Also, everyone grapples with questions of purpose, meaning, ethics, duty, etc. I think these questions are a lot more important to people than hoe old the universe is or what Dark Matter/Energy are. — RogueAI

Yes, I agree. And this is why I like to use 'ontology' for the more technical-scientific aspect of philosophy. Husserl is, for instance, not writing self-help books. It's fucking hard work to get relative clarity on foundational concepts like subjectivity and meaning and so on. Fussy stuff that bores the average person to tears, akin to pure mathematics. Outsiders don't respect it much because where's the gear, bro ? And anyone can do it.

I don't think there's anything wrong with self-help books, just to be clear. I love Epictetus and Epicurus, etc. For those who don't choose the particular existential path of 'scientific' philosophy ('ontology'), the literary or dramaturgical aspect of philosophy is indeed to be preferred. I read Nietzsche intensely in my 20s. My problem then was figuring out what kind of person to be (ethics, values, authority, identity).

I'm not bored with such issues now, but I'm more interested in fussy conceptual details than I once was, probably because youth's identity issues are relatively settled for me.

I very much think that a mathematician or physicist or biologist can do genuine 'ontological' work themselves. — plaque flag

Form and substance - the first dualism. I sometimes call them 'stuff and arrangements'. I would say that mathematicians explore the possible arrangements of anything- pattern, chaos, order, disorder, symmetry, asymmetry. whereas physicists and biologists look to explore the actual arrangement of stuff. Some mathematicians seem to think that there can be, or are arrangements of nothing. It makes no sense to me. Just as you cannot have stuff without it being arranged or disarranged in some form, so you cannot arrange or disarrange nothing. Form is the general, and substance the particular, and they are two aspects on one world.
Or we could talk about energy and information as the temporal unfolding of energy difference into informational complexity.

Whatever reality is, reality necessarily excludes – negates – unreality (i.e. ontological impossibles — 180 Proof

Ontological impossibles are contradictions, limits on sensible talk. but if reality happens to be that particles are wavy and waves are a bit particular, talk has to conform itself to reality, because talk does not constrain reality at all (unless it's God's talk of course - 'Let there be light.' :wink: ).

s the philosopher a life coach ? A spiritual advisor ? This “philosopher” is analogous to a nutritional supplement, which is to say as a piece of technology, tested qualitatively like a new painkiller or piece of music in terms of feeling it gives us.

Or can we really take seriously the idea that a philosopher is essentially “scientific” in some radical, foundational sense ? Is the philosopher a kind of “pure mathematician” of existence as a whole ? I say “pure” because I want to highlight an impractical interest in truth for its own sake. Even an unpleasant truth is still good, because it is possessed as truth, because it’s worse to be confused or deceived. — plaque flag

Mathematicians are also "spiritual advisors", for mathematics and logic are normative disciplines. Going along with Hacker's interpretation of Wittgenstein, I think it is most useful to consider the academic disciplines of pure Mathematics and logic as not having subject matter in themselves, but as defining semantical norms of representation that facilitate the translation, coordination and comparison of language games that do possess subject matter. Many language-games that are partly mathematical, e.g the natural sciences, possess some degree of subject matter to the extent that they are applied disciplines that establish synthetic propositions.

As for philosophy itself, I think it is reducible to every other subject and their interrelations.

Form and substance - the first dualism. I sometimes call them 'stuff and arrangements'. I would say that mathematicians explore the possible arrangements of anything- pattern, chaos, order, disorder, symmetry, asymmetry. whereas physicists and biologists look to explore the actual arrangement of stuff. — unenlightened

Yeah that sounds right !

Some mathematicians seem to think that there can be, or are arrangements of nothing. It makes no sense to me. — unenlightened

As you may know, set theory brilliantly (weirdly) builds everything from the empty set. I visualized it as Bubbleverse. The empty set is an empty circle. So it's circles inside circles inside circles, and one can build up to the real numbers and beyond. Nothing but circles. Empty circle at the center.

Cantor used vertical bars above his symbols of sets to indicate an act of abstraction. I respect that he included the subject in this sense.

Anyway, I understand your objection, but I'm partial to something like mathematical structuralism. Numbers are basically roles in structures. Their essence is in their relationship to other such roles. Holism. We don't say what a number is without describing the whole system. Same with objects in the lifeworld and the meanings of linguistic concepts, in my view. A single continuous semantic blanket.

Mathematicians are also "spiritual advisors", for mathematics and logic are normative disciplines. — sime

:up:

That's a reasonable claim. I don't think it's the whole story though. I have some of Cantor's original work in translation, and it's very much an 'intuitive' enterprise. The structures are 'there' for other mathematicians and he's studying them ---does not see himself as an inventor or a formalist.

The enterprise is normative in the sense that a scientist strives for the truth. But he's like a naturalist counting spider's eggs. He is articulating or disclosing a reality that was there waiting for the light to find it. [ I'd say it was implicit in human cognition or something, avoiding all-out Platonism. ]

I don't deny that other workers in the field had very different intentions.

I think it is most useful to consider the academic disciplines of pure Mathematics and logic as not having subject matter in themselves, but as defining semantical norms of representation that facilitate the translation, coordination and comparison of language games that do possess subject matter. — sime

Again, reasonable. But I'm tempted to say that they articulate norms that are 'found' or 'given.' This is not to deny creativity altogether. I just personally think there's an 'intuitive constraint' on our freedom. I can't put it under a microscope of course.

As for philosophy itself, I think it is reducible to every other subject and their interrelations. — sime

I guess my issue is that this itself is a philosophical claim. Yet I don't care about academic departments. So I'm talking about a mode of discourse that digs into the most basic concepts.

Gödel studied Husserl. It's easy to understand why. One of the basic questions for me in philosophy is : what the f*** are we talking about, really ? It's not just whether a statement is warranted that matters, but also what it means in the fullest and most robust sense.

Form is the general, and substance the particular, and they are two aspects on one world. — unenlightened

Mathematicians might use a minimal substance of symbols in order to play with form with the 'weight' of substance minimized.

The empty set is an empty circle. So it's circles inside circles inside circles, and one can build up to the real numbers and beyond — plaque flag

It's been done before.

In the beginning God created the heavens and the empty set. Now the empty set was formless and void, and darkness was over the surface of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the surface of the waters. And God said "there is the empty set and it is the only one, so the set of sets is one, and thus there are 2 sets, the empty set and the set of empty sets. and god divided the light from the darkness, and called the darkness the empty set and the light he called 'one'.

Mathematics is fabulous!

Mathematics is fabulous! — unenlightened

It really is (even if there is some irony in your remark.) Ever look into Cantor's ordinals and cardinals ? Beautiful stuff. Just finding a way to enumerate the rationals. Or seeing that a single infinite sequence of bits is also (is easily read as ) a countably infinite list of sequences of bits.The impossibly of enumerating all such sequences. Seductive apriori formal-intuitive science.

No irony, I mean it literally. I merely point out that set theory presupposes the set theorist commanding the realm of forms into existence, and this is exactly the same story as the bible creation myth of God hovering over the void. Neither is real, or both are real; and as I am unable to decide, I am inclined to call this a limit of thought, and say no more about it.

Yes Cantor is even more Godlike than the set theorist. Perhaps Hindu mythology could relate to him? I don't know enough of it. But the diagonal proof is beautiful. No matter how many gods you worship, there are always more ...

All very well said. I agree. And I'm not a Platonist, because my ontology is resolutely anthropocentric. Not on principle, but just on logical necessity. Don't want to speak beyond my experience. I never could figure out how to look around all human cognition and peep at Reality naked. And then I questioned what naked Reality could even mean.

But the diagonal proof is beautiful. No matter how many gods you worship, there are always more ... — unenlightened

:up: :up: :up:

I take Appel to be sketching a minimal foundationalism, relying primarily on the exclusion of performative contradiction. This is not so far from Brandom's coherence-aspiring subject. Behind it all is a quest for autonomy. — plaque flag

Have you read Lyotard’s The Differend? For Lyotard a differend is “a wrong or injustice that arises because the discourse in which the wrong might be expressed does not exist. To put it another way, it is a wrong or injustice that arises because the prevailing or hegemonic discourse actively precludes the possibility of this wrong being expressed. To put it still another way, it is a wrong or injustice which cannot be proved to have been a wrong or injustice because the means of doing so has (also) been denied the victim.”

As Shaun Gallagher explains:

“What we have in these instances are what Lyotard calls differends, and it is precisely differends that are excluded from the conversation of mankind which operates on the basis of shared vocabulary and "civility" (Oakeshott, Rorty, and Caputo all use this word). The conversation of mankind reduces deprivations to negations. As Lyotard puts it, "to be able not to speak [= a negation] is not the same as not to be able to speak [= a deprivation].

The conversation of mankind fails as a model of postmodern hermeneutics not only because it is a metadiscourse and worthy of our incredulity, but because it hides exclusionary rules beneath a rhetoric of inclusion. The overarching conversation of mankind aspires to resolve all differends. But by requiring what is genuinely incommensurable (i.e., incommensurable with the conversation itself) to be voiced within the conversation, it denies it expression and helps to constitute it as a differend at the same time that it disguises it as a litigation. The very attempt to include something which cannot be included makes the conversation of mankind a terrorist conversation.”

Fascinating stuff.

Do I think any actual conversation is stably or reliably ideal ? No. But I don't think Apel does either. For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of critical autonomous rationality. We await the descent of New Jerusalem.

it is a wrong or injustice that arises because the prevailing or hegemonic discourse actively precludes the possibility of this wrong being expressed. — Joshs

I mentioned an "ideal communication community that is in principle equally open to all speakers and that excludes all force except the force of the better argument."

Are you sure we are disagreeing ? Is the target bad or do you just think we'll never hit that target ? Because I don't think we'll hit the target often or at all. But I've never drawn a perfect circle either. Yet the concept of the circle helps make those imperfect circles circles to begin with. I grasp the failure of a communication structure in the light an ideal or telos.

[tangential, removed]

Are you sure we are disagreeing ? Is the target bad or do you just think we'll never hit that target ? Because I don't think we'll hit the target often or at all. But I've never drawn a perfect circle either. Yet the concept of the circle helps make those imperfect circles circles to begin with. I grasp the failure of a communication structure in the light an ideal or telos — plaque flag

I don’t think there is a single target to hit. As Gallagher writes:

The postmodern idea is not that there is one overarching conversation, but that there is a plurality of conversations, some constituting relative differends in relation to others. It is still possible that fusions can happen between conversations, not in the sense of unifying or reducing different conversations, but in the sense of creating new and different conversations by linking one to another; or again, not in the sense of a fusion of horizons, but in the sense of a creation of new horizons.

He imagines a dialogue like the following between Gadamer and Lyotard:

Gadamer: That I, as an individual, find myself always within a hermeneutical situation, a conversation, signifies that I am not alone. Even if I am only talking with myself, my language is something that I have inherited from others, and their words interrupt and make possible my conversation. Even if there is no universally shared human nature as a basis for Romantic trust, within the hermeneutical situation there is still some shared aspects, a certain range of background knowledge, some limited common ground which enables the particular conversation to happen. Otherwise communication would be impossible. Neither the common ground, nor the communication it makes possible, will necessarily guarantee community, consensus, or a resolution of differends. We are not focused here on outcomes, a particular consensus to be reached, but on what is anterior to (as a condition of possibility for) conversation. This anterior common ground may only be the battlefield on which our conflicts can be fought. Isn't the principle something like, no differends without a battlefield?

Lyotard: You know yourself how even "the battlefield" is open to conflicting interpretations. This was a favorite example used by Chladenius in his Enlightenment hermeneutics. Differends are not fought out on the battlefield; they remain outside the circumference of the battlefield, unable to enter the conflict within. So we must define many small battlefields, each of which might be called a community of difference, which is not presupposed but accomplished in and through conversation which remains dialogue without ultimate synthesis. Conversations, in such cases, always remain incomplete, imperfect. In them the we is always in question, always at stake, the consensus always local and temporary, community always deferred. Perhaps, within these conversations, a trust which is not good will is required; a trust that we are different and for that very reason require conversation to create a we. This is not a trust in a preexisting we, but a trust in the promise of a we, a not yet we which will always remain not yet, defined by our differences. I have stated elsewhere, "the true we is never we, never stabilized in a name for we, always undone before being constituted, only identified in the non-identity between you ... and me ..."A conversation "could do no more than put the we back into question"

This is not a trust in a preexisting we, but a trust in the promise of a we, a not yet we which will always remain not yet, defined by our differences. I have stated elsewhere, "the true we is never we, never stabilized in a name for we, always undone before being constituted, only identified in the non-identity between you ... and me ..."A conversation "could do no more than put the we back into question"

The above is just the horizonal-ideal 'we' already discussed, the we-to-come, the city of god.

I'm happy to grant that we are all in some sense misfits with idiolects. I'll grant that we have differing conceptions of rationality, but clearly there's enough agreement to debate about how much agreement there is.

It makes so sense to argue against the conditions of possibility for an argument. That means others in a world and a working language and rational norms. A true skeptic doesn't show up, actually feels and enacts his loss of hope in the possibility of communication.

Or can we really take seriously the idea that a philosopher is essentially “scientific” in some radical, foundational sense ? Is the philosopher a kind of “pure mathematician” of existence as a whole ? I say “pure” because I want to highlight an impractical interest in truth for its own sake. Even an unpleasant truth is still good, because it is possessed as truth, because it’s worse to be confused or deceived — plaque flag

Note: Philosophy is very broad and I'll be making some generalisations, I can acknowledge exceptions.

Philosophy does not have an impractical interest in truth, it's thought funnelled through a particular set of selection biases and rules which aim at creating particular moral conditions. Some of these include:

1. Philosophy is thought for the group, logic must succeed at providing desirable conditions for the group, and arguments compete in being the best at doing this.

2. Philosophy is thought-overriding, the logics of philosophy represents a commitment to the well-being of the group, and this objective is sacrosanct. Alternative objectives aren't accepted.

3. Truths are correct references, philosophy excludes the relevancy of most relevances, and the relevant ones have moral importance. Philosophical concepts tie back to point 1, they must be beneficial to the group.

4. While science and scientific endeavours can represent a concept that is good for the group, that's the extent of its relationship with philosophy. Where science wouldn't be considered best for the group, philosophy would reject it.

While philosophy is a broad term, I think there's a substantial difference between solitary thinking and discussing philosophy. However, so long as philosophy, refers to the use of these biases, it's not just critical thought. If we're preaching to the group, we need to offer something the group would be interested in, and that's what philosophy is.

To me, an important part of philosophy is the combining of the overriding quality of morality and the nature of group thinking with rationality. I have issues with the idea of rationality, but I mostly see it as useful in this way. Its role is in compelling us to act in the best interests of the group.

I do think it's generally true that what's best for oneself, is what's best for oneself and the group, and by agreeing to conditions that would work for the group, we're all served. Philosophy strives to argue for the benefits of this group-orientated thinking, that we should sacrifice some of our own personal goals because if we all did that, we'd all be much better off. Philosophy also provides us with a reason to hold others accountable for their actions, and fight for the benefit of others based on blind principles.

I'd argue that's what philosophy tries to offer to the world. Holding others accountable to do what's in the best interests of the group and figuring out the best conditions for the group to exist in.

Philosophy does not have an impractical interest in truth, it's thought funnelled through a particular set of selection biases and rules which aim at creating particular moral conditions. — Judaka

I see why this view is tempting. It looks like a form of relativism. Is your own statement here trying to be true ? Or as you yourself trying to create a particular moral condition ?

This next example is not aimed at you.

Let's say a person hates the conceptual complexity of metaphysics and sees no bump in their feed for all their trouble. Aren't they motivated to embrace a relativism that denies the purity of the enterprise ? 'It's all useful fiction.' 'It's all contingently determined by our cultural inheritance.' But such claims must themselves be rationalizations or fated unfree interpretations of the world. Frankly I myself find such claims hard to deny, yet I see the logical issue, and (foolishly in worldly terms) point it out on a forum.

1. Philosophy is thought for the group, logic must succeed at providing desirable conditions for the group, and arguments compete in being the best at doing this.

2. Philosophy is thought-overriding, the logics of philosophy represents a commitment to the well-being of the group, and this objective is sacrosanct. Alternative objectives aren't accepted. — Judaka

:up:

Well said. I don't 100% endorse or agree, but you point out the crucial issues. Very like Rorty again, too. Truth is what your contemporaries let you get away with saying. (Rorty). Since he got away with saying it....it must be true ?

Our vocabularies, Rorty suggests, “have no more of a representational relation to an intrinsic nature of things than does the anteater’s snout or the bowerbird’s skill at weaving” (TP, 48). Pragmatic evaluation of various linguistically infused practices requires a degree of specificity. From Rorty’s perspective, to suggest that we might evaluate vocabularies with respect to their ability to uncover the truth would be like claiming to evaluate tools for their ability to help us get what we want – full stop. Is the hammer or the saw or the scissors better – in general? Questions about usefulness can only be answered, Rorty points out, once we give substance to our purposes.

For Rorty, then, any vocabulary, even that of evolutionary explanation, is a tool for a purpose, and therefore subject to teleological assessment. Typically, Rorty justifies his own commitment to Darwinian naturalism by suggesting that this vocabulary is suited to further the secularization and democratization of society that Rorty thinks we should aim for. Accordingly, there is a close tie between Rorty’s construal of the naturalism he endorses and his most basic political convictions.

...
One result of Rorty’s naturalism is that he is an avowed ethnocentrist. If vocabularies are tools, then they are tools with a particular history, having been developed in and by particular cultures. In using the vocabulary one has inherited, one is participating in and contributing to the history of that vocabulary and so cannot help but take up a position within the particular culture that has created it.

The ethnocentric point is that we can't see around our own culture. But Rorty can't present this as a truth about human beings. Instead (for him anyway) it's only a useful tool, a speech act better understood as scratching an itch or opening a can of beans.

3. Truths are correct references, philosophy excludes the relevancy of most relevances, and the relevant ones have moral importance. Philosophical concepts tie back to point 1, they must be beneficial to the group. — Judaka

To me this is where your view shows some tension. Truths are correct references sounds like the assertion of truth's transcendence.

Do you believe that a community might generate a set of useful fictions ? or superstitions that are good for them in the short term ? For instance, Newtonian physics was once thought to be correct and not just an excellent approximation. People in that time were probably empowered by such a scientific triumph. Or a community might believe itself to be the center of freedom and justice on earth, even though it's mid or worse, which could help them expand their borders, since they are spreading the Best way to live.

We are in dark Nietzschean waters now questioning the will-to-truth itself. Does it not turn us back on our own intentions ? Do you understand yourself to intend truth ? To assert P looks irreducible to me. Articulation of world.

However, so long as philosophy, refers to the use of these biases, it's not just critical thought. If we're preaching to the group, we need to offer something the group would be interested in, and that's what philosophy is. — Judaka

If you mean it's not perfectly critical thought, then I agree. As Habermas puts it, the ideal communication community is, well, ideal. It's the perfect circle we never achieve. Rationality and justice shine on the horizon. These ideas/ideals affect us even in their 'unreality.'

Philosophy strives to argue for the benefits of this group-orientated thinking, that we should sacrifice some of our own personal goals because if we all did that, we'd all be much better off. Philosophy also provides us with a reason to hold others accountable for their actions, and fight for the benefit of others based on blind principles.

I'd argue that's what philosophy tries to offer to the world. Holding others accountable to do what's in the best interests of the group and figuring out the best conditions for the group to exist in. — Judaka

:up:

I think overall your present a kind of group nervous system that has individual thinkers as cells. These cells are constrained by their membership in what they can and ought to say. And I pretty much agree. Though I still think there's a subtle issue in the 'feedback' of such claims. I think we intend the same kind of transcendence that such claims deny as we make them. So I earnestly assert epistemological limits and violate those limits as I assert them. That kind of thing.

I see why this view is tempting. It looks like a form of relativism. Is your own statement here trying to be true ? Or as you yourself trying to create a particular moral condition ? — plaque flag

There's no difference between the two. I would like to hear how you understand the idea of "truth" since you've heard mine and offered no counterargument, and yet you don't use the term the same as I do. We seem to have a fundamentally different interpretation of what a "useful fiction" is as well.

My views further my goals, certainly, why would anyone knowingly argue for unfavourable conditions? We can go into my ulterior motives at some point, but I'll leave it for later.

When I say truth is a correct reference, I mean that it's a quality given to a reference when considered appropriate or warranted, it's a product of logic. If the conditions are met for it to be okay to reference something as something, that creates truth. Without telling me what this other something is, or without the context making it clear, the statement is meaningless. There are many ways in which any single thing can be true, depending on the reference.

A dog is a dog, an animal, a mammal, a loyal companion, a sentient being, and man's best friend, and so on. What's the prerequisite that must be met for an animal to be a loyal companion? Well, it's pretty loose, especially compared to some of the other terms, but I can still argue that it's true that a dog is a loyal companion, using my understanding of the concept of loyalty.

My statement is general and vague, and it makes claims based on creative interpretations. Are my creative interpretations true? What would make them true?

Is it relevant to ask whether my statement is a fair characterisation of philosophy? If so, when is it correct to reference a statement as being a "fair characterisation"? It's very nuanced, complicated, and there are no clear rules, but I'd say it does matter. If my statement is not a fair characterisation of philosophy, my entire argument could be dismissed.

The idea of a "fair characterisation" is a useful fiction, since the idea of fairness is abstract, the rules for determining it are vague and can vary greatly. That doesn't stop it from being true whatsoever. Useful fictions are far more tenacious than you're making it out, and they're tied to things that matter to people. They're practically inseparable from each other, truth and useful fiction, they're one and the same. There's no truth without useful fictions and no useful fictions without truth.

To address this "infinite consensus" argument, to be frank, it's silly. To begin with, what we call consensus isn't actually consensus at all, rules are created and people abide by them. I abide by the norms of language non-consensually, I have no choice, the alternative is too impractical. I can establish a useful fiction and have you accept it in no time at all, just the basic courtesy of allowing me to define a new term and we've done it.

I permit you some rope to use terms in ways that I don't agree with, to think in ways I don't, to have opinions that I don't and to engage in the use of many useful fictions without feeling a need to ask for a vote. Language allows me a lot of leeway with when I use terms, why I use them, how I use them, what I mean by them, and the rules for using them, I don't need to ask for your permission, nor you for mine.

People disagree immensely on all the above factors, there's no consensus whatsoever. Truth doesn't require consensus, useful fictions don't require consensus, and although words may appear like they are a consensus, they're not. There are substantial differences, truly massive differences in how we use and think about our various words, ideas and concepts. We counter these differences often in philosophy.

To me this is where your view shows some tension. Truths are correct references sounds like the assertion of truth's transcendence. — plaque flag

So what I mean here, is that we're to ask whether it's true that a proposition is just, logical, rational and so on. There is no "truth that exists in relation to nothing". However, what makes it correct to call a proposition any of those things can differ from person to person. Both in understanding the concept "justice" and then interpreting a correct reference "this thing is just". Can you see how truth & useful fictions are literally the same thing? To call something true without anyone having any clue what you're referring to has little meaning.

Let me reiterate that I largely agree with your take on things. So I'm just focusing on the place where we don't.

There is no "truth that exists in relation to nothing". — Judaka

To what does this truth relate ?

Let me offer something I found illuminating in my recent study of Husserl.

https://iep.utm.edu/huss-int/#SH1a

The character of an intentional act also has to do with whether it is an “empty” merely signitive intention or whether it is a “non-empty” or fulfilled intention. Here what is at issue is the extent to which a subject has evidence of some sort for accepting the content of their intention. For example, a subject could contemplate, imagine or even believe that “the sun set today will be beautiful with few clouds and lots of orange and red colors” already at eleven in the morning. At this point the intention is an empty one because it merely contemplates a possible state of affairs for which there is no intuitive (experiential) evidence. When the same subject witnesses the sun set later in the day, her intention will either be fulfilled (if the sunset matches what she thought it would be like) or unfulfilled (if the sun set does not match her earlier intention). For Husserl, the difference here too does not have to do with the content or act-matter itself, but rather with the evidential character of the intention (LI VI, §§ 1—12).

For Husserl, we can just see the plums in the icebox. But we can also intend that state of affairs from a distance (an 'empty' not-yet-fulfilled intention.) "There are plums in the ice box" is true because there are plums in the icebox --and meaningful in terms of potential fulfillment. To be sure, things get messier when concepts refer to concepts, but is our intention still transcendent ? Beyond utility ? The plums are there. And 2 + 2 =4. We can just see it, etc.

Direct realism helps here. We see the world as always already conceptually organized. I see plums and not purple balls. I see clouds and not white clumps. It's only philosophers whose theoretical analyses got us believing the world was actually reducible to pieces. Ontology is holist in its intention. But much of life is happy with useful reductive fictions or maps.

The ethnocentric point is that we can't see around our own culture. But Rorty can't present this as a truth about human beings. Instead (for him anyway) it's only a useful tool, a speech act better understood as scratching an itch or opening a can of beans. — plaque flag

Language meaning is changing all the time, culture is changing all the time, and it's possible to understand words and ideas differently despite the culture you're living in. We see this in different political affiliations within the same country, as they are sure to understand words and concepts differently, in ways that reflect their political views. Culture does have an impact though, sure.

If you mean it's not perfectly critical thought, then I agree — plaque flag

It is critical thought, with a particular set of biases and goals attached. It's just how it is, but I'm unsure on what "not perfectly' refers to.

As Habermas puts it, the ideal communication community is, well, ideal. It's the perfect circle we never achieve. — plaque flag

I think language needs to allow for expression of differences in perspective, I'll defend this against motivation. Philosophy as overriding must have its limits.

So I earnestly assert epistemological limits and violate those limits as I assert them. — plaque flag

Yeah, I agree, though I'm surprised to hear you say this. Isn't this the very performative contradiction you're so damning of? Why aren't you defending your infinite consensus argument? I always aim to strike where I think our disagreements lie, just to always find thin air.

To what does this truth relate ? — plaque flag

It relates to my argument, which I established earlier on.

To be sure, things get messier when concepts refer to concepts, but is our intention still transcendent ? Beyond utility ? — plaque flag

Motivations might involve values and ideas with intrinsic value - as opposed to utility, and we make a lot of compromises, there's also some implicit intention that could be argued against. An unthinking person might just accept the concepts they're given, and apply them without question. Not quite sure what you're asking though, usefulness can be more or less directly involved, and our motivation is almost certainly accompanied by other concepts, interpretation is subjective.

Yeah, I agree, though I'm surprised to hear you say this. Isn't this the very performative contradiction you're so damning of? — Judaka

I wasn't speaking in my own voice, but from within the perspective that I am indeed criticizing. My use of 'I' was rhetorical, in other words.

I think language needs to allow for expression of differences in perspective, — Judaka

Yes, and that of course is part of the ideal of rationality --- autonomy of the individual and of the community at large. So we work together to decide what to believe and do as a whole ---without dissolving completely into the crowd.
...He argued that human interaction in one of its fundamental forms is “communicative” rather than “strategic” in nature, insofar as it is aimed at mutual understanding and agreement rather than at the achievement of the self-interested goals of individuals. Such understanding and agreement, however, are possible only to the extent that the communicative interaction in which individuals take part resists all forms of nonrational coercion. The notion of an “ideal communication community” functions as a guide that can be formally applied both to regulate and to critique concrete speech situations. Using this regulative and critical ideal, individuals would be able to raise, accept, or reject each other’s claims to truth, rightness, and sincerity solely on the basis of the “unforced force” of the better argument—i.e., on the basis of reason and evidence—and all participants would be motivated solely by the desire to obtain mutual understanding. Although the ideal communication community is never perfectly realized (which is why Habermas appeals to it as a regulative or critical ideal rather than as a concrete historical community), the projected horizon of unconstrained communicative action within it can serve as a model of free and open public discussion within liberal-democratic societies.
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Jurgen-Habermas/Philosophy-and-social-theory

It relates to my argument, which I established earlier on. — Judaka

I should add that I think all entities are related inferentially, so I very much embrace a certain crucial kind of relationalism (structuralism, holism).

But do our asserts 'intend' the world or not ? Beyond utility, etc. I think they do. I don't dream of denying that people can be deluded or wrong. But to be deluded is still to intend the world (empty intention) in a way that cannot be 'fulfilled.'

My statement is general and vague, and it makes claims based on creative interpretations. Are my creative interpretations true? What would make them true? — Judaka

That is the question. But if you say that nothing makes them true, where does that leave your claims ? Are sentences 'really' as meaningless but somehow as useful as teeth ?

I think you are seeing the community from the outside in Darwinian terms and forgetting your own position as a speaker about the world interpreted through this vision. The issue is whether you believe what you say, whether you really think the world is one way or another way.