, though, 'mental' doesn't have some sharp meaning. Sure, we have a rough categorization, but I don't think it's sharp enough for what philosoph...

I'd say it's a terminological dispute, because here we are talking, pretty much intelligible to one another. And I'm guessing you think in English tha...

Perhaps. But if I'm honest, I'm not getting a clear picture of your perspective.

But there is no private language. We start with a profound sense of the inter-subjectivity of meaning. We are already where some of us think we need t...

To me the way to frame this question from the very beginning is how numbers exist, because if they don't exist in some way then what are we talking ab...

I don't deny that there is a little drop of something like atomic meaning associated with words. For instance, 'apple' will likely activate an image o...

But I never said that they did. That obscure ground works for us almost every time. It only breaks down all the time in philosophy, where we are const...

That sounds kinda-like what I mean. I am saying that attitude is entangled with method. And I am saying that the functioning ground is global and larg...

Our basic sense of who we are has a top-down effect on the details, the 'trees.' If my hero is the scientist who gazes at the cold hard truth without ...

But what is a subjectivist out of context? See all of these little positions, these 'mini-identities,' are just like atomic words. I am suspicious abo...

Well, you said the atomic meaning was apparent, and I was just trying to get you to introspect and see that words out of context don't have much force...

Is that so? So what lights up in your mind when I just offer the word 'justice' out of context? My point is that words function together. Meanings do ...

Right, but they experience that making of unnecessary trouble as necessary at the time.

What is the atomic meaning of 'justice'? Is it crisp in your head? Can you hold the exhaustive concept of justice in a single thought? I'm surprised t...

Exactly. We all stand on the same ground more or less, else we would not be able to make sense of one another at all. Now we are getting there. There ...

Your way of speaking and being manifests these 'truths' constantly. It's only when we reach for little machine like arguments that things get slippery...

My point is that the ground is somewhat obscure. Do you have any real doubt that you live in a world with others?

I'm saying that the ground is not a few ultra-important meanings but the language as a whole.

You just described exactly the view that I am 'attacking.'

I can somewhat to relate to that, but I wonder if you see where I'm coming from in terms of the interdependence of meanings --that they aren't really ...

Another approach is to just think about what it means to know English. Now you are not at all aware of every English word just now or every meaningful...

I've written about it in lots of post, and the name 'macrosoft' even hints at it. Basically the idea is that the tree gets its meaning from the forest...

As Let's say you try to live as an X. You do your best to live up to the pose, but you find that it just doesn't work in practice. And even logically ...

Two big revolutions for me were (1) self-consciousness with respect to the 'pose' and (2) meaning holism. And of course they are related. Meaning holi...

What I think 'really' happens is that individuals just get more and more complex. They understand more and more positions from 'the outside,' with a k...

To me there's never really been a stable system. Maybe this is a Hegelian idea, but I think every position tends to manifest some gap or blindspot.

I learned from it. I like that it is has the guts to face the monsters.

To me that's almost the central question. Who should I be? Who can I manage to be?

Sure. I may be interrupted, but I may not.

Part of the complexity comes from thinking the distinction between the world and our image of it is itself 'within' the image of the world, threatenin...

But surely most don't mean the same thing by 'ideas' and 'particular brain states.' Most would probably grant some kind of important relationship, but...

Sure, or, in other words, how the work exists for them, because the response is surely not only or even primarily thought.

I'd say maybe look into the ideas of the later Wittgenstein. All kinds of metaphysical ideas break down if we analyze the individual concepts. That's ...

I can respect that, but I'm surprised. Doesn't some some art stand out as not just clever, not just skillful, not just pleasant?

First, thanks for responding, and I think we have made progress in understanding one another. In your quote, you write : only material particulars and...

I thought of one more way to approach this. I have the impression that you are focusing on whether something exists. It's a binary predicate in the sa...

Well said.

I agree, at least technically. But I think there is an implicit focus on what some might call the highest or deepest kind of art. Obviously what this ...