The way I understand it, the movements of the body are not separate from the body, but are just aspects of it; so, I don't know how not to distinguish between the two.

The aspects of the body are the body, at least when I look. What distinguishes them beyond the words used to describe it?

But how do you help with this, where the whole picture and every word in it is either confused or wrong. — Antony Nickles

I read this and found "All along the watchtower" playing in my head - the Hendrix version...

No reason to get excited
The thief, he kindly spoke
There are many here among us
Who feel that life is but a joke
But, uh, but you and I, we've been through that
And this is not our fate
So let us stop talkin' falsely now
The hour's getting late, hey

There are folk hereabouts who have come to philosophy from elsewhere, usually science or engineering, seeking some sort of validation for the work they have done.

Others have long, perhaps always, had the niggle that leads them to puzzle over these questions.

The main driver for this thread was 's OP, not so much because of it's specific content, as that the approach was simply taken as granted for much of that thread. "How do you help with this, where the whole picture and every word in it is either confused or wrong". Engaging directly in the discussion is of no help. Folk have to work through it themselves. Perhaps reading Austin will proved a few folk with the tools one needs to see the error in such threads.

The aspects of the body are the body, at least when I look. What distinguishes them beyond the words used to describe it? — NOS4A2

Even without words I see the aspects, movements or activities of the body not as the whole body. I suppose you could say that the totality of all the aspects, movements and activities of the body just is the body, but I never see any totality of aspects, whereas I do see bodies.

That said it is also true that I don't see the totality of any body. but when I look at a body from the front, back or side I still think I am looking at the body. and not necessarily focusing on any specific aspects of it.

You're thinking of "the world" as not including origin stories, mythology, religious belief, etc. That there is, for example, nothing meaningful to anyone about having the world be created. This is an example of judgment by one standard, e.g. what is "real". — Antony Nickles

I'm not sure what you're saying. Do you mean if everyone believed in God, that would make him real?

I just disagree that there are metaphysical truths we can pull out of the way we speak. It's frequently difficult to even pin point how our speech refers, much less discover great truths in grammar. — frank

Maybe you are not taking seriously Austin's "cannot" and "wrong" and "facts" and the distinctions he points out. He comes off as arrogant, but he is providing evidence of how the world works, so, unless you can argue with his examples (by saying, "no that's not the way it works"), I don't see how, reasonably, you can categorically "just disagree" with his conclusions--this isn't about opinions. One "metaphysical truth" or implication from Austin's examples is that our speech does not "refer", in the same way there is nothing "direct" for us to "perceive" or not. But I'll leave you to feel however you'd like.

but he is providing evidence of how the world works, — Antony Nickles

I really didn't see him as doing that at all. Interesting how differently two people can read the same paragraphs, huh?

Do you mean if everyone believed in God, that would make him real? — frank

I'm not sure you've read Sec. VII, where Austin claims that we only ask "Real or not?" in the case of something in particular (p. 68-69). So the question "Is God real?" would be framed "Is that a real god?", and then we would apply the criteria for gods, such as, perhaps, do people believe in its power, its truth, or is it just an idol. Another way to come at it would be to question, when we ask "Is God real?", what criteria do we apply? what would be the basis for our judgment? in what situation are we asking this question? (to a priest? to ourselves?) Obviously you are thinking of specific criteria without considering, also, if "real" in this case is a different sense, and thus subject to different criteria.

So the question "Is God real?" would be framed "Is that a real god? — Antony Nickles

I was just trying to figure out what you were saying.

I don't think there are much in the way of metaphysical implications from Austin, — frank

Austin is denying there is "reality" (directly addressing the metaphysical), — Antony Nickles

all this dismissive talk of "just language" and "quibbling" — Antony Nickles

I think there is an elephant in the room. People do seem to have picked up the puzzle about why, if Austin wants to deny reality, he doesn't just come out with it. He seems to dance around the question with marginal and trivial comments on how the word "real" is used, and so forth. I think someone should at least try to explain why.

Metaphysical claims, if true, are necessarily true, which means that their contradictions are necessarily false; Epistemological claims are a priori true and hence a priori false. This undermines any idea that one can simply assert or deny such claims. True claims, whether they are necessary or a priori, exclude nothing and hence are trivial and empty; false claims could not possibly be true and hence are meaningless. So one cannot simply deny the claim that "the moon is made of green cheese" or "that 'twas brillig and the slithy toves did gyre and gimble in the wabe" or that "John is a married bachelor". Denying those claims requires that they be possibly true; but a metaphysical truth, if it is true, is logically true and there is no possibility that it is false, and vice versa. All you can do with any of those three examples is point out that they are meaningless. Similarly, if someone asserts that all we ever perceive is directly is sense-data all we can do is point out what "direct" and "indirect" mean in this context.

Philosophy is extremely difficult because it needs to establish common ground where there appears to be none. But for some reason one keeps on trying.

Well, for a start, the word "real" in "nothing is really as it seems" should bring on some hesitancy. What's it doing there? We might take it out, and see what happens. Consider "nothing is as it seems". Well, that doesn't seem right. It seems I am writing this, and you are now reading it, to the extent that one could not make sense of "It seems I am not writing this, and you are not reading it". — Banno

The way I see it the word "real" is just for emphasis. If QM is taken to show us something about the fundamental nature of things, then from that perspective things are not as they seem; that is not solid and static with well-defined boundaries.

I'm afraid this triggers one of my hobby-horses. Language is also for expressing emotions, giving orders, consoling people, deceiving people, inspiring the troops, shaming wrong-doers and many other things. Focusing on one, admittedly important, use of language narrows the vision of philosophy and distorts the understanding of people living in the world.
There is, I believe, even an argument that the origins of language, assuming they lie in animal communication systems are severely practical things like expressing peaceful or aggressive intentions, making demands, expressing anger, fear, pleasure and pain and such.
The theoretical uses of language are not the core, but a derivative, and arguably still marginal, use of language. — Ludwig V

Yes, good point. You seem to agree that language cannot grasp or understand the world in full. Because it cannot perceive or think about the objects. It can express, describe, criticise and diagnose on the objects and world according to the mental events and judgments.

I was expecting to come back with his own points or arguments against my points. But I was disappointed at his response saying that my points on the Philosophy of Language are too general to give any replies. I didn't feel that was a fair and right response from him, which was also anti-philosophical. Because Philosophy is all about brining one's own arguments against the others' trying to either agree or disagree on the points, but never dismissing the other interlocutor's points on the basis of the non-philosophical reasons.

My points were not general as makes out, and was never out of blue, because I was particularly responding to his own points on few of his previous posts where he suggests that Linguistic Philosophy can understand the world in full.

The problem with language is that, no matter what one says, and how one says on something, if it were about abstract objects, then it will just be a statement about the abstract objects in one's mind.

If the sayings were about external objects, but it didn't cohere with the external object one was talking about, then it will be judged as false, or meaningless statements.

I really didn't see him as doing that at all. Interesting how differently two people can read the same paragraphs, huh? — frank

'Real or not?' does not always come up, can't always be raised. We do raise this question only when, to speak rather roughly, suspicion assails us--in some way or other things may be not what they seem; and we can raise this question only if there is a way, or ways, in which things may be not what they seem. — Austin p.69 (my emphasis in bold)

You'd have to give me some reason how this is not claiming evidence of how things are or are not done, or when they can be.

You'd have to give me some reason how this is not claiming evidence of how things are or are not done, or when they can be. — Antony Nickles

What metaphysical truth do you see in that?

For me the key here was Davidson's A nice derangement of epitaphs. — Banno

Thanks. I'll add it to my reading list.

What metaphysical truth do you see in that? — frank

None whatever. That's the point. What Ayer wants to do, can't be done. He wants to ask the question about anything that we see (in the normal sense of "see") whether it is real. Can't be done.

If someone tried to escape a check-mate by making a knight's move with the king, you don't make a counter-move, you protest that what he wants to cannot be done.

He wants to ask the question about anything that we see (in the normal sense of "see") whether it is real. Can't be done. — Ludwig V

You can't ask if your cell phone is real?

@Banno @Ludvig @Corvus @javi2541997 @Ciceronianus @frank @wonderer1@Janus @Richard B

People do seem to have picked up the puzzle about why, if Austin wants to deny reality, he doesn't just come out with it. He seems to dance around the question with marginal and trivial comments on how the word "real" is used, and so forth. I think someone should at least try to explain why. — Ludwig V

I did try to explain here and here why Austin and Wittgenstein do not overtly argue for a certain case. What it comes down to is that the authority of their claims, about these examples, is only as much as you are willing to grant in seeing for yourself (finding your own reasons perhaps), say, about what Austin is claiming about how "real" works (and thus how "reality" does not**). This shift in perspective is so radical that it is possible to fight someone "too close in" where you are engaging on their terms, instead of continually leaving the door open that they might see the bigger picture, despite that we are "inclined" to just give up (PI, #217). What it takes to see the point is not adopting an opinion, understanding an argument, but changing your "attitude" (perspective, as position with respect to) or the "aspect" you see Wittgenstein will say, perhaps by even seeing what you thought you wanted in a new light (your "real need") and, in a sense, changing who you are.

One point, however, is that we all want to get at the truth, find (explicate) something illuminating about ourselves and the world. So we can say that a claim does not make sense; that we can't (yet, hopefully) figure out what sense it has, but to say it is "meaningless" is to imply that it shouldn't be meaningful to those who propose it (though I understand your point is logical Ludwig), which not only could be taken that we are dismissing "them", but that we are refusing to understand their reasons for making the argument they do (which I am guilty of). Austin crosses this line more cruelly than Wittgenstein, who is actually investigating why he wanted the kind of answers he sought in the Tractatus.

marginal and trivial comments on how the word "real" is used — Ludwig V

Again, we are trivializing the import of these claims in mistaking that they are about how "words" are "used". He is making claims about how we actually (in the world) judge whether things are real or not; he is using these examples to draw out the criteria for it and the mechanics of it. I'm not sure how I can explain this another way unless someone explains what there is not to understand. (Not turning spade... not turning spade...)

p.s.** Austin does not get into the cases of when we do want to address "reality", as in something someone is avoiding, what you encounter in being naive, in insulting someone's hope as just a fantasy, etc.

"'Real or not?' does not always come up, can't always be raised. We do raise this question only when, to speak rather roughly, suspicion assails us--in some way or other things may be not what they seem; and we can raise this question only if there is a way, or ways, in which things may be not what they seem. — Austin p.69 (my emphasis in bold)

You'd have to give me some reason how this is not claiming evidence of how things are or are not done, or when they can be. — Antony Nickles

What metaphysical truth do you see in that? — frank

I was responding to what seemed like your dismissal that Austin:

"is providing evidence of how the world works, — Antony Nickles

I really didn't see him as doing that at all..."

Does it make sense now?

@Banno @Ludwig V (Below, I'm trying to capture that there is something to the sense that metaphysics (and skepticism) seem to follow the criteria that Austin sets out for real or not.)

Nevertheless, the truth about metaphysics is that it comes from philosophy's desire to generalize the question "Real or not?" onto everything, thus making "real" a quality of the entire world, as opposed to mediated; or objective as opposed to subjective, or appearance as opposed to universal, etc. In Austin's words, metaphysics was manufactured to answer the question whether the entire world "may not be what it seems", "raised" out of our fear ("suspicion", skepticism) that it is true. The remaining criteria (a must) of Austin's is "there is a way, or ways, in which things [the whole world] may be not what they seem [it seems]." p. 69 I'm not sure how that plays out.

Ok, just by way of an example, how might Austin have replied to your first point?

1. Language is for expressing, describing and communicating thoughts and the contents of perception. — Corvus

His first reaction might have been to point out that this is some of what language can do, but certainly not all. In How to do things with words he goes into this in more detail, but as points out we also command, question, doubt, and so on. With these words, we don't just percieve the world, we change it.

He might then point out that we don't only "express", we also hide, conceal and camouflage; we don't only "describe", we misdescribe, mislead, misdirect; we don't only "communicate", we deceive, mislead and beguile. Where we do one thing with words, we also do the opposite.

You'll be thinking "Yeah, but each of those is just more expressing and describing" - thereby forcing language in to the boxes you already built for it. But one should avoid the temptation to first decide what language does and then look at the how. A first step might best be to look at the variety of ways in which we do things with words and build a picture of what language does from that. Look, first.

He might puzzle as to why you give such primacy to perception. Again this might be the result of preconceived philosophical views entering in to your considerations. Giving primacy to perception is indicative of the misplaced need for certainty discussed in many of the posts here, were perception is considered, against the evidence, to be veritable. Again, perception will not bear the epistemological weight philosophers put on its shoulders.

And if Austin were writing this, there would be a thread running through the text that shows how the very approach you have taken presumes wrongly that a complete answer can be given, an account of language in its entirety, as if the whole of language dwelt within itself.

So there, against my better judgement, is a beginning of what might be said about just your first point. As Anthony says, the whole picture and every word in it is either confused or wrong.

This post might seem cruel, but you were insistent. It very much seems that although you are commendably struggling with this material, you haven't yet seen how it undermines much that you take as granted.

And yet for frank, "(Austin is) just pointing out the way we speak".

Quite agree. This seems to be coming to the fore - that there is no single way in which to be conscious. — Banno

:100: :up:

We're approaching a point of difference, perhaps, in that for me, there is a place, if not for certainty, then at the least for confidence in our understanding, a foundation found in the very actuality of these very considerations. We are not utterly adrift. I'm not sure you will agree.

I was responding to what seemed like your dismissal that Austin:

"is providing evidence of how the world works, — Antony Nickles

I really didn't see him as doing that at all..."

Does it make sense now? — Antony Nickles

I don't think it's a dismissal of Austin to fail to see anything of metaphysical import. I didn't think that was his goal. He can point out features of the way we speak, but that doesn't cash out as anything metaphysical.

We are not utterly adrift. — Banno

I agree, but we don't learn that from analyzing speech.

It's a cliché, but you have missed the wood for the trees. Austin is not just analysing speech.

Showing that Ayer's metaphysics is misconceived is itself a deeply metaphysical activity.

It's a cliché, but you have missed the wood for the trees. Austin is not just analysing speech. — Banno

I agree. I was responding to the view of the folks here on this thread. They think Austin's analysis of speech provides some foundation for something metaphysical. I don't think it does.

Showing that Ayer's metaphysics is misconceived is itself a deeply metaphysical activity. — Banno

Showing that Ayer's metaphysics is misconceived is itself a deeply metaphysical activity. — Banno

Has anybody here actually read any Ayers?

Yep. I linked the text earlier in the thread. I've been re-reading it as I read Austin. (That's part of the reason it takes so long to post on each lecture).

Why do you ask?

Why do you ask? — Banno

How would you characterize his metaphysics?