The equivalence is ironically still true because both are false; the duck is not wearing a black-band and nor is the rabbit. — fdrake

Clever. I thought I had you there. I'll have to appeal to selective black-band-blindness the refusal to accept that rabbits can wear black bands, but an enthusiastic belief that ducks always do.

I'll have to appeal to selective black-band-blindness the refusal to accept that rabbits can wear black bands, but an enthusiastic belief that ducks always do. — Isaac

I've made a joke before about Dirac delta priors, don't get to wheel it out very often.

Alice: "What do you learn from the evidence?"
Bob: "I always learn I was right before"
Alice: "That's not how learning works"
Bob: "It is if you have the right prior"
Alice: "You have a Dirac delta prior, you can't check if it's right"
Bob: "Give me any evidence that contradicts it and I'll perform a Bayesian update"
Alice: "You know that won't do anything"
Bob: "This is because I have incorporated all available evidence and found it consistent with my prior"
Alice: "Your decision procedures are inadmissable"
Bob: "With respect to my measure and loss function they're Bayes optimal"
Alice: "Just look at the data, the performance is terrible"
Bob: "The sample is unrepresentative"
Alice: "You have the whole population"
Bob: "This is a model specification problem not a prior elicitation problem; if we correctly modelled the selection biases in the data generating mechanism we'd do better"
...
It can go on forever.

Ha!

Of course, your introducing a Dirac prior joke at this point just confirms my expectations!

Thank you for clarifying that. So your point is that there is no disagreement concerning the meaning of the words, the disagreement is about something else, some other "belief". So how do you construe the disagreement itself as being meaningful? — Metaphysician Undercover

In one case we disagree because I don't understand what you believe. In the other case we disagree even though I understand what you believe.

Correspondence theory (truth bearers and makers) is very intuitional and the philosophy behind it is fascinating, but it's coming from a misunderstanding. We think humans are the only ones who talk, and so we think when a human says something, she's pointing to the world. In order for her statement to be true, the world has to correspond with what she's saying.

This is wrong. The world talks to us. This becomes clearer when we notice that the proposition that the cat is on the mat is expressed by humans, but it's not coming from us. It's the world talking. This is part of our heritage from ancestors who saw the world as being conscious just like we are. In the same way we attribute beliefs and consciousness to each other, we attributed the same thing to the world in general.

Since then, we've narrowed our population of conscious entities to ourselves, but the old way of thinking and talking is still there. We treat the world as if it can talk. The world makes assertions, and that's all there is to truth: that something was asserted. — frank

Some interesting thoughts here. Note that there have been many versions of "Correspondence theory" (see here).

Referring to what I have been saying in this thread, I have not claimed that the T-sentence is equivalent to any correspondence theory, but simply to a general correspondence account. (Apropos, I remember reading in Heidegger that he considered his notion of truth as alethia (unconcealment) to be compatible with the ordinary everyday correspondence account of truth, but he also maintained that no theory of truth is possible. I agree with this, since I think truth is irreducible to simpler terms).

You say we think humans are the only ones to talk. Of course in a most literal sense they are. But you say this is wrong; the world talks to us. This I agree with, this is Heidegger's "unconcealment"; the world discloses itself to and in us, and we can refer to this metaphorically as the world "talking to or through us". So our perception of the world just is the world talking. This is related to Kant's "Thoughts without content are empty, intuitions without concepts are blind?". There is no "raw sense data". Sensory perception is always already permeated with conception.

So correspondence, understood most clearly and simply, and in accordance with ordinary everyday intuitions of what truth is, is simply the accordance of our talking with the talking of the world. So I can agree with you that "the world makes assertions", the assertions of the world are its acts (of talking) or actuality, and truth consists in accordance with this actuality. That is all there is to truth (on the side of the world at least) that something was asserted; the world cannot be false.

But you say this is wrong; the world talks to us. This I agree with, this is Heidegger's "unconcealment"; the world discloses itself to and in us, — Janus

Yep. Nietzsche says people lie to gain an advantage. We value truth primarily to avoid the pain associated with being deceived.

...and all that means is "...is true". Which is exactly what the T-sentence says. — Banno

So truth equals actuality...or corresponds with it...thanks, you are making my argument for me.

Yep. Nietzsche says people lie to gain an advantage. We value truth primarily to avoid the pain associated with being deceived. — frank

That's an interesting left of field extrapolation!

There's a concern worth careful consideration. Please overlook my ignorance if it's been dealt with in it's entirety. If that is the case, hopefully one of the participants could point me towards a place to look in order for me to get all those details. I would be quite thankful... at least for a little bit.

If my concern has been dealt with in simple convincing and perhaps irrefutable fashion, then I'd be very interested in seeing the argument in it's entirety...

:smile:

How would anyone know if a correct translation between two conceptual schemes, belief systems, and/or lines of thought had has been successfully performed?

When we're dealing with two distinct languages, we're talking about those consisting - in part - of completely different sets of marks in perhaps all sorts of different arrangements. These are native tongues replete with all sorts of written marks. So, there must be - unbeknownst to everyone beside the users - a set of referents and/or perhaps some other form of further subsequent attribution of meaning to those marks. The marks become important and/or significant again and again with each subsequent connection made between the marks and other things. The evolutionary march of meaningful marks is built upon first time correlations being drawn between those same 'ole marks, and novelty(different than the conventional norm).

There is no shortage of this. That is the evolutionary progression of meaning in a nutshell. Many old grumps moan over it when some crucial historical notion/conception/idea is lost because the newer meaning is no longer amenable to the historical. Demanding rigidity is the only thing close to preserving integral elements/aspects of meaningful marks. It demands the use be connected to the same other things... and only certain other things... besides the utterance/expression/use.

So, back to the question at hand...

We must know what the speakers do with those marks. Are they picking out some individual or another to the exclusion of all else? Are they sounding an alarm? Are they defending themselves and/or their offspring? Are they offering greetings? Are they describing the world and/or themselves? Are they talking about that which has already been picked out? Are they manipulating the situation for explicit reasons. Is there a goal in mind? Are they predicting? Are they talking about what has not happened? There are so many things that can be done with language.

:nerd:

The only way to know that different conceptual schema, belief systems, and or any other expressions made using different tongues has been successfully translated one into the other is to have very knowledgable speakers of each respective native language, and/or knowledgable speakers of both perform the meaningful assessment and/or comparison between the two. Without these necessary preconditions, without having these sorts of people perform the translation process, we've got no verification/falsification method whatsoever.

Unfortunately for Davidson, there are all sorts of bilingual people in the world that will gladly agree that sometimes there is no direct translation of one utterance in one language into one utterance of another. So, it seems that the way things are is a problem for anyone denying that.

There are times however, that we can know as best we can. Convention T proves that two languages share the same referents and/or say the same things about the same referent(mean the same thing). Yet only a knowledgable bilingual could possibly know that that's the case, for it's every bit as much about meaning as truth... more, it seems to me. It is a semantic rendering.



Here's what convention T shows me as far as correspondence goes...

The quoted left half is a true statement of belief if the right half obtains, is the case, has happened, is happening, and/or perhaps will happen. The right half could be said to amount to the truth conditions that need be met in order for the belief statement on the left to be true. We all know if there is a cat on the mat at the time one utters a belief statement saying as much, it is a true statement. The speaker has formed and/or holds true belief. Because we know what it takes, we know when it's true. Because we know what the marks means, we know where and/or what exactly to look for. It's not that hard. Likewise, we know that two statements from different languages share the same truth conditions when the exact same events serve as verification/falsification for both.

How would anyone know if a correct translation between two conceptual schemes, belief systems, and/or lines of thought had has been successfully performed? — creativesoul

For Davidson, if you have the truth conditions for a statement, you have the meaning. This is why he rejects intranslatability, because he thinks that would compromise the concept of truth.

So "how do you know" shouldn't come up.

In real life, when two groups of people must understand one another, a sort of baby-talk hybrid language is generated. The English language went through that after 1066.

That's an interesting left of field extrapolation! — Janus

So not even in the ballpark. Yep. Nietzsche talked about truth as it exists in the real world.

Davidson's truth is fictional.

How would anyone know if a correct translation between two conceptual schemes, belief systems, and/or lines of thought had has been successfully performed?
— creativesoul

For Davidson, if you have the truth conditions for a statement, you have the meaning. This is why he rejects intranslatability, because he thinks that would compromise the concept of truth.

So "how do you know" shouldn't come up. — frank

I'm not buying that at all. In order to have the truth conditions, one must already speak the language. Davidson seems to want to be able to combine coherence and correspondence into one. That is to conflate meaning and truth.

His aversion/diversion to and from "fact" is very well grounded. The notion is riddled with problems, especially if it is accompanied by proposition talk.

Logic simply cannot be used as a means to take an account, and/or offer a rendering(convention T) of correspondence. Logic presupposes correspondence by virtue of presupposing the truth of premisses. The task of logic is to preserve truth. The slingshot - as far as I can see - simply confirms that inherent inability of logic to account for correspondence.

In real life, when two groups of people must understand one another, a sort of baby-talk hybrid language is generated. The English language went through that after 1066. — frank

Creole. Pigeon. Combinations of English and other languages are the result of exploration and colonization. Such combinations of different languages are marked by continued use of parts of both. Names for common directly perceptible referents and common indirectly perceptible referents as well are continuations of traditional use.

The Battle of Hastings... interestingly enough, that's around the time when my own last name began showing up in historical record...

But with more fundamental perception, or with less concrete objects, it is perfectly possible that their form, properties or constitution really are different depending on how you perceive them, and yet that final perception is all we have access to to give a name. — Isaac

That which exists in it's entirety prior to our awareness of it has the very same elemental constitution regardless of how one 'perceives' it. So, no... it is not perfectly possible that our talk about such things(or how we perceive them) has an effect/affect upon the constitution of such things.

I'm not buying that at all. — creativesoul

As I showed earlier, it's wrong, so you're good.

I'm concerned about criticizing the article correctly, hence my defense of it. But I suppose what gets me is this, @Banno -- how do we learn our first language? Surely we don't translate back into some more primitive language through the T-sentence, or some formulation like that. Obviously we wouldn't do it explicitly, but we could claim implicitly that it's so -- but then we'd have to have some proto-language or something going on to allow that to be the case.

I'd submit that there's a far simpler explanation -- that we learn the meaning of a language through using it. But if that be the case then the T-sentence provides a hopping-over point for learning some phrases within another language through the "...is true" predicate -- but there comes a time in learning another language that we simply know how to use said language.

If that be the case then we can come to know two separate languages with partially different meanings. And we know they have partially different meanings not because we translated back to our native tongue, but because we learned this new language in the same way we learned our first language.

That is: rather than translating, all we do is compare meanings.

And in the same way that we can compare meanings in two distinct languages we could also compare meanings in two different conceptual schemes. No? So the way a person would know, ala Kuhn, that two paradigms are different in meaning is they bothered to spend the time to learn the meanings of the different paradigms.

And while we could understand them both, just as we can understand two languages, we didn't understand them through translating back into our native language -- but by becoming familiar with the meanings of the beliefs related (or concepts? Not sure I even require "concepts", i.e., I could follow your suggestion that we replace concepts with beliefs and I think this line of thinking would hold).

And this is how we'd come to make an understanding of partial non-translatability -- through knowledge of two distinct languages with different meanings.


Now one thing I'll acknowledge here is that this does not provide a criteria of language-hood, as Davidson sets out to do. Or, insofar that it does, it's something of a fiat criteria -- we know it's a language because we speak it.

But then I'm still compelled by this thought that we do just simply learn a language, rather than translate a language back into some other tongue -- else, how did we learn the native tongue?



edit: just to clarify a bit on my thoughts on Kuhn -- I tend to think of Kuhn, and Feyerabend's, claims as being a little more local than the more general place that Davidson is operating from. I read them of talking about science specifically, and scientific theories specifically, more than knowledge generally. Just to be clear on some of expressed resistance to Davidson's treatment. But I'll go along with the more general claim because I think with Kuhn, especially, it's easy to read him going both ways.

so what would Chinese medicine be "wrong" in relation to according to you? — Janus

Better to ask what is right. Pangolin scales? What's that about.

If we begin by granting all conceptual schema are true - — creativesoul

If that leads you to oddities, don't do it.

After all, it amounts to granting relativism.

I'm not at all sure what you are doing in that post.

So, a statement need not be believed in order to be true. A statement's being true requires more than being believed. — creativesoul

What? How does the second sentence follow?

A statement's being true requires exactly that it be true, no more and no less.

For the remainder, you are confusing belief as a whole with belief in any particular.

A statement's being true requires more than being believed.
— creativesoul

What?

A statement's being true requires exactly that it be true, no more and no less. — Banno

A statement's being true requires statements. Statements require belief. Thus, a statement's being true requires belief.

...you are confusing belief as a whole with belief in any particular.

I'm noting the existential dependency that all statements have upon belief.

Good for you. Just so long as you do not conclude , as you did, that a statement's being true requires it's being believed.

A statement's being true requires more than being believed. — creativesoul

An excellent post. I will get to it.

Good for you. Just so long as you do not conclude , as you did, that a statement's being true requires it's being believed. — Banno

No, I didn't.

You cannot divorce truth from belief. <-------that's what I've been setting out, some of which you've quoted.

I'm very well aware that a statement can be true regardless of whether or not any specific individual believes the statement. I'm also very well aware that all true statements are existentially dependent upon belief. So, keeping this in mind, we cannot conclude that truth is existentially independent of all belief simply because some particular statements need not be believed by any individual speaker in order to be true.

So...

Pots and kettles to the earlier charge.

...you are confusing belief as a whole with belief in any particular. — Banno

Davidson's earliest work is about learning languages: Theories of Meaning and Learnable Languages. He shows that some theories of languages are untenable because they render language unlearnable. I'm mentioning this just to show that language acquisition is one of the thinks on Davidson's mind.

Something I spent considerable time on was reconciling Davidson with Wittgenstein.

I think you hit on the key criticism of Davidson: decoding language is not understanding meaning. I also think that Davidson realised this, and that it didn't strike him as much of a problem.

Say you are asked to translate something - the beatitudes, or a sonnet - something with multiple levels of meaning. blessed are the meek becomes Heureux les Grecs or whatever. Someone complains that you have missed the significance associated with the original, all that extra stuff that gave it meaning.

Your answer? But I translated it for you - what more could you want?

Their answer - hand waving about Monty Python and the nature of humour and so on.

"Oh, its the meek - Blessed are the meek! Oh, that's nice, isn't it? I'm glad they're getting something, 'cause they have a hell of a time.

Davidson tries to re-invent literal interpretation. Only he doesn't really.




Put another way, yes, there is a whole lot of ineffable stuff about which Davidson says nothing... That's an unusual virtue amongst philosophers.

how do we learn our first language? — Moliere

Davidson is talking about translation and interpretation; language is presumed.

But if you like, Davidson describes how we "make it up as we go along" in his description of an iterative process.

That is, his descriptions are not incompatible with our learning language as we use it.

Still mulling over the significance of Davidson's rejection of conceptual schemes. I'd be interested to hear some new thoughts on the questions below:



If the essence of a conceptual scheme can be located in a far-ranging belief, are we back to square one? Back to an essentially (although a belief- rather than a concept-based) relativistic picture?

What is the significance of the rejection of conceptual schemes if our beliefs continue to paint a picture of fundamentally different ontologies (and sister -ologies)?

Belief seems just as potent in creating a kind of weltanschauung-relativism. Different people believe the world fits best into such and such a belief system. Not such a far cry from conceptual relativism. Maybe someone can clarify the distinction.

I cannot answer what the significance of Davidson's rejection amounts to, aside from perhaps an outright denial of the importance regarding the discovery he mentions early on regarding the truth of a statement largely depending upon the language being used. Taken strictly, that amounts to a sort of epistemic relativism or some such...

I really don't know though. I can't say that I understand exactly what Davidson's position includes.

Human thought and belief is the basis of my own position, and truth - while being existentially dependent upon thought and belief by virtue of presupposition within all of it - is not relative to belief in the strong sense, for belief that X is insufficient for X's being true. Statements have truth conditions. Those, in my view anyway, set out what it takes for a statement to be true. Belief is more than sufficient for X to be called true, but a statements being true does not require any particular speaker to believe that it is.

So, I can acknowledge and grant that some conceptual frameworks are not amenable to direct translation into others. However, it seems that the only sorts of things which are problematic are abstract objects and/or other indirectly perceptible things.

I dont think Davidson was trying to say that whatever people happen to believe must be correct. Is that what you meant?

He was maybe saying that relativism can't be radical. His truth-conditions-theory-of meaning cant be used support that thesis (or any other thesis).

The weaker support appears to me to be kind of phenomenological. We do seek common ground if we're trying to understand sentient beings.