- Thanks Paine. Another very lucid and helpful post. :up:

Thus the soundness of the concept of a c-proposition depends on there being this structure to the thought of someone who uses a sentence to make an assertion: thinking it correct to use the sentence in the way that she does, she thinks that a c-proposition is true at the context in which she uses it. — ibid. page 30

Some overlap here:

Accordingly, linguistic expressions refer to what their users intend by them to refer to in a given context, that is, what they think of while using the expression either properly, or improperly.8 So referring was held to be a context-dependent property of terms: according to this view, the same expression in different propositional contexts may refer to different things, or refer to something in one context, while refer to nothing in another. — Gyula Klima, St. Anselm's Proof

-

The question becomes, on what basis does that "structure of thought" involve verification from what is presumed to exist outside of it. At that point, I do not see it as a matter of how "Pat" or "Quenton" choose what is happening. — Paine

Yes, I think I am just barely understanding what you are saying here. Is it something like the idea that c-propositions, if true, demonstrate that there is significant bleed between force and content? Or does the new distinction's newness simply conceptualize the territory differently without in any way reordering that which force/content takes for granted? Is there any continuity between the force/content distinction and the new distinction?

Good, and let's remind ourselves what Rodl means by "validity": He's not saying that "I judge p to be true" means that it must be true. We can certainly be mistaken in our judgments. He means, "If it is true, then it is valid to so judge."

"Judgment is self-consciously and objectively valid." [This] locution is not meant to convey -- absurdly -- that judgment as such is valid. It describes the form of validity that belongs to a judgment. . . . And its validity is objective: the measure of its validity does not involve the subject of the judgment. — Rodl, 5

The Klima quote does demonstrate that he and Rödl are both addressing a shared understanding
of force/content propositions. 's description of second order judgement also bears that out. Perhaps the impending discussion of Aristotle will touch upon some of the distinctions between ancient and modern concepts that concern Klima. But those distinctions do not directly concern Rödl's effort here to completely defeat the force/content explanation for all time.

Rödl does not treat his opposition as an equal in a dispute such as Anselm or Aquinas would argue against. Rödl uses the term "reflection" in a consistent way in the book. An early example:

Therefore there is no such thing as a first-person proposition. There has been opposition to the idea that first-person thought is a propositional attitude. This is helpful, for it weakens the immunity to reflection enjoyed by the idea. Yet the opposition is limited; it limits itself by thinking of the first person as marking out a special class of thoughts. — ibid. page 34

To lose this immunity is to become exposed in a way that causes distress to the thinker. The isolation of immunity interferes with reflection. The question of epistemic agency is treated as an illusion:

I am doing something, I am active. It is not a point about the content. There is no notion that the I think is inside p, no notion that reflecting on the I think is reflecting on p. The self-consciousness of thought is not in view in the infatuation with agency — ibid. 35

.

The coup de grâce given to his proposed interlocutors:

But if what I say is true, then the demand for argument does not show intellectual acumen, but betrays a lack of understanding. An argument establishes that something is so by citing grounds for it. Embracing the argument involves affirming these grounds. An argument rests judgment on judgment. But if what I say is true, then the knowledge of it is contained in any judgment. There is no meaning in the idea that I might come to know it by turning to a further judgment. — ibid. page 39

All of this is interesting in its own way, but it reminds me of the adage, "Hard cases make for bad law." If Rodl is to subtly critique the various conceptions of thought on the basis of not properly capturing self-consciousness, and if he is going to do his darndest to capture this notion of self-consciousness with perfect exactitude, will this hyper-focus on self-consciousness produce a reliable anchor for thought? Or is it a hard case that makes for bad law? Because it seems that the response of any of his interlocutors could simply be, "Our approach may not be able to handle the minutiae of self-consciousness, but it provides a much firmer foundation than an approach that is hyper-focused on, or hyper-accommodating to, the subtleties of self-consciousness." So perhaps Rodl thinks that his approach will improve on these other approaches even apart from questions of self-consciousness, or that properly understanding self-consciousness and fitting our theories to that understanding will be the key that unlocks the box containing what has previously remained hidden. And of course Rodl does not say, "I think I am Pandora," but would his interlocutors agree?

---

Good, and let's remind ourselves what Rodl means by "validity": He's not saying that "I judge p to be true" means that it must be true. We can certainly be mistaken in our judgments. He means, "If it is true, then it is valid to so judge." — J

"p is valid, and by that I mean that if p is true then it is valid to judge it true." Or, "I judge p to be true, and by that I mean that if p is true then it is valid to judge it true."

It surely must be more than that. Presumably Rodl is saying that what some separate into a second-order act is already contained in the first-order act, and validity cannot be merely a non-committal conditional, "If it is true..." (because the second-order act was more than a non-committal conditional). Presumably validity involves the notion that it is in fact true, even if this is not infallible.

What is being opposed by Rödl is the ground for thinking:

If Rodl is to subtly critique the various conceptions of thought on the basis of not properly capturing self-consciousness — Leontiskos

By speaking of how "objectivity and self-consciousness can be conjoined", Rödl is sounding a retreat from where "various conceptions of thought" are possible contenders of a true condition. His argument is the antithesis to a prolegomenon of any future metaphysics:

The science of judgment does not stake out a position, located in a space of positions structured by relations of exclusion or inclusion. It says only what anyone always already knows, knows insofar as she judges at all. — ibid. page 39

At the end of 3.1, a footnote compares the "the science without contrary" with a passage from Wittgenstein:

Wittgenstein, Philosophical Investigations § 251, suggests that it is the defining mark of “grammatical sentences”, which are the province of philosophical reflection, to be without contrary. — ibid. Footnote 1

In regard to Rödl militating against the mind/not mind opposition, perhaps a closer example of concordance with Wittgenstein is in the Blue Book where solipsism is said not to be an opinion.

In regard to Rödl militating against the mind/not mind opposition, perhaps a closer example of concordance with Wittgenstein is in the Blue Book where solipsism is said not to be an opinion. — Paine

Hmm, okay. So Rodl is just telling us "what anyone always already knows." He need not jockey among "possible contenders of a true condition." He is above that, no? He wants to eclipse that whole debate.

So Rodl is just telling us "what anyone always already knows." — Leontiskos

Perhaps it's matter of recollection ;-)

The scope of the book, of which I am less than halfway through, is said by Rödl to address the validity of empirical judgements by the end of it. That suggests that more is required than the claim about what "anyone already knows".

But it is fair to say he claims his view is less deluded than others. I am not sure what I think about it, but that element was missing from the discussion here so far.

- That's fair. You've definitely shed a great deal of light on the book, as have @Wayfarer's synopses. It has helped to orient me to what it is all about. :up:

3.4 Holding a True Thought I spent quite a bit of time on this section, partly because it seems so repetitive and I am becoming a bit exasperrated by the repetive nature of the arguments.

Rödl acknowledges that many resist the idea that we are conscious of our own judgments only through second-order judgments. However, he points out that rejecting second-order judgement while still maintaining the force-content distinction is incoherent. The two positions are intimately linked: if judgment is structured into force (assent) and content (the thought), then self-awareness of judgment must be a separate act— meaning it entails second-order judgement, and that, If we reject second-order, we must also reject the force-content distinction.

If we accept the force-content distinction, then self-awareness of judgment is always a second-order act, which means the first-order judgment itself lacks inherent validity. This renders judgment passive or “dead,” lacking logical traction—it is just an attitude toward a thought rather than an act of understanding. (It means we have 'no dog in the fight' as the saying has it.)

Rödl reconstructs how the force-content distinction conceptualizes judgment: judging means assigning the value true to a thought. This is separate from thinking that it is correct to judge it is true, which is treated as a distinct second-order judgment. However, Rödl notes that recognizing that "it is right to hold p true if and only if p is true" already blurs this distinction because the act of judging and the act of thinking its correctness are intertwined.

Someone who possesses the concept of judgment can expand a judgment by adding, "and so it is right to assent to p." However, Rödl argues that this is only a superficial return to judgment—it does not reintegrate the act of judging with its validity but merely layers a second thought on top of it. The structure remains bifurcated.

Rödl then presents a scenario where someone affirms both p and ¬p, while also knowing that one must be false. This awareness does not necessarily mean they recognize that they themselves are making a contradictory judgment. The logic of the situation is understood, but it is not integrated into self-conscious awareness of one’s own act of judgment.

Where someone holds contradictory judgments:
*She judges that p is true.
*She judges that ¬p (not-p) is true.
*She also holds the meta-level belief that "it is correct to hold a thought true if and only if it is true."

From this, she can logically infer that someone (which might include her!) must be making an error.

At first glance, this seems unproblematic—she recognizes that something must be wrong with holding both p and ¬p as true. However, Rödl points out that if we separate force (the act of judging) from content (the thought being judged), nothing necessitates that she is aware that she herself is the one making the contradictory judgments.

This is the key flaw: if judgment is treated merely as assigning truth values to thoughts, rather than as an inherently self-conscious act (e.g. she knows she is thinking p), then contradictions can be recognized in an abstract way but without self-awareness. She can see that someone is in error, but there’s no necessity that she realizes she herself is the one making the mistake.

In other words, if the force-content distinction were correct, then logical contradiction would not necessarily lead to self-awareness of error, because judgment would not be inherently self-conscious.

Now, Rödl shifts the focus to inference. Suppose someone judges:

*A is true.
*B is true.
*She knows that if A and B are true, then C must be true.

Based on this, she judges that C is true.

So far, everything seems fine: she makes a logical inference. However, Rödl points out a crucial gap: nothing in this description implies that she is aware of having inferred C from A and B:

We cannot say that she knows that she holds a given thought true because judging something is understanding oneself to judge it. For then assigning the value true to a thought would be thinking it valid to assign this value to that thought. The act of holding true a content would be inside that content and the distinction of force and content would collapse. — p47

The problem, again, stems from treating judgment as merely assigning truth values to thoughts. If judgment were just about saying “A is true” and “B is true,” and then mechanically following a rule to conclude “C is true,” then there is no necessary awareness that she has performed an inference. In other words, she might have judged correctly but without knowing why she holds C true.

At this point, I was reminded of John Searle’s ‘Chinese Room’ argument. As is well-known, this thought-experiment is meant to challenge the idea that syntactic processing (mere symbol manipulation) is sufficient for understanding. Rödl’s critique of the force-content distinction exposes a similar issue: if judgment is just assigning truth values (a kind of syntactic operation), then the person making the judgment could go through all the correct logical steps without actually understanding what they mean—just like Searle’s man in the Chinese Room follows rules for manipulating Chinese symbols without understanding Chinese.

In both cases, the key problem is lack of intrinsic self-consciousness:

* The man in the Chinese Room manipulates symbols but does not understand them.
* The thinker who assigns truth values to thoughts (under the force-content distinction) can make inferences or recognize contradictions but does not necessarily recognize themselves as making these judgments.

Rödl’s position could be seen as a deep challenge to the very idea that cognition (or at least judgment) could ever be modeled in purely mechanistic, syntactic terms. Just as Searle insists that syntax is not sufficient for semantics (understanding), Rödl insists that judgment is not just assigning truth values but is an act of self-conscious understanding.

That's all for now.

What have you decided concerning the OP?

I guess he thinks <p>.

I guess he thinks <p>. — Wayfarer

:lol: And I do it self-consciously!

What have you decided concerning the OP? — Banno

Looking back at the OP, I'm struck by how modest its scope was intended to be. I was, and am, quite unequipped to teach anything about Rodl, and am still working my way through his remarkable book. My interest in the OP was about the "I think" in general, and whether a "common sense" report such as Pat's has to be accepted at face value. My responses 1 - 3 were intended to be possible disagreements with an empirical or experience-based understanding of what the "I think" is supposed to represent.

So on reflection, I have two main conclusions. First, that the time spent on the thread in attempts to clarify terminology were essential, and barely touched some of what is needed when we use words like "think" or "accompany" or "self-conscious". (Does the "I think" accompany thought the way a nanny accompanies a pram?). Second, that response #3 comes closest to my own view. Speaking to Pat, I would agree with her about her experience, and say something like, "So we see that either the 'I think' is a conspiracy of Kantians and phenomenologists, or it has to be an unexperienced condition of thought. You may well decide that the former is true, and there is no purpose to positing an 'I think'. But if you're willing to entertain the idea that there's something to it, then it must function for us similarly to space and time in other types of cognition."

OK, and one further semi-conclusion. Rodl wants to argue for some significant aspects of self-consciousness that he believes are built in to the "I think". I'm not (yet) convinced this is necessary. I believe thought is necessarily first-personal, but to say, as in response #2, that "the 'I think' is an experience of self-consciousness" seems wrong on two counts: the "I think" is not an experience at all (Rodl would agree), and self-consciousness is being asked to stretch itself into something constitutive of objectivity. Let me quote @Wayfarer's astute summary on this:

To make a judgement is implicitly to state 'I think that <p>' or 'I believe that <p>' In this sense, judgement is itself not one perspective among many but the condition for the possibility of any perspective.

To deny that judgment is self-conscious would involve making a judgment—and thus reaffirming what you are trying to deny. This makes the self-consciousness of judgment something that cannot be opposed or rejected. — Wayfarer

This seems to me a bridge too far. I can accept the first paragraph: In an important sense, judgment is not like other "possible perspectives." But the second paragraph is question-begging: It only describes a contradiction if you already posit that a judgment must be self-conscious. Perhaps more importantly, we want self-consciousness to be interesting, to be about something that is worth pondering and exploring. This isn't it. But again, the debates re Rodl can go on and on, while the OP was aiming at much smaller fry.

I’m happy to have delved into the book, as I’d noticed it before it was brought up here, but had been put off by the reviews and its perceived obtuseness. I wanted to like it, due to the title being about absolute idealism, what with my interest in and advocacy for philosophical idealism. And when I did the hard yards of reading the first three chapters, I started to see the points Rödl was making. But I also had a strong sense of ‘so what’? In plain language, he’s criticising ‘objectivism’ and/or metaphysical realism, the stance that the world is just so, irrespective of your or my or anyone’s judgement of it, something which I’ve never gone along with. In the end I decided that I’m not really the audience for the book, that audience being the academic profession. In fact I’m not much interested in 20th century philosophy, generally. So I’m not going to persist with it, but I’ve learned from the exercise.

Thanks - it's been an interesting topic, your summation is appreciated. Three response.


First, for my part I "think" is too broad a word to bear the sort of analysis attempted here. In addition, since the context "I think..." is extensionally opaque, I doubt the wisdom of supposing that there is a general case to be made.

Relating this to the OP, accepting (3) rather than (4) seems to be claiming that Pat is mistaken as to her account of her own metal life. I doubt such a move can be justified.



Second, even if we supose that such a critique of Pat might be valid, Way's account still looks at odds with the OP.

To make a judgement is implicitly to state 'I think that <p>' or 'I believe that <p>' In this sense, judgement is itself not one perspective among many but the condition for the possibility of any perspective. — Wayfarer

Arguably, to make a judgement is to think that some state of affairs is so, for some account of "think". But one can think of some state of affairs without judging it to be so. Hence even if to make a judgement is to think, to think may not always to make a judgement.

This is perhaps what is asked in the OP - not does every judgement involve thinking, but does every thought involve judgement.

The simple truth behind this is that we can entertain a proposition without thereby accepting, believing, or assenting to it.



And third, Frege's approach bypass such discussions by placing the whole argument within the scope of the Begriffsschrift, "⊢". The Begriffsschrift might be "I think..."; or "I judge...", "I believe...", "I wonder if...", "I doubt...". That is irrelevant to the content. Hence, demonstrably, the content can be considered separately from the intent and the intentionality.



So I'll still opt for (4). The grain of truth in Rödl's thinking might be that when Pat thinks "The oak tree is shedding its leaves" Pat is supposing there to be oak trees and leaves. It would be a stretch to call this a judgement, as if there were an alternative here.

Relating this to the OP, accepting (3) rather than (4) seems to be claiming that Pat is mistaken as to her account of her own mental life. I doubt such a move can be justified. — Banno

I don't want to keep this going unnecessarily, but it's worth pointing out that, in other contexts, it's perfectly ordinary to question someone's account of their mental life. We question motivations, refer to unconscious processes, interrogate "forgotten" memories, etc., all in the belief that we are frequently mistaken in our account of our mental life.

Good thoughts from all, thanks.

I am going to hang on until at least the chapters involving Aristotle.

I have been distracted by an invasion from nowhere, if the descriptions are to be believed.

I get it, and respect your readings. But at any given time I'm sorrounded by books I ought to read, not to mention my late-in-life attempt to generate some income, so Rödl will have to wait.

Cheers. Leave it there. Thanks.

The Australians have left the building.

From another thread:

Physicalism accounts for the world at large first, and after that focuses on whether the mind can fit that paradigm. It can account for the mind, but it's not in the terms we generally apply to mental processes.
— Relativist

What you think the 'world at large' is, relies on and is dependent on a great many judgements that you will make when considering its nature. You might gesture at it as if it were obviously something completely separate from you, but the very fact of speaking about it reveals the centrality of your judgement as to what the 'world at large' is. Science as a whole is always concerned with judgements as to what is the case in particular applications, but philosophy is different, in that it considers and calls into question the nature of judgement itself, not judgement concerning this or that state of affairs. — Wayfarer

It occured to me after I wrote this, that a bit of Rödl might have seeped in.

It occured to me after I wrote this, that a bit of Rödl might have seeped in. — Wayfarer

A bit of Selley's sealant will fix that.

Save it for your crockery mate ;-)

It occurred to me after I wrote this, that a bit of Rödl might have seeped in. — Wayfarer

Definitely! For me, that's one of the marks of an interesting philosopher -- their insights hang around, and show up in other contexts, and you realize your thinking has been expanded. (Note to those who think philosophy has to be either right or wrong: This phenomenon I'm describing can happen regardless of whether you agree with the philosopher's solutions. What you get is insight into the questions.)