Doesn't this requirement effectively beg the question, since realists affirm that our only "contact" with universals is via the mind? — aletheist

Our "contact" can be via the mind, but what you're claiming to "contact" isn't itself mind, right? (Otherwise, you're really a nominalist.) So if what you're "contacting" isn't itself mind, there should be some evidence of that (and that evidence should be the reason you believe that it's something other than mind). Whatever that evidence would be, that's what you'd present.

Of course, I don't believe there is any such evidence, and it seems to me that people are simply projecting/reifying the way they think about this issue--they're projecting/reifying concepts. But just in case I'm wrong about that, there would be some evidence regarding real universals, and that would falsify nominalism.

Peirce's "proof" of realism was holding a rock and asking his audience whether they knew that it would fall if he let go of it. In other words, our ability to make reliable predictions about the future behavior of individual objects requires the reality of the laws of nature as generals that govern particulars. — aletheist

Think about what that would be assuming, though: it would be assuming that either (a) nominalists believe that there's no way to account for regularities of "behavior" such as rocks falling under nominalism/under anti-realism on physical law as something separate from properties of particulars, yet despite this, they'd still be nominalists, or alternately and more crassly, it would be assuming that either (b) nominalists do not believe that there are regularities of behavior, or (c) they've not had the philosophical acuity to think through such cases. All of those should be dubious. No one is denying regularities of behavior. Nominalists simply believe that they're (particular) properties of particulars.

To show evidence that the regularlties are rather separate, real abstracts, we'd need to show evidence somehow of those separate, real abstracts.

But that is not falsification in the same decisive sense that "discovery" or "observation" of one real universal would falsify nominalism. — aletheist

Which is why I said "asymptotically."

As the saying goes, absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. — aletheist

Which isn't a very good saying, because it's wrong.

For one, it's very clearly wrong when we're talking about something that's very limited. For example, consider "my keys on top of this table." Absence of evidence--evidence of your keys being on top of that table, is very clearly evidence of absence of your keys being on top of that table. You know they're not on top of that table when you look at the top of that table and your keys are not there. That tells you that your keys are somewhere else instead.

But even when we're talking about something that's not limited in the same way, absence of evidence is evidence of absence. For example, say that someone says, "Someone in our solar system, there's a gang of cigar-smoking purple and pink polka-dotted turtles who sing Judas Priest songs five hours per day." You can't check everywhere in the solar system for them--at least not very easily yet. But the more you look for such a thing, the more you can rule it out.

(Aside from that, it becomes increasingly clear that there's no good reason to believe such a thing, but I'd say that that is different than falsifying evidence. We also have no good reason in my view to believe that there are real universals.)

Refuting realism seems to require proving a negative. — aletheist

"You can't prove a negative" is also not a very good saying, because it's also wrong. We prove negatives in logic and mathematics all the time. For example, we can prove that there's no largest prime number.

Of course, empirical claims are not provable period. So we're not talking about proofs for this issue anyway.

No; you are ignoring the distinction between "real" and "actual," and instead treating them as synonyms. Realism regarding universals/generals is the view that the real is a broader category than the actual, such that possibilities and regularities (for example) are just as real as actualities. You are simply asserting nominalism - the opposing view that the real and the actual are one and the same. You cannot refute realism by simply insisting on a nominalist definition of "real." — aletheist

I was just following the accepted definition of "real", which defines real as actual. I find there is a problem with your suggestion, that possibilities are real, because then all logical possibilities are equally realities. Unless we allow for some way to distinguish real possibilities from unreal possibilities, then we have all sorts of counterfactuals, possible worlds, multiverses, and many worlds, as realities, simply because they are logically possible. If we attempt to separate real possibilities from unreal possibilities, we do so by grounding them in what is actual. But if a real possibility is one that is grounded in an actuality, then why not just adhere to the proper definition of real, and maintain that what is real here is the actuality, and that the so-called "real" possibility is somehow related to the actuality. Then we have different types of possibilities, depending on the way that they are related to (or lack of relation to) what is real, actual.

You're explaining what you take a universal to be here. You're not showing evidence that there are real (extramental) universals. — Terrapin Station

To provide evidence for extramental givens requires rational justification for the particular given addressed being extramental. Yet, I’m so far not finding a difference between such justification as it applies to universals and such justification as it applies to physical objects. (And yes, I’m arguing for extramental givens.)

So, if multiple unrelated organisms hold awareness of good, then it seems safe to presume it justified that awareness of good, or of the beneficial, is not a given culturally transmitted from one organism to another (unlike mores and morals). The disparity between ameba and humans may be too extreme, so one can merely think of the disparity between great apes and humans. Like our awareness of a physical rock as object, awareness of good is an awareness of a particular object that is independent of other minds and invariantly present in all minds: all minds are aware of good as a given object, though this awareness is not gained culturally; just as all minds concerned will be aware of the same physical rock perceived, though this awareness is not gained culturally. (Rather than the example of good, the same can be stated of awareness of circles—though awareness of circles is more restrained to our sapient minds.) Therefore, though the physical rock is a phenomenal object and goodness is non-phenomenal object, the same justification here applies to both these objects of awareness being extramental.

What form of justification would one propose for a physical rock being extramental (say, rather than a mirage) that does not simultaneously also justify universals being extramental?

Our "contact" can be via the mind, but what you're claiming to "contact" isn't itself mind, right? (Otherwise, you're really a nominalist.) — Terrapin Station

Or an objective idealist, such that "matter is effete mind, inveterate habits becoming physical laws." Peirce sometimes defined reality as that which is independent of the thoughts of any individual person or finite collection of people, but not necessarily independent of thought in general. He also once said that thought "appears in the work of bees, of crystals, and throughout the purely physical world." That is a different debate, though.

No one is denying regularities of behavior. Nominalists simply believe that they're (particular) properties of particulars. — Terrapin Station

Could you elaborate on this? How can particular properties of particular objects exhibit the same regularity, such that my choice of which particular rock to drop does not affect the universality of the outcome?

But the more you look for such a thing, the more you can rule it out. — Terrapin Station

This is what Peirce called "crude induction" Interestingly, he considered it to be the only legitimate way to infer a universal proposition, because a single counterexample would suffice to refute it - i.e., it is instantly self-correcting.

I was just following the accepted definition of "real", which defines real as actual. — Metaphysician Undercover

But that is certainly not the technical definition within philosophy, especially in the context of the debate over the reality of universals, which is the thread topic.

I find there is a problem with your suggestion, that possibilities are real, because then all logical possibilities are equally realities. — Metaphysician Undercover

The claim is not that all possibilities are real, it is that some possibilities are real. Likewise, the broader claim is not that all generals are real, it is that some generals are real.

If we attempt to separate real possibilities from unreal possibilities, we do so by grounding them in what is actual. — Metaphysician Undercover

On the contrary, the actual is grounded in the really possible. A continuum is more fundamental than any individuals that happen to be actualized on it. As I went on to say in my post that you quoted, no multitude of actual points comprises a line; instead, a line contains potential points exceeding all multitude.

You might say religions make it too easy, that the kind of truth they offer are rather too settled - 'sign here'. That's where the Platonist tradition is so interesting and still so important. Plato was determined not to be taken in by 'mere belief' but to arrive at a greater truth through the exercise of reason, which is still what distinguishes philosophy from religion as such (although there are many overlaps). But your observation of 'knowing how we know' is crucial to that. What motivates that, is something like a religious type of instinct, but again it is more questioning and more critical than what we generally take religion to be. — Wayfarer

I generally agree. This seems to imply that concepts are either Divine or reflect the light of the Divine. The phrase "religious instinct" especially resonates for me. Thinking is passionate. Its object of love or desire is concept that reveals, or reality revealed in the concept. Thinking about thinking seems to concern itself with the revelation of revelation itself. I suppose the big question is whether there is something like a final or complete revelation. If there is not, then we seemingly never have absolute truth --but only the best truth of the day, necessarily perishable. If concept reveals reality, then a final Truth seems to require that the truly real be in some way fixed or complete. If concept creates reality to an important degree, though, we may never catch our own tail. In this case, the final truth might be a realization that all is process and fire and novelty.

But that is certainly not the technical definition within philosophy, especially in the context of the debate over the reality of universals, which is the thread topic. — aletheist

Well I have no clue of what you mean by "the technical definition". Unless you specify it, where is that technical definition supposed to be found? To say that real is a broader term than actual does not provide a technical definition.

The claim is not that all possibilities are real, it is that some possibilities are real. Likewise, the broader claim is not that all generals are real, it is that some generals are real. — aletheist

What then, distinguishes between a real possibility and an unreal one. It cannot be something real, nor can it be unreal, because it has to create a boundary between these two. In your system of definitions, what creates that boundary between a real and an unreal possibility?

And if you say that there are real generals and unreal generals, then I suppose there is a similar boundary between real inductive conclusions and unreal deductive conclusions. None of that makes any sense to me. All inductive principles are of the same type, "inductive", some are better than others. To say that some are real and some are unreal would create a categorical separation within that category, and this is an unnecessary complication. Furthermore, you still need to account for something which substantiates your distinction between real and unreal inductive principles, this boundary cannot itself be something real.

Unless you specify it, where is that technical definition supposed to be found? — Metaphysician Undercover

Sorry, I just assumed that you were reading all of the posts in this thread. Briefly, reality means being whatever it is regardless of whether any person or finite group of people thinks it so, while existence means reacting with other like things in the environment.

What then, distinguishes between a real possibility and an unreal one. — Metaphysician Undercover

Good question, I will have to think about it. However, whether we can distinguish between real and unreal possibilities is not germane to whether there is such a distinction. In other words, it would be a real distinction.

It cannot be something real, nor can it be unreal, because it has to create a boundary between these two. — Metaphysician Undercover

Huh? This would entail that the distinction between the actual and the non-actual likewise cannot be something actual or non-actual. Is that your position?

I did not follow your last paragraph at all. Where did I say or imply anything about "inductive principles" being "real and unreal"?

Sorry, I just assumed that you were reading all of the posts in this thread. Briefly, reality means being whatever it is regardless of whether any person or finite group of people thinks it so, while existence means reacting with other like things in the environment. — aletheist

So, doesn't it make sense to say that whatever is, regardless of whether any person says so, actually is, and therefore real is synonymous with actual? And how would you support the claim that a possibility is anything other than what some one says is possible?

However, whether we can distinguish between real and unreal possibilities is not germane to whether there is such a distinction. In other words, it is a real distinction. — aletheist

But don't you see the problem here? Whatever it is that creates the boundary between real and unreal cannot itself be real or else it would be part of the real, and therefore not the boundary between real and unreal?

Huh? This would entail that the distinction between the actual and the non-actual likewise cannot be something actual or non-actual. Is that your position? — aletheist

Well, you might state it like that, what lies between the actual and non-actual is the possible. But that's simplistic, and incorrect, as the possible is the non-actual. The problem may be resolved through dualism though. I'm dualist, so I allow two distinct forms of the actual, both are real. What separates them is the unreal, possibility.

Where did I say or imply anything about "inductive principles" being "real and unreal"? — aletheist

You said "not all generals are real". I assumed inductive principles are generals, so I asked how would you distinguish between real and unreal inductive principles. If they are all unreal, then what type of generals would be real?

What then, distinguishes between a real possibility and an unreal one. It cannot be something real, nor can it be unreal, because it has to create a boundary between these two. In your system of definitions, what creates that boundary between a real and an unreal possibility? — Metaphysician Undercover

A real possibility is an intelligible, or non contradictory, particular. So it speaks to the reality of constraints or generals. A real possibility is what the general conditions of regularity allow - or more accurately, can't forbid.

Well, you might state it like that, what lies between the actual and non-actual is the possible. But that's simplistic, and incorrect, as the possible is the non-actual. — Metaphysician Undercover

Again, this way of thinking is only true if you are locked into standard issue reductionism. In a holist, four cause, view of causality, existence becomes self organising development.

So we begin with a vagueness - everything is possible, anything might be the case. And yet embedded in that is the further constraint that most of these possibilities are in fact going to be contradictory and so cancel each other out.

Thus given an initial condition where everything is possible, that most general possible state is already going to suppress the actualisation of most of that possibility.

If I can shift a foot left just as easily as I can shift a foot right, then freely doing both will immediately cancel each shift, leaving me not able to move at all in effect.

So possibility is only actual when it meets the general constraint of being inteligible. It has to pass the test of not being self contradictory. Or rather, not being self cancelling in regards to some more general condition or constraint.

This is why you need a metaphysics that can distinguishes the two classes of potentiality - the possible vs the vague.

The vague is that state of everythingness to which the law of non contradiction fails to apply. In vagueness, there is no possibility that is not intelligible - because, symmetrically, there is also nothing to rule a possibility intelligible.

But a real possibility is a degree of freedom shaped by a context. It is something that actually could happen, in that it's happening is not already ruled self-defeating.

So, if multiple unrelated organisms hold awareness of good, then it seems safe to presume it justified that awareness of good, or of the beneficial, is not a given culturally transmitted from one organism to another (unlike mores and morals). The disparity between ameba and humans may be too extreme, so one can merely think of the disparity between great apes and humans. Like our awareness of a physical rock as object, awareness of good is an awareness of a particular object that is independent of other minds and invariantly present in all minds: all minds are aware of good as a given object, though this awareness is not gained culturally; just as all minds concerned will be aware of the same physical rock perceived, though this awareness is not gained culturally. (Rather than the example of good, the same can be stated of awareness of circles—though awareness of circles is more restrained to our sapient minds.) Therefore, though the physical rock is a phenomenal object and goodness is non-phenomenal object, the same justification here applies to both these objects of awareness being extramental. — javra

Wait--but you're just noting that goodness is an idea that multiple people have. What would be the evidence that it's not simply a mental phenomenon--that it's simply a way that brains function? (And by the way, I don't actually buy that mores/morals are culturally transmitted. They're culturally influenced,but that's different than them being literally culturally transmitted.)

Re rocks, we perceive them, we can observe them as something external to us. We can manipulate them, measure various aspects of them with machines, etc.

So, doesn't it make sense to say that whatever is, regardless of whether any person says so, actually is, and therefore real is synonymous with actual? — Metaphysician Undercover

No, not given the technical distinction between real/reality and actual/existence. The whole point of making the distinction is to clarify that the two concepts are not equivalent. The nominalist holds that, indeed, only the actual is real; but the realist holds that there are some realities that are not actual. Philosophers have been arguing about this for centuries, so it seems like there must be something to it.

The problem may be resolved through dualism though. I'm dualist, so I allow two distinct forms of the actual, both are real. What separates them is the unreal, possibility. — Metaphysician Undercover

No, that does not solve the problem. What separates the unreal (possibility) from each form of the actual? Merely making a distinction does not "draw a boundary," and even if it did, the boundary would (by definition) be on neither side of itself. What color is the perimeter of a black ink spot on a white piece of paper? In what state is the border between Colorado and Wyoming?

You said "not all generals are real". I assumed inductive principles are generals, so I asked how would you distinguish between real and unreal inductive principles. If they are all unreal, then what type of generals would be real? — Metaphysician Undercover

I am still not following you at all here. What do you mean by "inductive principles"? What do they have to do with the realism/nominalism debate?

Or an objective idealist, such that "matter is effete mind, inveterate habits becoming physical laws." Peirce sometimes defined reality as that which is independent of the thoughts of any individual person or finite collection of people, but not necessarily independent of thought in general. He also once said that thought "appears in the work of bees, of crystals, and throughout the purely physical world." That is a different debate, though. — aletheist

Well, arguably that would still amount to nominalism, though it depends on just what thought amounts to on that view, I suppose.

Could you elaborate on this? How can particular properties of particular objects exhibit the same regularity, such that my choice of which particular rock to drop does not affect the universality of the outcome? — aletheist

Note that it wouldn't be literally the same. Just similar. And it would simply be a (brute) fact of how particular matter in particular dynamic relations behaves.

A real possibility is an intelligible, or non contradictory, particular. — apokrisis

I have been talking about real possibilities as an inexhaustible continuum of potential individuals - general, not particular. Do you disagree?

And it would simply be a (brute) fact of how particular matter in particular dynamic relations behaves. — Terrapin Station

But that sounds just like a universal, except for the "brute" part. Why would particular matter in particular dynamic relations predictably behave in the same way, or even in a very similar way? Calling it "brute" implies that there is no explanation. Why should we accept that?

Wait--but you're just noting that goodness is an idea that multiple people have. What would be the evidence that it's not simply a mental phenomenon--that it's simply a way that brains function? — Terrapin Station

Hey, as I mentioned initially, I don’t have high hopes of me being convincing. This, by the way, due to goodness being here evidenced experientially—and not through rational(ist) justifications (whatever these might be).

I use goodness as example, rather than maths, because it isn’t applicable only to some beings’ awareness. It’s ubiquitous to anything sentient—human or otherwise--while yet superseding all particular sentient beings. For example, hypothesize there being a superlative god (for the philosophizing of it) and good will supersede even this being as a universal. If an ameba in any way senses attraction and repulsion, it too will hold innate awareness of good—no brains are required for a sentient being to be innately aware of it. Like quantity, “good” is a property, or form, that is both imbedded into and apart from any individual being’s mind—or, at least, so the argument would go.

But I fold my cards for today. (May it be a good new year for all.)

If concept reveals reality, then a final Truth seems to require that the truly real be in some way fixed or complete. If concept creates reality to an important degree, though, we may never catch our own tail. In this case, the final truth might be a realization that all is process and fire and novelty. — R-13

Or perhaps "final truth" has nothing to do with concepts, in any determinate sense, at all.

I have been talking about real possibilities as an inexhaustible continuum of potential individuals - general, not particular. Do you disagree? — aletheist

I agree in that a continuum is the continuity of a habit or global constraint.

But a wrinkle may be that I'm avoiding treating a continuum as causally generative. So rather than creating possibilities - like a line producing always more points - it is all about suppressing vagueness, with crisp possibility being then the degrees of freedom that get left over.

So if the continuum simply generated the points that populate or construct the line, then where is the secondness, where is the reaction? The points are being imagined as static existents - at which point the reductionist will just say forget all the other causal apparatus and just take the points as real, treat the line an emergent fiction.

But I am stressing that the nature of the point is open ended. It is characterised only in terms of what about its spontaneity or tychism is actually constrained.

Of course in geometry, there is nothing more constrained than a zero dimensional point. Except it then has the open ended inertial freedoms of Newtonian mechanics - specifically the freedoms to translate and rotate.

So rather than calling the continuum inexhaustible - which suggest it is itself the generator of endless distinction - I would stress that it is instead a limit, and quite exhaustible. It can't restrict what is not within its scope. And what is unrestricted is the truly free.

That's an idea that has a certain appeal to me. I am tempted to use the words "mystical" or "intuitive." This would be something like the Philosopher dying into the Sage or Dialectic completing itself in Silence. I capitalize to stress the concepts as protagonists in an abstract narrative.

But that sounds just like a universal, except for the "brute" part. — aletheist

The reason it's not a universal is because it's not a matter of something separate from the particulars in question, where the particulars are instantiating that different thing.

Why would particular matter in particular dynamic relations predictably behave in the same way, or even in a very similar way? — aletheist

There error there is in assuming that sans universals, there shouldn't be similarities.

Calling it "brute" implies that there is no explanation. Why should we accept that? — aletheist

At some point you're going to posit things for which there is no further-down-the-turtle-pile explanation. For one, you have to, because you don't have infinite time to keep positing more.

I have been very interested in Hegel, too. With his "The Rational is the Real", though, I think he objectifies spirit and intuition. I don't personally believe there is an evolution of spirit in a dialectical sense, although there may certainly be a logical evolution of ideas in that kind of sense.

So, the Philosopher "dying into the Sage" has been going on from the beginning of self-consciousness, in various spiritual forms in various cultures, I would say. I don't believe there will be a general culminating vision of Absolute Knowing.

The reason it's not a universal is because it's not a matter of something separate from the particulars in question, where the particulars are instantiating that different thing. — Terrapin Station

You still seem to be treating a universal as another kind of individual - "something separate" - that is somehow "in" particulars. In this case, it is rather a real habit - a law of nature - that governs particulars.

There error there is in assuming that sans universals, there shouldn't be similarities. — Terrapin Station

But why there should there be predictable similarities; i.e., regularities? What is the alternative explanation to real universals?

At some point you're going to posit things for which there is no further-down-the-turtle-pile explanation. — Terrapin Station

But why does the nominalist stop here? How do we determine that there are no further explanations to be found?

You still seem to be treating a universal as another kind of individual - "something separate" - that is somehow "in" particulars. — aletheist

Because that's the concept of universals. A different concept is different (obviously). It's not the same issue.

In this case, it is rather a real habit - a law of nature - that governs particulars. — aletheist

If the "law of nature" obtains separately from the particulars (regardless of whether we're talking about potentials versus actualities, etc.), then that would be separate, woudln't it? Otherwise it's not separate from the particulars, whatever it is, and we're talking about nominalism.

But why there should there be predictable similarities; — aletheist

Let's try it this way: what is your answer to why there should be predictable similiarities when we posit universals?

But why does the nominalist stop here? How do we determine that there are no further explanations to be found? — aletheist

I don't see it as a matter of explanations. I see it as a matter of talking about what there is. There's no evidence that there's anything other than particulars.

Because that's the concept of universals. — Terrapin Station

No realists (except maybe some Platonists) believe that universals are determinate individuals.

Let's try it this way: what is your answer to why there should be predictable similiarities when we posit universals? — Terrapin Station

Because the particulars are being governed by a real universal - the same general law. Now, what is the nominalist's explanation? Why should observations of particular events in the past be reliable indicators of particular events in the future? What good reason do we have for being confident that the rock will drop now - and tomorrow, and next week, etc. - just because we have seen rocks drop in similar situations in the past?

There's no evidence that there's anything other than particulars. — Terrapin Station

Predictable regularities are evidence that there is something other than particulars.

With his "The Rational is the Real", though, I think he objectifies spirit and intuition. I don't personally believe there is an evolution of spirit in a dialectical sense, although there may certainly be a logical evolution of ideas in that kind of sense. — John

I suppose I understand this objectification in terms of concepts. The "objective" self swims in language, is "made" of language. So, yeah, a "logical evolution of ideas," but driven on by something that is not well represented in language: emotion. Music and visual art seem like "objectifications" of the desire that drives the evolution of ideas.

So, the Philosopher "dying into the Sage" has been going on from the beginning of self-consciousness, in various spiritual forms in various cultures, I would say. I don't believe there will be a general culminating vision of Absolute Knowing. — John

I tend to agree. I think highly of Epictetus and Epicurus. I think Hegel paints these positions as stations on the way, but I experience this as the bias of a state philosopher. I don't think the individual has to wait for the end of history to find some kind of wisdom, though clearly we inherit our very individuality largely from what has evolved before our births. I'm reading his philosophy of history at the moment, and it's pretty great, but he's pretty blatantly an ideologist. A joker might call him a cheerleader for Reality, but what's really so bad about that? If we want to be wise, happy, dignified.

In the Christian religion God has revealed Himself, — that is, he has given us to understand what He is; so that He is no longer a concealed or secret existence. And this possibility of knowing Him, thus afforded us, renders such knowledge a duty. God wishes no narrow-hearted souls or empty heads for his children; but those whose spirit is of itself indeed, poor, but rich in the knowledge of Him; and who regard this knowledge of God as the only valuable possession. That development of the thinking spirit, which has resulted from the revelation of the Divine Being as its original basis, must ultimately advance to the intellectual comprehension of what was presented in the first instance, to feeling and imagination. The time must eventually come for understanding that rich product of active Reason, which the History of the World offers to us. It was for a while the fashion to profess admiration for the wisdom of God, as displayed in animals, plants, and isolated occurrences. But, if it be allowed that Providence manifests itself in such objects and forms of existence, why not also in Universal History? This is deemed too great a matter to be thus regarded. But Divine Wisdom, i.e. Reason., is one and the same in the great as in the little; and we must not imagine God to be too weak to exercise his wisdom on the grand scale. Our intellectual striving aims at realising the conviction that what was intended by eternal wisdom, is actually accomplished in the domain of existent, active Spirit, as well as in that of mere Nature. Our mode of treating the subject is, in this aspect, a Theodicaea, — a justification of the ways of God, — which Leibnitz attempted metaphysically in his method, i.e. in indefinite abstract categories, — so that the ill that is found in the World may be comprehended, and the thinking Spirit reconciled with the fact of the existence of evil. Indeed, nowhere is such a harmonising view more pressingly demanded than in Universal History; and it can be attained only by recognising the positive existence, in which that negative element is a subordinate, and vanquished nullity. On the one hand. the ultimate design of the World must be perceived; and, on the other hand, the fact that this design has been actually, realised in it, and that evil has not been able permanently to assert a competing position. — Hegel

Compare that with this:

And chiefly Thou O Spirit, that dost prefer
Before all Temples th' upright heart and pure,
Instruct me, for Thou know'st; Thou from the first
Wast present, and with mighty wings outspread [ 20 ]
Dove-like satst brooding on the vast Abyss
And mad'st it pregnant: What in me is dark
Illumin, what is low raise and support;
That to the highth of this great Argument
I may assert Eternal Providence, [ 25 ]
And justifie the wayes of God to men. — Milton

I suppose I understand this objectification in terms of concepts. The "objective" self swims in language, is "made" of language. So, yeah, a "logical evolution of ideas," but driven on by something that is not well represented in language: emotion. Music and visual art seem like "objectifications" of the desire that drives the evolution of ideas. — R-13

I would agree in thinking about the self as swimming in a sea of language, at least in terms of its intersubjective dimension; but I do not think of the self as 'made" of language. For me it is more like it is made by something that might be called 'emotion'; perhaps 'affective disposition' is a better term. affective disposition and the creativity it engenders is "not well represented in language" if you mean by "language" something along the lines of discursive analysis. I think you're right that emotion, or as I would prefer, affective disposition, at least contributes towards driving the evolution of ideas, but I do also think that ideas have their own supplementary dialectical engine, with its own logical momentum. So, I think the evolution of ideas is an interplay of free creativity and logic. I don't find any place for genuine freedom in Hegel's system. He wants to make philosophy into a science, even an exact science one almost feels; I think it is and always should be more like an art.

Nice passages from Hegel and Milton. Perhaps Milton's puritanism and Hegel's Lutheranism are not too far apart. I think both probably later came to reject, or at least to distance themselves from, institutionalized religion. Both were wary of the "aegis of tutelage" and the limitations on speculative and creative freedoms that it represents.

No realists (except maybe some Platonists) believe that universals are determinate individuals. — aletheist

I'm not saying anything pro or con about "determinate" (especially because I don't even know what it would be to say something pro or con about it). I'm just saying something about universals not being identical to particulars but having a relationship with them.

Because the particulars are being governed by a real universal - the same general law. — aletheist

No that doesn't answer the question I'm asking. Why should there be predictable similarities with the same universal? In other words, events at time T2 compared to T1. Why should there be predictable similarities--why shouldn't it change instead? You can't answer something like "because it's (the universal) the same" or "because it doesn't change." I'm asking why that is the case. I'm asking you about the properties of the universal.

Again, this way of thinking is only true if you are locked into standard issue reductionism. In a holist, four cause, view of causality, existence becomes self organising development. — apokrisis

As you may well know, I don't belief in this concept of self organising development. I think such organising requires a cause, and the cause is something active, and necessarily prior to the self which comes to be from the organising.

Thus given an initial condition where everything is possible, that most general possible state is already going to suppress the actualisation of most of that possibility. — apokrisis

As I am arguing with altheist, I don't think possibility is real. When we refer to a "real possibility" it is only said to be real because it is supported by some actuality. The actuality is the substance of the possibility which makes it real, and therefore the essence of why we can call the possibility real. The possibility isn't actually real then, it is the actuality which is real. We call the possibility real simply because it is supported by something real. Therefore a "condition where everything is possible" is not a real possibility. That described condition is actually impossible, it's just a fiction, because according to the description, there is no actuality, no substance to make that a real possibility.

No, not given the technical distinction between real/reality and actual/existence. — aletheist

Well I'm asking you to give me the technical distinction. What you gave me supports my position as well as yours. You say that it doesn't support my position, "given the technical distinction", but I haven't been given the technical distinction.

but the realist holds that there are some realities that are not actual. — aletheist

If you accept this, that some realities are not actual, I want to see your principles, your reasons, what gives substance to this idea? That is the whole problem which Plato ran into with Pyhtagorean Idealism, the Ideas were described as passive entities which individual human minds partake in. But he slowly came to realise that this passive existence, independent from minds, could not be supported. Then he introduced "the good", which threw a whole new light on the intelligible objects, allowing him to understand Ideas as active Forms, active in creation. From here, Aristotle soundly refuted Pythagoren Idealism, while the Neo-Platonists went on to develop the concept of actual Forms.

No, that does not solve the problem. What separates the unreal (possibility) from each form of the actual? Merely making a distinction does not "draw a boundary," and even if it did, the boundary would (by definition) be on neither side of itself. What color is the perimeter of a black ink spot on a white piece of paper? In what state is the border between Colorado and Wyoming? — aletheist

You are exactly making my point for me. The boundary is nothing real, as you demonstrate with your examples. I assign "possibility" to the boundary, because if the boundary is vague, there is the possibility of assigning the area within the boundary, to either one of the two actualities.. So possibility is nothing real, just like in your examples, it is a boundary. What is separated by the boundary is two distinct actualities. It is the vagueness of the boundary, which makes possibility appear to be something real. Consider that there is a grey area, between the black spot, and the white of the paper, or a grey area in the Colorado/Wyoming border terrain, such that in this area, it is not definitively one or the other, we are open to possibilities. It is the failure of the human being to properly define the boundary, which creates the illusion that possibility is something real.

I am still not following you at all here. What do you mean by "inductive principles"? What do they have to do with the realism/nominalism debate? — aletheist

I didn't know we were involved in a realism/nominalism debate. I for one, do not know the fundamentals of these positions, and I am not arguing one side or the other.

Inductive principles are any conclusions derived from inductive reasoning. Say, liquid water always freezes to solid ice at the same temperature. That's a generality produced from numerous observations of particular occurrences, an inductive conclusion. You have asserted that some such generalities are real, and some generalities are unreal. How would you differentiate between real and unreal inductive principles?

I'm not saying anything pro or con about "determinate" ... I'm just saying something about universals not being identical to particulars but having a relationship with them. — Terrapin Station

A key difference between universals and particulars is that no universal is determinate, while all particulars are determinate. A lion in general is not any particular age, size, color, etc. within the ranges of properties that encompass all possible lions; but a particular lion is always a particular age, size, color, etc. This is what it means for a universal to be a continuum, and a particular to be an individual that is actualized from that continuum.

No that doesn't answer the question I'm asking. — Terrapin Station

Well, you still have not answered the questions that I asked first. Why should there be predictable regularities in the world if everything is particular? What is the nominalist's alternative explanation to real universals? How else can observations of particular events in the past be reliable indicators of particular events in the future? What good reason do we have for claiming to know that the rock will drop now - and tomorrow, and next week, etc. - just because we have seen rocks drop in similar situations previously?

Why should there be predictable similarities with the same universal? In other words, events at time T2 compared to T1. Why should there be predictable similarities--why shouldn't it change instead? — Terrapin Station

Because that is what we mean when we talk about universals - when we talk about laws of nature, in this case. There is something real that governs events in such a way that whenever certain conditions obtain, certain outcomes happen. Without it, no mere aggregate of particular events that occurred in the past can warrant the confident expectation that similar events will occur in the future.