Banno

It's still there, put together by your brain in order to explain what you did.

That's pretty much what I am suggesting: that your preference is what you do, and your belief is a (logically) post hoc explanation for your action. "...

Which project? There were a few...

Yes. And, the post hoc justifications we use to explain our own behaviour lend themselves to ascribing beliefs to animals.

Describing Davidson as Cartesian would be... shall we say, odd.

The notion I am playing with is that we get the order of the explanation wrong. It's not: Pat believes the keys are in the Kitchen So, all things bein...

Hence triangulation - me, you, the world. (A triplet - Pierce would be so pleased)

Oh, and the other.

Sure. But what it obviously leaves out is the world.

It astonishes me that there is any debate here. The issue is clear cut; children before guns. The extent that yanks will go to in order to justify the...

What else would it be?

That map-teritory model was critiqued by Davidson, I think with considerable success.

Actually, I'm not sure that's right. It's rather that Pat searches the kitchen, and justifies his behaviour post-hoc by claiming to believe that the k...

Hanson argues that our justifications serve to align what we do with the norms of our culture. So in effect the reason Pat looks in the kitchen is not...

So beliefs are post-hoc justifications for stuff we do anyway.

Strewth, that was quick. Have you come across the book The Elephant in the Brain? See https://80000hours.org/podcast/episodes/robin-hanson-on-lying-to...

This appears to be the same point I have made at various times with that silly philosophical game in which players make up the rules of the game as th...

Beliefs are of little use in explaining behaviour.

Apologies for the delay. Yes.

Same answer. Putting it in writing or saying it out loud both bring it out in the open.

Yep. A democracy that can't fix its issues.

...then of course there is all he has done on the issue of gun control; schools are such safe places now.

...and he has done so much for peace in Gaza...

Trump has much to answer for.

An appeal to authority. Hm. I have only a Shorter OED, but it lists five definitions. The one you appear to leap to is the third: "Not to be doubted; ...

So are certainties undoubted propositions? But what is involved in doubting some proposition, if not for adopting a specific attitude towards it?

A meta muddle. Certainties are not undoubted facts. First off, Not all certainties are facts. One can be certain of things that are not true.

Yeah. I'm lost, too. "I am certain" is a statement of an attitude; but "We are certain" isn't. Nor is "He is certain".

Jill was certain. turns out she was wrong. It turned out that what she thought was the case, wasn't. SO we can be certain of things other than facts.

Both are attitudes. So now we are in agreement.

(My italics) But to not doubt some given fact is to adopt a specific attitude towards it - that is, to be certain of it. I can't see your distinction.

That's because certainty is an attitude.

OK, let's take it for a drive... Mad Mike builds rockets to launch himself into space so that he can see for himself if the Earth is flat or curved. M...

What of the ambiguity mentioned above - any belief could be used to justify any action, given suitable auxiliaries. This appears to undermine any caus...

Infelicities Error: believing one thing when another is true Lying: saying one thing is true while believing another Hypocrisy: Claiming a belief that...

Interesting, but not demonstrated. Yeah, serves me right for over-stating the case. It's not nothing, it's irrelevant. Edit: I see Janus said this bef...

Various changes made to the exposition in the OP, The interesting bit: An individual's belief is inscrutable I tried to defend the notion that to beli...

In the example - which you set up - recording devices, physical evidence, personal recollections are ruled out ex hypothesi. Any such device would mak...

We can see that he held two different beliefs. That is, in order to understand this situation, we are needed. Beliefs require the Other.

I'll leave that to science. That we learn the language of our family shows that language is learnable. A child of Russian descent who is adopted at bi...

What is a state of being? I can make sense of a propositional attitude, but a state of being - sounds suspicious. Folk are certain of unproven things ...

Really? So language is unlearnable?

So you are comfortable with Bob thinking that he has a theory that contradicts itself? Bob believes A; over time, his belief changes to ~A, but he doe...

Sure. What cannot be said can be shown. I can't tell you how to ride a bike but I can show you. Bike riding is not private. IF i can't tell you what I...

The first thing to note is that certainty is an attitude. So it's not "Can we be certain that the sun will rise tomorrow?" but "Ought we be certain th...

Indeed, if it is not expressible, why call it a theory? If it is not expressible, then it is nothing.

This is deeply anti-Cartesian. Descartes failed to notice that in doubting all but his own doubt, he already admitted the language in which he could d...

What counts is that Bob's theory is distinct from George's theory. And getting back on topic, what makes beliefs worthy of consideration at all is tha...

Suppose that Bob's theory changes over the time spent on the island, but Bob doesn't notice. There's no written record to compare it to, and George ha...

IF Knowledge is justified true belief, and if belief is propositional, then knowledge is propositional. IF knowledge is being able to act in a specifi...