I read this list as.

Summary: we can defeasibily evaluate what context a statement is made in and what this evaluated structure requires for the statement to be true.

(1) There is a range of sets of such descriptions xyz such that some set of the range must be true if the description A is to be true. But the range can only ever be roughly indicated, and the way to indicate it is by giving a few diverse examples. — Anscombe, 'On Brute Facts'

We can describe the contexts that would make the statement "I owe the grocer 3 shillings" true, but not exhaustively and completely.

(2) The existence of the description A in the language in which it occurs presupposes a context, which we will call "the institution behind A "; this context may or may not be presupposed to elements in the descriptions xyz. For example, the institution of buying and selling is presupposed to the description "sending a bill", as it is to "being owed for goods received", but not to the description "supplying potatoes ".

""The grocer provided me with goods" (for which I owe him 3 shillings)" - I could be provided with goods by other means than by the grocer, so "provided by goods" simpliciter is not part of the context of "I owe the grocer 3 shillings" but "The grocer provided me with goods now in the shop" would be.

(3) A is not a description of the institution behind A.

"The grocer provided me with goods" (for which I owe him 3 shillings) is not a description of what that requires to mean what it does. We don't have to read Adam Smith to buy groceries.

(4) If some set holds out of the range of sets of descriptions some of which must hold if A is to hold, and if the institution behind A exists, then " in normal circumstances" A holds. The meaning of "in normal circumstances" can only be indicated roughly, by giving examples of exceptional circumstances
in which A would not hold.

Leveraging defeater examples to circumscribe the context. "I owe the grocer 3 shillings" would not be true if the groceries were North Korean Gettier identical plastic grocery copies and I was being conned.

(5) To assert the truth of A is not to assert that the circumstances were "normal"; but if one is asked to justify A, the truth of the description xyz is in normal circumstances an adequate justification: A is not verified by any further facts.

You can justify a claim by appealing to the context it's made in; as in, "this context is commensurate with the claim's usual function".

(6) If A entails some other description B, then xyz cannot generally be said to entail B, but xyZ together with normality of circumstances relatively to such descriptions as A can be said to entail B

Some type of type/token distinction thing? If A entails B, and we justify A with XYZ, we can only justify B with XYZ when we can be assured that XYZ is of an appropriate type. "I owe the grocer 3 shillings" => "I owe the grocer x dollars", but what if the grocer doesn't accept dollars? Would need to add "the grocer accepts dollars" to xyz for the implication to hold true in the context. A logical entailment of statements in XYZ does not entail that if the premise is conformable to standards XYZ then the conclusion is conformable to standards XYZ.

The paper doesn't appeal to social norms to vouchsafe what is moral or immoral (it goes against this use of moral and immoral explicitly). — fdrake

You just repeated what I said.

I was going through the ways we could approach moral philosophy starting from analysis of what we do.

You just repeated what I said. — frank

If you can't see the distinction between appealing to social norms to set out what "moral and immoral" means vs analysing social situations to re-evaluate what the topic of moral philosophy should be I'd suggest you read the paper more closely.

you can't see the distinction between appealing to social norms to set out what "moral and immoral" mea — fdrake

We both pointed out that A rejects using norms. You didnt read what I wrote.

analysing social situations to re-evaluate what the topic of moral philosophy — fdrake

That would be an interesting topic. I'll see if I can find someone to discuss it with.

You didnt read what I wrote. — frank

More words, more thoroughly, then.

More words, more thoroughly, then. — fdrake

No, actually. You should read. You did exactly the same thing in a recent discussion about Quine. You fed back to me exactly what I had just said.

I'm sorry: I'm still traveling and my comments suffer. They are short and written with tablet.
In Anscombe's article you quoted I see no reference to Wittgentein or to private languages. The author dispenses the self-legislating power of the Self in four lines: p. 11, 2nd column, lines 15-19. "That legislation(...)is not legislation".
This is not an argument. In my previous comment I gave an example that disproves this assertion.
.

No, actually. You should read. — frank

But why should you read? It has to do with respect, of which there is mutually little in this situation.

But that's unfortunate. Wasted potential. There are no obligations, but I'm trying to conjure them because that's how we relate to one another. It's where synergy comes from: it's something in the essence of human.

Found somebody to discuss it with. Yay!

Investigating what this tradition/consensus is is a matter of induction, either from experience or scientific investigation (samples, statistical analysis etc). Investigating what traditions hold and in what circumstances is a matter of psychology. — Isaac

Yes, ethics and morals are entirely matters of tradition/ consensus, and it is not possible to examine those from some "higher" perspective in order to judge whether they are "justified" or not. So forget psychology; it will only ever tell us what people do, not what they ought to do.

Is your ethical outlook law-bound? Do you accept that this is problematic for an atheist?

Or do you suspend worrying about it since it works for you without any philosophical infrastructure? — frank

Isn't it possible to have an ethical outlook that is not law-bound, and yet still hasa philosophical infrastructure?

Isn't that what virtue ethics is?

(Italics because I am borrowing your mode of expression, with which I am not entirely comfortable.)

I do explain my actions in terms of kindness and integrity rather than in terms of the greatest happiness and categorical imperatives.

I do explain my actions in terms of kindness and integrity rather than in terms of the greatest happiness and categorical imperatives. — Banno

When it comes to wrong-doing, there are people who mainly think of it in terms of condemnation and punishment. They need law-bound morality as a springboard.

Virtue ethics is better for people who want to understand the sinner and think of morality more as a road we all tread. We fall down. We get back up having learned something. We fall down again, and so on.

So I'd say you can tell if you're really a virtue ethicist if you think forgiveness (the result of understanding the sinner) is more important than condemnation. Would you agree?

Sure; I'm asking why she thinks it absurd. She doesn't actually say, so we are left to make suppositions.

She was one of Wittgenstein's favourite students, and a close friend. She certainly would have a good grasp of the arguments now grouped together under the label private language. These, of course, are a species of a more general argument regarding privately following rules.

She says

That legislation can be for oneself I reject as absurd;

It seems to me not at all unreasonable to suppose that she would reject legislation to oneself for much the same reason as she would reject making a law to oneself.

Sure.

You were going to tell us about the necessity of obligation?

She says at the beginning that we need a more adequate philosophy of psychology, but it's not really that, it's her treatment of how we get 'owes' to be a fact. Her explanation here is confusing to me so I could easily have this wrong, but all I get out of it (both here and in 'Brute Facts') is that 'owes' refers just to a circumstance which most people would use 'owes' to identify. What criteria they are using is not yet fixed, but simply held by tradition. I owe the grocer for the potatoes (after he has delivered them) simply because that it the state of affairs most people would consider had arisen as a result of that prior fact. Even though some instances where we would use some label 'owes' can have their history/tradition elucidated by reference to other more brute facts/institutions (justifying that A is done by reference to xyz) but such a relationship between A and xyz is held in normal circumstances by tradition.

Also, we only have a speculative, pragmatic description of 'owes', fringe cases are up for debate and (local) consensus wins.

Investigating what this tradition/consensus is is a matter of induction, either from experience or scientific investigation (samples, statistical analysis etc). Investigating what traditions hold and in what circumstances is a matter of psychology. — Isaac

I agree with - or think I do - everything you said right up until the bit I bolded. The unbolded seems authorized by the text; the bolded seems far more extrapolative and ambigious in its textual warrant. The very question of induction is nowhere raised for instance, and I suspect for good reason.

The paper does speak of 'institutions' but gives no direction on how - except for conceptual analysis - to individuate traditions.

I have to say though, I don't quite understand the role that 'psychology' has to play in the paper. The places where Anscombe invokes it seem arbitrary to me - I can't gork why she does it when she does. The closest I can get is when she talks of the 'mesmeric' effect of moral oughts, and perhaps a psychology needed to understand that effect. Anyone have any further ideas?

I have to say though, I don't quite understand the role that 'psychology' has to play in the paper. The places where Anscombe invokes it seem arbitrary to me - I can't gork (grok?) why she does it when she does. The closest I can get is when she talks of the 'mesmeric' effect of moral oughts, and perhaps a psychology needed to understand that effect. Anyone have any further ideas? — StreetlightX

Just that second sentence, where she wants an "adequate philosophy of psychology"... a philosophy of psychology is not a psychology; and adequate for... doing morality?

I don't see that psychologists would be better placed than, say, deontologists, to tell us what we ought do. They might be able to tell us how to use CBT to reduce feelings of existential angst; or to rid us of feelings of remorse when we behave poorly.

,

I don't think that for Anscombe "...owes..." comes for any induction or consensus. It's more that if one admits to receiving the spuds after having asked for them, one has misunderstood the nature of the transaction if one then insists that one is not in dept to the grocer.

I'm intrigued by that idea, having previously thought of such interactions in terms of group intention, after the analysis Searle provides in his The Construction of Social Reality. Roughly, whereas Searle would have us sharing institutional facts that place us in a state of obligation, Anscombe seems to think that it follows more directly from understanding the nature of the transaction - and here I am advisedly avoiding using the term language game.

SO the difference would be that between understanding and agreeing to join in the group enterprise of creating the institution of paying for one's spuds, and just understanding a simple transaction from the point of view of the grocer - he thought you would pay for the spuds.

Edit: Better, the meaning of the transaction was that if the grocer provides the spuds then you will pay for them; that there is no further analysis needed.

It bypasses a part of ethics that seems - well - almost autistic; lacking in a theory of mind. — Banno

Further, there's a sense in which justice is not about being moral. Consider that in order to be forgiving, one must forgo what is just.

Consider that in order to be forgiving, one must forgo what is just. — Banno

I'm not sure what you mean.

David, in a fit of temper, kills your calf. He ought pay for the inconvenience - a question of simple justice. But you are moved to forgive him and hence to refuse recompense, perhaps realising that his act was quite out of character. You forgo what is just in order to be merciful.

David, in a fit of temper, kills your calf. He ought pay for the inconvenience - a question of simple justice. But you are moved to forgive him and hence to refuse recompense, perhaps realising that his act was quite out of character. You forgo what is just in order to be merciful. — Banno

Makes sense.

Just that second sentence, where she wants an "adequate philosophy of psychology"... a philosophy of psychology is not a psychology; and adequate for... doing morality? — Banno

Yeah, like, why do we need a philosophy of psychology to do moral philosophy? She just kind lays that out there, and I don't understand why.

I don't think that for Anscombe "...owes..." comes for any induction or consensus. It's more that if one admits to receiving the spuds after having asked for them, one has misunderstood the nature of the transaction if one then insists that one is not in dept to the grocer.

...SO the difference would be that between understanding and agreeing to join in the group enterprise of creating the institution of paying for one's spuds, and just understanding a simple transaction from the point of view of the grocer - he thought you would pay for the spuds. — Banno

This seems right to me.

Well, it's not going to hurt for us to understand how minds work if our aim is to tell folk what to do with them...

Point being, this seems to me to show the poverty of deontology - it is moral to do otherwise then what the rules say.

Point being, this seems to me to show the poverty of deontology - it is moral to do otherwise then what the rules say. — Banno

Yep. Although in Asian horror movies justice is like a force of nature. It's the reason the gang rapers hammer a nail into the back of the dead girl's neck: to keep her vengeful spirit from killing everybody in the village including the imported Indonesian shaman.

Thoughts of good health sent your way my friend.

:smile:

Well, it's not going to hurt for us to understand how minds work if our aim is to tell folk what to do with them... — Banno

Yep. Thought and belief anyone?

:wink:

Kidding. Hope you are well. I need to finish my reading...

Yes, ethics and morals are entirely matters of tradition/ consensus, and it is not possible to examine those from some "higher" perspective in order to judge whether they are "justified" or not. So forget psychology; it will only ever tell us what people do, not what they ought to do. — Janus

I think that's what Anscombe is saying here though. 'Ought' doesn't make any sense without laws. Something just is 'unjust' because of the definition of 'just' which is provided by society's use of the word. Something simply is 'bilking' because tradition means you 'owe' the grocer as a result of his having delivered some potatoes. There is no 'ought' in that sense. Hence the sociological investigation is all there is (apart from our own group, of course, which we already know about, being language-users within it ourselves).

The unbolded seems authorized by the text; the bolded seems far more extrapolative and ambigious in its textual warrant. The very question of induction is nowhere raised for instance, — StreetlightX

Yeah, I should have made that more clear. The bolded bit is my opinion on what follows from Anscombe and constitutes pretty much a wild guess as to why she's mentioning psychology, which I agree, is not spelled out in the text at all. I just think it follows because the 'normal circumstances' she refers to under which these 'moral' type of brute facts come about are an empirical matter, I mean, they either are or are not the case, and yet they are crucial to those facts. A is not resultant fro xyz as a matter of logic. It results fro xyz "in normal circumstances". The actual sociological circumstances dictate the possibility (if not the actual means) by which A results from xyz.

if one admits to receiving the spuds after having asked for them, one has misunderstood the nature of the transaction if one then insists that one is not in dept to the grocer. — Banno

Yes, but the 'nature of the transaction' is a sociological fact, not a logical one.

understanding and agreeing to join in the group enterprise of creating the institution of paying for one's spuds, and just understanding a simple transaction from the point of view of the grocer - he thought you would pay for the spuds. — Banno

The first part is a sociological fact, the second a psychological one.

the meaning of the transaction was that if the grocer provides the spuds then you will pay for them; that there is no further analysis needed. — Banno

But there is. In 'Brute Facts' Anscombe is quite clear that this meaning is not an absolute one. There is an uncountable (un-listable) set of circumstances under which that is not the meaning of the transaction - the spuds were provided as part of a film, the spuds were a gift, the spuds were given out under charity...etc.

Without an understanding of the actual sociological and psychological circumstances we do not have the 'meaning' of the transaction at all.

It bypasses a part of ethics that seems - well - almost autistic; lacking in a theory of mind. — Banno

You massively overestimate the quality of data that theory of mind provides us. There's bags of evidence on this, but I won't go into it now if it's too off-topic. Suffice to say your faith in the ability of theory of mind to provide us with mutual understanding of intent is misplaced.