There's some value in Thomism. But recent posts have relied on appeals to Aristotle and Plato as if they were authoritative; as if that they said it were proof enough.

This too will pass.

↪Arcane Sandwich
There's some value in Thomism. But recent posts have relied on appeals to Aristotle and Plato as if they were authoritative — Banno

They are. Those appeals, I mean. Technically speaking (since we love debating "the semantics of the rules" so much). They're fallacies.

There's some value in Thomism. — Banno

I'm not a Thomist myself, since I'm an atheist. But the mere fact that I'm an atheist doesn't mean, by itself, that I won't comprehend religious philosophers when I read what they wrote. That's just not being charitable to my own intellect.

Can you show that this view was maintained unmodified into the Later period? And if not, how was it modified? — Banno

That's an essay question. I cribbed some of the lecture notes but never sat the exam. Regardless, hope the point is clear.

recent posts have relied on appeals to Aristotle and Plato as if they were authoritative — Banno

It's not that. I've explained I'm not Catholic (although I'm also not atheist), but that Thomas preserves an element of the philosophia perennis which has elsewhere been forgotten. Similar points are made by Max Horkheimer in The Eclipse of Reason, and he's no friend to theism.

I'm simply urging us to notice that "the distinction is discernible" no matter what terms we use, and that is what counts. On the important point -- pistis and dianoia as picking out two different areas on the conceptual map -- we agree. And when we examine the various relations between the objects of pistis and dianoia, we may find yet further agreement. So we shouldn't let logomachy get in the way! — J

I'm very pleased to hear that. And, I've learned a new word!

Realism is true. That's not to say that materialism is true, it only means that realism is true — Arcane Sandwich

Post-realist approaches would agree with you. Realism is indeed true, but that’s just a circular statement. Realism is that way of thinking which thinks truth in terms of adequation and correctness of fit. Post-realist approaches, by contrast, understand truth as correctness to be a secondary form of truth. For instance, for Wittgenstein, within the norms provided by a language game , one can determine truth and falsity. But this notion of truth is irrelevant to the comparison between different language games. The life transitions that take us from
one language game to another can’t be made sense of in terms of truth as adequation.

Regardless, hope the point is clear. — Wayfarer

Again, you express a tractatian view, that is not carried forward.

Thomas preserves an element of the philosophia perennis which has elsewhere been forgotten. — Wayfarer

Forgotten or bypassed? I remain unconvinced.

'Mind is what brain does' is lumpen materialism. — Wayfarer

Phenomenology is lumpen idealism.

Phenomenology is lumpen idealism. — Arcane Sandwich

If you could make lumps from air.... :rofl:

I use π to work out the volume of a water tank. You use it to lay out the design for your garden. We are not here making use of a different thing. You could also use it to work out the volume of the tank.

That you do something different with π does not suggest that you are using a different π — Banno

We are using more or less the same sense of meaning of pi if we are proceeding within the same language game. This form of life is not strictly defined by the description of pi as the ratio of a circle's diameter to its circumference. It is rather a larger network of interconnected references that forms the basis of intelligibility of that description, as well as a potentially unlimited variety of similar but not identical descriptions. If the language game were different, the meaning of pi could change even if the description remained the same.

If you could make lumps from air.... :rofl: — Wayfarer

But you see, this is something else that I've been "secretly" arguing about, in other Threads. You know what it feels like? It feels exactly like this:

Intentional consciousness as Husserl understands it is necessarily (in a modal sense) dependent upon the factual world in which the Living Subject in the phenomenological sense is immersed. And that factual world, most of the time, is the world of ordinary life. The "Lifeworld" of Phenomenology is just ordinary life. — Arcane Sandwich

You have it exactly backwards. It is the factual world which is dependent on the processes of transcendental consciousness. Husserl was not a realist. The factual world was for him a product of the natural attitude, which concealed its own basis in subjective processes.

“Certainly the world that is in being for me, the world about which I have always had ideas and spoken about meaningfully, has meaning and is accepted as valid by me because of my own apperceptive performances because of these experiences that run their course and are combined precisely in those performances—as well as other functions of consciousness, such as thinking. But is it not a piece of foolishness to suppose that world has being because of some performance of mine? Clearly, I must make my formulation more precise. In my Ego there is formed, from out of the proper sources of transcendental passivity and activity, my “representation of the world, ” my “picture of the world, ” whereas outside of me, naturally enough, there is the world itself. But is this really a good way of putting it? Does this talk about outer and inner, if it makes any sense at all, receive its meaning from anywhere else than from my formation and my preservation of meaning? Should I forget that the totality of everything that I can ever think of as in being resides within the universal realm of consciousness, within my realm, that of the Ego, and indeed within what is for me real or possible?” (Phenomenology and Anthropology)


“Indeed, perhaps it will turn out later that all externality, even that of the entire inductive nature, physical and even psychophysical, is only an externality constituted in the unity of communicative personal experience, is thus only something secondary, and that it requires a reduction to a truly essential internality.”

You're not doing your case any favour by citing cartoons.

If the language game were different, the meaning of pi could change even if the description remained the same. — Joshs

You talk as if there were a discrete entity that is the "meaning" of π.

That's the bit to which I am objecting.

Whether you use π to find the volume of tanks or the orbital period of a planet, the extension of "π" is the very same. That much is clear.

That we are doing something different with π does not imply that we are using a different π.

If in your novel language game the value of π is different, then that is simply not a use of π.

So extension is clear. Meaning, not so much.

You have it exactly backwards. It is the factual world which is dependent on the processes of transcendental consciousness. Husserl was not a realist. The factual world was for him a product of the natural attitude, which concealed its own basis in subjective processes. — Joshs

If @Wayfarer can say that the brain-stomach metaphor is lumpen materialism, then I can say that what you just said in that quote is lumpen idealism.

But you notice, I presented an argument. I said, the analogy of stomach and enzymes is insufficient as an analogy for brain and thought, on the basis that, in the former, there is a clear and comprehensive account of how digestion works, in terms of organic chemistry, physiology and so on. But there's no way to extend that to the relationship between brain, mind, and thought (see the Explanatory Gap). There are many reasons why this is so, too many to try and squeeze into a forum post, but I gave at least one of them in my initial response. (Note that 'lumpen materialism' is not intended as an ad hominem, it is the description of an attitude.)

@Joshs and I have our differences, but I'm entirely on board with that quote he provided from and about Husserl. That Mario Bunge thinks Husserl is obscure is not an argument, but again, an attitude. He simply takes it for granted that anything that sounds like idealism is wrong, because any sensible person would think so. But Husserl is making a case. Tackle that case.

You have it exactly backwards. It is the factual world which is dependent on the processes of transcendental consciousness. Husserl was not a realist. The factual world was for him a product of the natural attitude, which concealed its own basis in subjective processes. — Joshs

And yet not just any "processes of transcendental consciousness" will do; the "processes of transcendental consciousness" is itself restricted by the "factual world"...

It's not either realism or idealism, We construct the facts, from the world.

You talk as if there were a discrete entity that is the "meaning" of π.

That's the bit to which I am objecting.

Whether you use π to find the volume of tanks or the orbital period of a planet, the extension of "π" is the very same. That much is clear.

That we are doing something different with π does not imply that we are using a different π.

If in your novel language game the value of π is different, then that is simply not a use of π. — Banno

Taking this step by step:

I should say sense of meaning rather than meaning.

When I talk about the use of pi I dont mean applying it to different problems, I mean that every time I hear or think the word ‘pi’ I am using pi. This goes back to Witt’s claim that words only existence in their use. The point is that we don’t first learn to understand a word or mathematical symbol and then draw on that understanding like a static picture stored in our memory every time we hear or think the word or symbol. Instead, something new happens when we connect our memory of prior understanding with the actual context we are faced with when we hear or think the word again. This is why we don’t simply recall a learned word, we ‘use’ it.

So what happens when we use a word in a new context, but within a stable language game? If that word is pi, then there is little likelihood of any dispute arising over whether one of us is following the ‘rule’ specified by pi correctly. That stability is not the consequence of the description of pi as the ratio of a circle's diameter to its circumference. There is a much richer network of significations underlying that seeming simple and straightforward description making it possible for us to agree on what it means to apply pi correctly. Put differently, the ‘bedrock’ belief alleviating the need for doubt in the case of applying pi is in the underlying language game , not the extension.

. But there's no way to extend that to the relationship between brain, mind, and thought. — Wayfarer

How do you know that "There is no way" here? Overstretching yourself, again, it seems. The best you might conclude is that it hasn't been done yet; that's not to say it cannot be done.

The neuroscience is in a state of rapid development.

That Mario Bunge thinks Husserl is obscure is not an argument, but again, an attitude. He simply takes it for granted that anything that sounds like idealism is wrong, because any sensible person would think so. But Husserl is making a case. Tackle that case. — Wayfarer

(Note that 'lumpen materialism' is not intended as an ad hominem, it is the description of an attitude.) — Wayfarer

You just described my attitude as "lumpen materialist". So if I'm literally a lumpen materialist, why should I even tackle that case? I am a lumpen after all (you just said so, by calling me a lumpen materialist), so why would I put in the work to being with?

You've happened on the forums at a time when the fashion is towards mediaeval thinking. — Banno

I know what you're getting at, but discussing the Divided Line is a different matter, no? Surely we can adapt the ideas of pistis and dianoia into our modern debates. And very interesting contemporary philosophers like Kimhi and Rödl are using Aristotle in new ways.

What is "medieval" to me -- and this has nothing to do with Thomism as such -- is the appeals to authority. It's not so much "X is correct because Plato said so" but rather "X is incomprehensible to modern thought unless we agree with how Plato viewed X."

Then it becomes very unclear to me what you were saying way back here, where in rpely to my "π is not private thing in each of our heads, but a public thing that is used openly to make calculations and settle disagreements" you said:

Pi is like any other word. It is communicated in partially shared circumstances. This circumstance includes your brain processes and my brains processes , along with their embodiment in each of our organisms and the embeddedness of our brains and bodies in a partially shared social environment. None of these aspects
can be neatly disentangled from the others, but the fact that the meaning of pi is only partially shared between us explains why its use by either of us can always be contested by the other. — Joshs

What is your point of disagreement, if there is one?

And yet not just any "processes of transcendental consciousness" will do; the "processes of transcendental consciousness" is itself restricted by the "factual world"...

It's not either realism or idealism, We construct the facts, from the world — Banno

Yes, neither realism nor idealism. But for Husserl, the factual world only has its intelligibility on the basis of acts of coordination and correlation between events and schemes which assimilate them. Just as for Wittgenstein, there is never a norm-free basis for understanding the world.

I know what you're getting at, but discussing the Divided Line is a different matter, no? Surely we can adapt the ideas of pistis and dianoia into our modern debates. — J

I think not, pistis and dianoia are pseudo-scientific concepts. They had their day, let them rest. When a science lives long enough, it turns into a pseudo-science, unfortunately. Oddly enough, it never begins as one. As a pseudoscience, I mean. Pseudosciences never turn into sciences. Only protosciences do. But when a science is living past "its heyday", so to speak, then it turns into a pseudoscience.

This is all just Theory though, that part might be wrong.

You just described my attitude as "lumpen materialist". — Arcane Sandwich

I apologize, it was careless of me to use that term and I will not do so again. But then, as I explained, the view that 'mind is to brain as digestion is to the stomach' is a materialist attitude. Mario Bunge, whom you introduced into the conversation, is an avowed materialist. And the kinds of criticisms of phenomenology of his which you've referenced so far, hardly amount to arguments, so much as declarations.

It's not either realism or idealism, We construct the facts, from the world. — Banno

Agree! I've said this many times - that self and world co-arise. There is not one without the other. But that is much nearer to phenomenology and transcendental idealism than it is to direct realism. And it's also very near to Buddhist philosophy.

What is "medieval" to me -- and this has nothing to do with Thomism as such -- is the appeals to authority. — J

But notice that nowadays even reason is relativised; it is social convention, it is a useful tool, it has nothing to do with the way the world is. To even appeal to reason is nowadays covertly regarded as an appeal to authority.

Sure, we can make new use of antique arguments. But they are not in themselves authoritative; and there are reasons they are antique.

What is your point of disagreement, if there is one? — Banno

I’ve forgotten now.

...the factual world only has its intelligibility on the basis of acts of coordination and correlation between events and schemes which assimilate them. — Joshs

Sure. That does not make the world only the result of those "acts of coordination and correlation between events and schemes which assimilate them". Not just any "acts of coordination and correlation between events and schemes which assimilate them" will do. There remains novelty, agreement and error, embedding us in a world that does not care what we believe.

I’ve forgotten now. — Joshs

Me too.

↪J Nice work. I'll go along with that.

I baulk at your distinguishing "conceptual" from "terminological". Our terminology sets out our "conceptual framework" as it were. — Banno

Thanks -- but if we can't distinguish "conceptual" from "terminological," then what I'm saying wouldn't make sense. How about this? We likely construct our conceptual maps using language, the language we're taught as children and the further technical language, if any, that we acquire as philosophers. At a certain point we can realize that we now have a pretty adequate conceptual map -- we see where the pieces ought to go, more or less -- but there's a problem with the words we were taught. So we can abandon some of the terms, while retaining the map. This is what I mean by "conceptual" versus "terminological." Another way to describe it would be "structural" versus "labeling". We all know what it's like to view a structure, note the various pieces, but find the names (if any) for the pieces to be confusing or silly.

The contrary view -- that language goes all the way down, that thinking or conceptualizing is irreducibly linguistic -- I think is wrong. The path may depend on language, but what we find there has got to be independent, because otherwise the problem will metamorphose into Everything Is Language -- cats and so forth. I'm too much of a realist for that.

But then, as I explained, the view that 'mind is to brain as digestion is to the stomach' is a materialist attitude. — Wayfarer

So what? Who cares? It's not a big deal, to anyone. Not even to Bungeans, and I'm one of them myself.

Mario Bunge, whom you introduced into the conversation, is an avowed materialist. — Wayfarer

And so am I. And, I am not Mario Bunge. I'm allowed to have my own thoughts. That is a basic ontological right that I have. It implies nothing.

And the kinds of criticisms of phenomenology of his which you've referenced so far, hardly amount to arguments, so much as declarations. — Wayfarer

And I told you that I agree with you on that point: Bunge is wrong, and you, Sir., are right. Like, what more do you want, mate? I'm not going to give you a Medal of Honor for that.

So what's your point? You sound like you don't need me, from a philosophical point of view. But we're philosophizing. So what is that you need from me specifically in philosophical terms, mate? I mean, am I even allowed to call you "mate"? Have you somehow allowed it? Must you allow it? What do you think of it? Is your opinion as valid as mine? Do we both believe in good common sense? What is good common sense, anyway? Should it be trusted? Good common sense I mean, should it be trusted as if it were "a thing"? Etc., and so on, and so forth, down the Rabbit Hole we go, but for what? That's what I call "lumpen idealism": chasing the experience of imaginary Rabbit Holes. Like, mate, you have an intellectual addiction, you need more materialism in your life.

And very interesting contemporary philosophers like Kimhi and Rödl are using Aristotle in new ways. — J

I'm following your other thread on Rödl and also reading the text.

So what is that you need from me specifically in philosophical terms — Arcane Sandwich

I don't need or expect anything from anyone. We're here to discuss ideas, and these discussions do push buttons from time to time.

I don't need or expect anything from anyone. We're here to discuss ideas, and these discussions do push buttons from time to time. — Wayfarer

Yeah, the button that says "lumpen materialism", and you lay that down on Bunge, on me, and on Searle. What did Searle ever do to phenomenology?