Yeah, strong and slightly ironic. After all, I'm here, doing philosophy by saying we shouldn't bother with philosophy.

I can't help myself...

We could work down@fdrake's list...

eah, strong and slightly ironic. After all, I'm here, doing philosophy by saying we shouldn't bother with philosophy.

I can't help myself... — Banno

It seems like you haven't quite cured the itch yet. Maybe rub some more analysis on it.

But I suppose on your view philosophy could be seen as a necessary endeavor to clarify and dissolve or handoff certain kinds of questions humans have been tempted to ask the past 2500 years, at least.

Or, if you like, I will make the claim that philosophy consists in sorting out grammatical structures that appear, on the face of it, problematic; it is showing how we can conceptually remove loops, knots and mindsets.

Once the conceptual topology is set aright, what we are doing ceases to be philosophy.

That's well put. Let's go with it.

So if we us fdrake's list, the question is whether all of those topics will cease to be philosophical once the right conceptual topology has been grammatically sorted out.

Yes.

Let's start with the first item:

1. Philosophy of time: presentism, block universes etc.

So, our concept of time developed out of noticing that things change, and some of those changes are periodic, such that we can measure the change by days, seasons, etc. And then we can say that yesterday I went to the market, today I'm plowing the field, and tomorrow I will be marrying my cousin.

Now at some point (in time), somebody must have first wondered about yesterday and tomorrow. Do they exist? What is meant by that? It's easiest to understand by borrowing from science fiction, where a time machine enables travel to the past or future. In earlier times, magic or the gods may have been invoked to explicate the notion.

At some point (again in time), a debate would have developed where one side said yesterday and tomorrow exist in that you could visit them if you had some means to do so. But then the other side said that no, they don't exist. All that exists is the ever changing now. And from this you also get a debate as to whether the "flow of time" we experience is real or an illusion.

Fast forward to modern physics, and we have the implications of General Relativity with time dilation. Which leads some to suggest the 4D block notion of the universe, in which all points in time exist eternally, and the flow of time we experience is an illusion constructed by the mind.

Thats my attempt at explaining the issue. Someone else can give a more precise explanation with the actual philosophers who put the issue on the table. We know that as far back as Heraclitus and Parmenides, there were related disputes as to whether time was an illusion or everything was change.

For this discussion, can we dissolve the issue, or leave it up to physics by engaging in linguistic analysis?

The philosopher in us, this tendency to overgeneralise and search for ultimates behind what is given to us, will hopefully die (or at least weaken). And we'll might "see the world aright". — Πετροκότσυφας

But what would this mean? Presumably it doesn't mean seeing the world the way pre-philosophical people saw it, or the average person ignorant of philosophy who takes things as they appear. Although that's a bit harder today with the prevalence of science and various fictional concepts. Everyone knows about the Matrix and time travel, for example, and anyone a little drunk or high can tell you how time doesn't exist or the cells in our bodies could be entire universes, or whatever passes for profundity.

Do they exist? — Marchesk

Well, here's how it might be done. The details are, of course, debatable.

SO let's go back to a word game from Austin, Quine and others. To say that something exists is no more than to give it a role in our language. So although "does time exist?" looks like a profound bit of metaphysics, it is also (only?) a question of language use.

Presentism says that we should adopt a grammar such that we don't give a role to future or past, but only to now (or something like that...). The block universe says we should adopt a grammar such that events occur in a block of space-time with Lorentz transformations to decide on their order from any given position.

Now, which of these is right? I'm not sure that question makes sense. Perhaps block universes are most appropriate for physics, and presentism for psychology. IF it's a choice of grammar, then it's like choosing to speak Italian in Rome and English in London.

This is a gross oversimplification, but there's my mooted PhD in a nutshell.

To say that something exists is no more than to give it a role in our language. — Banno

I'm going to disagree strongly with that. For starters, we say unicorns don't exist, but they do have a role in our language. But we do say horses exist, and they aren't simply a role in language, but are animals who don't need us to talk about them to be.

So although "does time exist?" looks like a profound bit of metaphysics, it is also (only?) a question of language use. — Banno

We do have a perception of change. That's not linguistic. It's why time plays a role in our language. We could invoke Kant here, or a physicist.

What is someone asking when he asks if the fish is wet in water? — Πετροκότσυφας

Well, a fish can dry out on land, so I guess you mean does a fish feel wet? Because certainly fish are wet in water.

As for what fish feel, notice that we do feel the air around us. I don't know that we have a word for it. Do we feel "aired"? We would certainly feel the lack of it in a vacuum. So I'm sure fish feel the water around them. Would not be very adaptable if they didn't. It's just that being wet is normal for them, like having air around us is normal for land animals.

What does it mean to feel wet? — Πετροκότσυφας

Something like what it means to feel air around your skin, I suppose.

For starters, we say unicorns don't exist, but they do have a role in our language. But we do say horses exist, and they aren't simply a role in language, but are animals who don't need us to talk about them to be. — Marchesk

But this is already a grammatical error because horses and (the proposed) unicorns are both things, objects in spacetime which can either be there or not. To presume the same of 'time' is either to beg the question, or, as I say, make a grammatical error. The investigations of language can uncover that error.

And what does it mean to feel air around your skin? — Πετροκότσυφας

I assume you know? Maybe we only notice it with a temperature change or air movement. But sure, a fish doesn't feel wet in the way we feel wet, I would assume. I'm not a fish, though.

But this is already a grammatical error because horses and (the proposed) unicorns are both things, objects in spacetime which can either be there or not. — Pseudonym

Unicorns are not things in spacetime. They're fictional.

I'm going to disagree strongly with that. For starters, we say unicorns don't exist, but they do have a role in our language. But we do say horses exist, and they aren't simply a role in language, but are animals who don't need us to talk about them to be. — Marchesk

Sure. Note that the argument here is not about the details, but the philosophical method being used.

So when you say "But Unicorns do not exist", You are telling us about unicorns... or are you telling us about how we use the word "exists"? Why not both?

We do say things like "Only virgins can attract unicorns", and hence posit unicorns within some of the things we do with words - writing myths, perhaps, or children's stories.

So mapping out the topology of the word "exists" would be one way to sort through the conceptual issues around time. That's linguistic philosophy.

The concept is of a thing in spacetime such that we can look and see it isn't there.

The concept is of a thing in spacetime such that we can look and see it isn't there. — Pseudonym

Right, but change is in the horse category of being there, not the unicorn one of not being. Notice that you even use spacetime as the backdrop for seeing what's there.

So mapping out the topology of the word "exists" would be one way to sort through the conceptual issues around time. That's linguistic philosophy. — Banno

Okay, so I think there is no disagreement that we do perceive change, events taking place, that sort of thing. And form this we have a notion of time which we can measure.

So it appears to us that things change, and we can talk of the before, during and after.

we have a notion of time which we can measure. — Marchesk

Is measurement special in some way?

No, change is not in the horse category, because we cannot simply look at it to see it exists, we cannot point to change, we experience it, which leaves open the possibility that we simply think we experience it. We must therefore describe the experience, and there, language becomes the framework which determines that definition. As such, an analysis of language gets at how we have constructed the experience of 'time' in a more complete sense than it gets at the experience of 'horse'. After we remove all the subjectivity about 'horse' something (probably) still remains. Once we've removed all the linguistic construction of the concept of 'time' nothing is left behind.

Is measurement special in some way? — Banno

*Must. Resist. Mentioning. QM.*

Measurement probably means something exists to be measured.

Once we've removed all the linguistic construction of the concept of 'time' nothing is left behind. — Pseudonym

That remains to be seen. But surely change is still left behind? Or are you in agreement with Parmenides that change doesn't exist?

What we should be doing is not arguing the case, but understanding how the case might be argued.

SO perhaps unicorns exist, in that we can talk about them, but are not real; while horses also exist in the same sense, and in addition they are real. Arguing in this way is setting up a grammar about "existence" that distinguishes it from "real" in order to sort out the conceptual issues.

Arguing in this way is setting up a grammar about "existence" that distinguishes it from "real" in order to sort out the conceptual issues. — Banno

Sure, but are you only attempting to show how a linguistic analysis would proceed? I'm not doubting that you can analyze language for any philosophical position. They are stated using language.

What I'm skeptical of is that linguistic analysis will dissolve all the philosophical problems. Has the philosophy of time been successfully dissolved to your knowledge?

Sorry, my wording was ambiguous. I'm not making a claim about the existence of time, I'm saying that the entire experience of it is constructed in our minds, we cannot point to it, or bump into it. As such any attempt at inter-subjective analysis relies entirely on language (ie there is nothing left to analyse after language has been taken away). With the horse, after we take away the language describing our experience of the horse, there's still the actual horse.

SO another way of using "exists" is "can be measured".

Which is right?

The one that works.

Has the philosophy of time been successfully dissolved to your knowledge? — Marchesk

Some issues have been, to my satisfaction.

And that's what counts.

The one that works. — Banno

Sure, and yesterday/tomorrow works well in language, but if I'm asking you as a philosopher as to whether to finish building the time machine in my garage, what would be your advice?

Some issues have been, to my satisfaction. — Banno

I'm sure some issues are amenable to this. Truth might be one of them. But all of philosophy? It only takes one exception.