Your knowledge on something can be rational, but still be wrong. — Corvus

It is true that one can believe something on rational grounds, and be wrong. But if you are wrong, you didn't know it. Knowledge cannot be wrong. If someone believes that it will rain on Tuesday, and it doesn't, they didn't know that it will rain on Tuesday.

You have modified the content of my post with your own writing. That is not what I wrote in my post on what intelligence means. It would help clarifying the points if you could go over what intelligence means, and what reasoning means in general terms, and think about the difference between the two. — Corvus

You seem to be misunderstanding me. I didn't modify your post at all. I simply presented to you my own definition of intelligence, which is different from yours.

Truth emerges when your belief or knowledge is examined and verified by reason. Reason itself cannot deliver truth as you claim. — Corvus

If reason cannot deliver truth, then it cannot verity my belief or knowledge.

We were not talking about truth, and truth as a property of belief or knowledge has nothing to do with rational thinking. Your knowledge on something can be rational, but still be wrong. — Corvus

Clearly, we have different concepts of rationality. If rationality has nothing to do with truth, what is the point of it? How does it differ from reading tea leaves of consulting an astrologer?

There is certainly a problem about rational justification if one allows that someone can be justified in believing something and be wrong; it becomes even more confusing if you allow that someone can know something and be wrong. But the answer is to find a solution.

Yes, it is an inherent mental capability — Vera Mont

Yes, that's the idea that the psychologists are pursuing. But the evidence for the existence of such a mental capacity is thin, to say the least.
IQ tests were supposed to be such that one could not benefit from practising. But it turns out that you can, although it is also true that there is a limit to how much one can improve. It also turns out that IQ questions are culturally biased and it is very difficult to construct questions that are not biased in that way.

Everything that we learn to do is the result of our genes and our environment working together; one simply cannot disentangle one from the other.

Rational thought is less often used in the service of Truth than in achieving goals. — Vera Mont

Yes, that's true. But I don't think we should be too hard on people who go along with the conventional views in society. It's perfectly possible to accept orthodoxy, not because it is easier, but because it seems to you to be true or even because you can't conceive of an alternative. It took thousands of years for us to develop the idea that there is something wrong with slavery and racism, and it seems absurd to think that all those people were morally deficient in some way.

I'm motivated by the reflection that much of what we believe and take for granted is likely to turn out to be false, or at least to be replaced by some other orthodoxy by our children or children's children. So I think I'm living in a glass house and don't want to start throwing stones.

IQ tests were supposed to be such that one could not benefit from practising. — Ludwig V

They're also administered way too late. You have to be literate and numerate to take one; at least 10 years old. By then, whatever experiences you've had since birth formed most of your thinking. There are tests for development - generally aimed at detecting problems - but I'm not sure they're as reliable as the ones given to dogs and crows. Anecdotally, I can tell you that bright parents tend to have bright kids and stupid parents usually have dumb kids, and I could pick the most intelligent toddlers out of a day-care by watching them pay for twenty minutes. But that's not scientific evidence.

But I don't think we should be too hard on people who go along with the conventional views in society. — Ludwig V

I'm not! Quite the reverse: I'm saying that those who didn't stick their necks out for what we consider "the truth" today were acting rationally. So are those who go along to get along now. (Maybe not Bezos, hedging his political bets...)

It took thousands of years for us to develop the idea that there is something wrong with slavery and racism, and it seems absurd to think that all those people were morally deficient in some way. — Ludwig V

Some of them always knew. Very possibly, most of them did, whether they could conceive of an alternative or not. For damn sure, the gladiators in Rome did, and the abducted Africans in American cotton fields. The captives felt it was wrong to be captured, but when they had the chance, they would do the same to an enemy. Nobody wants to be first to stop: it's a sign of weakness. The Quakers knew, and early Mormons and the Cathari long before them. But... The Economy!!!! There is no bloody way a man doesn't know that it's wrong to batter his wife, or a woman doesn't know it's wrong to cripple her little granddaughter's feet, but one has license to unleash his temper and the other has cultural norms to uphold. It's convenient to go along, as well as safer and easier. But there have always been rebels who spoke out against the wrongs in their society - they mostly got killed in unpleasant ways - so we know those wrongs were perceived, even back then when everyone was supposed to be blind.

It is true that one can believe something on rational grounds, and be wrong. But if you are wrong, you didn't know it. Knowledge cannot be wrong. If someone believes that it will rain on Tuesday, and it doesn't, they didn't know that it will rain on Tuesday. — Ludwig V

Checking out you knew or not, that is the work of reason. Reason itself is not truth.

You seem to be misunderstanding me. I didn't modify your post at all. I simply presented to you my own definition of intelligence, which is different from yours. — Ludwig V

It is a very peculiar way of putting down your own definition on someone else's writing, making out as if it was written by someone else.

If reason cannot deliver truth, then it cannot verity my belief or knowledge. — Ludwig V

Does reason deliver truth? It sounds not making sense. The sentence "Reason delivers truth." sounds not correct. Reason brings truth to you at your door step? Like a Amazon delivery van delivers what you have ordered from Amazon? I am not sure if that was what you meant. Hope not. You find out truth or falsity on something using reason.

Clearly, we have different concepts of rationality. If rationality has nothing to do with truth, what is the point of it? How does it differ from reading tea leaves of consulting an astrologer? — Ludwig V

Rationality is a method to finding truth, but rationality itself is not truth. We do have different ideas not just on rationality, but also truth. All the best.

It took thousands of years for us to develop the idea that there is something wrong with slavery and racism, and it seems absurd to think that all those people were morally deficient in some way. — Ludwig V

Sadly, they were. There are still many people like that. Slavery and genocide are still with us.

I'm not! Quite the reverse: I'm saying that those who didn't stick their necks out for what we consider "the truth" today were acting rationally. So are those who go along to get along now. — Vera Mont

I'm sorry I misunderstood you.

a career priest [Augustine] might propound Christian/Platonic values as a rational way to support the status quo. — Vera Mont

I understood that as saying that Augustine might propound Christian/Platonic values in order to support the status quo - which is true. But then he would be guilty of hypocrisy. I wanted to point out that it is also possible that he might propound those values because he believed in Christianity and Platonism, whether or not they supported the status quo.

There are many cases when it is very hard to assess people. Heidegger (support for Nazism) and Hegel (support for the Prussian monarchy) are particularly difficult cases. Descartes has also been suspected, maybe because of his explicit policy of accepting orthodox morality while he is applying his methodology of doubt. I'm just saying that I don't think we should rush to judgement. But I see now that you were not rushing to judgement and I was. So I apologize.

Rational thought is less often used in the service of Truth than in achieving goals. — Vera Mont

I'm not quite sure what you are saying here. Practical reason is inherently morally ambiguous; a bad actor can be entirely rational. It is only theoretical reason that is in the service of truth.

But there have always been rebels who spoke out against the wrongs in their society — Vera Mont

Quite so. But there it can be very hard to tell which of them has really put their finger on an actual wrong, as opposed to a perceived wrong.

The captives felt it was wrong to be captured, but when they had the chance, they would do the same to an enemy. — Vera Mont

That's certainly an acid test.

Sadly, they were. There are still many people like that. Slavery and genocide are still with us. — Patterner

You are right about slavery and genocide. The (rather few) days when we could all be confident in the eventual triumph of western liberal values are long gone. It's all been a big let down.
But one cannot aspire to moral standards unless they can be articulated in the world that one lives in and I don't think it is appropriate to apply the standards of other societies to lives lived in that way. For example, the first traces in history of human rights did not appear until the fifth century BCE - in Persia. It took a long time before the idea was articulated in the late Roman Empire and even longer before Thomas Paine was able to articulate them with some clarity in the 18th century CE.
All that can be expected or required of us is to get along as well as we can in the world that we know, with all its many imperfections. That's the only standard that it is reasonable to apply. The virtues of saints and heroes are supererogatory - beyond what is required or expected. Certainly, they are to be admired, but it is not necessary to imitate them in order to live a good life.

But then he would be guilty of hypocrisy. — Ludwig V

I don't know about that, which is why I said 'might'. I do know Descartes was. I was only interested in the rationality of their thought, whatever the rationale - not in whether they actually believed in the product.
I'm not assessing people or judging their morals or psychoanalyzing them: I'm only concerned with whether the thought process being exhibited is rational or irrational. Without accusing anyone specific of lying, it is very often the most rational approach to a situation; a lunatic can shout out what he really thinks and feels, if he's heedless of the consequences.

Rational thought is less often used in the service of Truth than in achieving goals. — Vera Mont

I'm not quite sure what you are saying here. Practical reason is inherently morally ambiguous; a bad actor can be entirely rational. — Ludwig V

Again, I'm not concerned with anyone's morality. I'm concerned with judging whether a thought process is rational or irrational. If it achieves a discernible goal, opens a gate, invents a helicopter, evades a predator, earns you a promotion, liberates the cookies from the box, it's rational thought, whatever motivated the goal, whatever tactics were employed.

It is only theoretical reason that is in the service of truth.

Both require facts which are true. If one's goal is to discover some particular truth, like who broke into the Watergate, or whether Christine has been unfaithful, or how magnetism and electricity interact, or how many marbles will raise the water level so you can reach the treat, it's still goal-oriented thought. I don't believe there such a thing as a great big all-encompassing Truth to which you can apply rational thought. You can think quite a lot about how to talk about Truth, but you can't comprehend it with reason; the Truth is too abstract to capture with anything but faith. (Not saying definitively that It isn't 'out there'; only that I can't believe in it.)

But there it can be very hard to tell which of them has really put their finger on an actual wrong, as opposed to a perceived wrong. — Ludwig V

Of course. My point was only that social injustices were always perceived by some people, even against an overwhelming cultural norm.
You can only judge according to your own values. If you assume that enslaving people is wrong and somebody in 400BCE spoke up against it, you're likely to think he perceived correctly. If you think people should be equal under the law, you'll probably disagree with the perception of legislators who blocked women's and Chinese immigrants' voting rights. Whether you think they were/are right or wrong, these actions are rational. The perceived/actual grievances of Maga cultists would be very difficult to sort out, but we could each do it, given a comprehensive list to compare with our own convictions. (but I can't drink hard liquor anymore)

Show me the Messiah(s) who will be followed to this new life.
Tell me when the movement reaches world-changing momentum. — Vera Mont

Let's use rational thinking. The Messiah is based on a myth. Information collected from science and history is based on valid facts.

It took doctors at least a hundred years to believe sanitation was important after the first curious people began looking at bacteria in microscopes. Today knowledge spreads much faster. People in biblical times could not know of a distant war, as we know of our wars today, as they are happening in live color and full sound. That does not mean climate change, disease, famine, and lack of resources will not bring civilizations down, but it does mean we have a chance of making better decisions and this might just happen if we had a functioning democracy. A functioning democracy depends on education for that purpose. We had such an education in the past but not since the 1958 National Defense Education BUT some teachers and schools are better than others and a few people are making a difference.

This discussion goes far beyond what animals talk about, and this is why we should understand the difference between humans and the rest of the animal kingdom. Squacking a warning and responding to the roar of a bear or lion is communication, but it is not the language of humans. It is language and rational thinking that separates some of us from animals. Believing a mythology about a god making humans and then cursing them and punishing them or rewarding them is not rational thinking based on facts.

In the 1920s a small article in a newspaper warned, "Given our known supply of oil and rate of consumption, we are headed for economic disaster and possibly war". Soon after that all industrial economies crashed and the world went to war. Following the war, we maintained the social and economic behavior that brought us to war. That is not rational. We are behaving like animals incapable of rational thinking because we evolved from animals. Our ability to be rational is blocked by religion and ignorance. That is something we can change. We may not do so before destroying our planet and making our present civilizations impossible, but I do believe we can make better decisions.

You should be very careful not to be deceived by the word democracy. It could mean, that you must do anything irrational to justify the word. It would be wiser to stay critical and analytical on these fancy words which can be hollow inside, but can force people to irrational actions and thoughts. — Corvus

"All gods have anger issues. Athena was just as petty and vengeful as the others." Wikipedia

:rage: Obviously you are ignorant of the ideology of democracy. That is a widespread problem. It would be wiser for you to question what you believe and what I believe, instead of making assumptions and attacking something you may not understand. It matters because it is the difference of having hope for the future or complete hopelessness. That hope is based on human intelligence and potential and only by being rational is that hope founded. So explain what think democracy is and why you object to it. This is the difference between reacting like an animal or reacting like a rational human.

You should be very careful about offending Athena.

Well, I would say that an economy that requires people to work for wages that cannot sustain a decent life is broken. But that requirement is so common that I suspect I'm just being idealistic. Still, it seems inhumane and immoral not to see those jobs as problematic. — Ludwig V

I agree with everything you said. When Britain had to prepare for the war, it realized most of its military-age men were unfit to serve in the army and it was a matter of national survival to improve the health of the labor force. Industry was asked to pay higher wages to improve the condition of those living in poverty and Industry said it could not pay higher wages because that make everything cost more and they would lose their competitive advantage on the global market. That is around the world workers are being used as cheap labor so their nations can compete for world markets. Welfare subsidizes Industry by providing the assistance low wagers need. Only we have very little understanding of this so we are not managing our reality well.

Remember the saying cheap as dirt? It meant we had land and resources than people, and housing was very cheap. That is no longer true.

That is something we can change. We may not do so before destroying our planet and making our present civilizations impossible, but I do believe we can make better decisions. — Athena

Like you said: hundreds of years for this, decades for that.... Have you noticed what's happening in the US election? We simply ran out of time. What's the point of 'making better choices' when everyone left on the planet is fighting over the last habitable acre?

I don't believe there such a thing as a great big all-encompassing Truth to which you can apply rational thought. You can think quite a lot about how to talk about Truth, but you can't comprehend it with reason; the Truth is too abstract to capture with anything but faith. (Not saying definitively that It isn't 'out there'; only that I can't believe in it.) — Vera Mont

Oh, I agree with you entirely about Truth. But I do think there are truths. (After that, it all gets complicated.)

You can only judge according to your own values. — Vera Mont

That's true. But I would only make judgement taking into account the situation or context of the action - especially when it is very different from my own. BTW, I've heard people commenting on Descartes' personal moral stance before, but I've never quite understood what the problem is.

A functioning democracy depends on education for that purpose. — Athena

Yes. Somehow, that important truth has got lost in public discussion in these days .

Welfare subsidizes Industry by providing the assistance low wagers need. Only we have very little understanding of this so we are not managing our reality well. — Athena

It is very curious that industry can be relied on to adopt the narrowest point of view. It's not as if industry doesn't end up footing the bill for their starvation wages. It doesn't seem to occur to them that they might have to pay smaller taxes if only they paid a decent wage and make bigger profits because they would have a larger market for their goods.

It is a very peculiar way of putting down your own definition on someone else's writing, making out as if it was written by someone else. — Corvus

Like a Amazon delivery van delivers what you have ordered from Amazon? I am not sure if that was what you meant. Hope not. You find out truth or falsity on something using reason. — Corvus

No, not like that at all. Your way of putting it is better.

Rationality is a method to finding truth, but rationality itself is not truth. — Corvus

Checking out you knew or not, that is the work of reason. Reason itself is not truth. — Corvus

But then, I just don't understand what you mean by these comments. Reason and truth are not the same thing. But they are connected. You seem to recognize that, but then deny it. I must be missing something.

BTW, I've heard people commenting on Descartes' personal moral stance before, but I've never quite understood what the problem is. — Ludwig V

No problem. After Galileo had his little confrontation with the good fathers - and quite rationally stood down from his heretical belief in the Earth moving around the sun - every thinker in Europe had some difficult moments rethinking their strategy. So Descartes has his big truth-seeking exercise: purges his mind of all beliefs, everything he's ever been taught, delves way down in there for one incontrovertible fact and comes up with "I exist" OK... "But wait, here's another incontrovertible truth: God. Didn't learn about God; it wasn't a belief: I just happened to find Him in here at the bottom of my completely empty mind. And now, I shall proceed to unfold my theory of a mechanistic universe, only God's winding all the clockwork animals. Oh, and people are a mechanistic body with a completely independent, immaterial soul.
Are you convinced of his sincerity?

You can't be moral when you're dead - so you compromise to stay alive. That's rational. The same person who made that compromise might still be honest with his friends, faithful to his wife, accurate in his court testimony, prompt in the payment of his debts and play a clean game of billiards.
Why insist that anyone be pure in both thinking and probity? That's just not human. The insides of our heads are never swept clean like Descartes imagined that one time.

But then, I just don't understand what you mean by these comments. Reason and truth are not the same thing. But they are connected. You seem to recognize that, but then deny it. I must be missing something. — Ludwig V

I think I have tried to clarify the points enough from my side. There is nothing much more for me to add here. You seem to keep going around circle of deviation. I will leave you to it.
I am bowing out from this thread. All the best.

You seem to keep going around circle of deviation — Corvus

I agree. I don't even understand what you mean by a circle of deviation. I was indeed deviating in the sense that I was trying to break out of your circle of repetition. Best wishes to you as well.

After Galileo had his little confrontation with the good fathers - and quite rationally stood down from his heretical belief in the Earth moving around the sun - every thinker in Europe had some difficult moments rethinking their strategy. So Descartes has his big truth-seeking exercise: purges his mind of all beliefs, everything he's ever been taught, delves way down in there for one incontrovertible fact and comes up with "I exist" OK... "But wait, here's another incontrovertible truth: God. Didn't learn about God; it wasn't a belief: I just happened to find Him in here at the bottom of my completely empty mind. And now, I shall proceed to unfold my theory of a mechanistic universe, only God's winding all the clockwork animals. Oh, and people are a mechanistic body with a completely independent, immaterial soul.
Are you convinced of his sincerity? — Vera Mont

Oddly enough, I am convinced of Descartes' sincerity. It is Galileo who gets himself into a morally complicated situation. (I mean that he could be accused of hypocrisy, but I think he was (rationally and morally) justified in what he did.)

Galileo, as you say, recanted. The inquisitors forbade him from teaching or even discussing his heretical theory. However, the story goes that, as he left the Vatican, he paused on the steps and said (to himself) "Even so, it moves". If he had said that in the hearing of the inquisitors, he would thereby have recanted his recantation. But he kept that remark to himself, thus leading the inquisitors to believe that he had rejected the theory that he actually believed - the essence of hypocrisy. But I agree with you about the need to survive as best we can, so I have no criticism of him.

Descartes' position is also complicated, but much less black-and-white than Galileo's. Of course, I don't question the repressive regime that all these guys lived under, and his position is not entirely clear; I don't deny that he may have been influenced by it. But the key point is that his scepticism is a thought-experiment. He presents his story in the Meditations as if he is really believing the sceptical conclusions. But his introduction makes it clear that he doesn't, and the reader knows perfectly well that he is going to go on and rescue the situation. The genius of the Meditations is that it is a story with a plot exactly like every adventure (thriller) story - disaster looms and seems inevitable, but our hero risks everything in order to dash in and rescue the situation. There are arguments, to be sure, but the suspense of the plot does the real work of persuasion. True, the world will seem different, but we are safe and that's the important thing. T.S. Eliot says it well - after all our wanderings we will come back home "and know the place for the first time"; there may even be toast and honey for tea. It is very odd that Descartes and Hume are both classified as sceptical philosophers, when actually, they are nothing of the kind.

The difference between the two is that Galileo pretended to accept that his theory was an erroneous hypothesis when he believed that it was a true account and while Descartes never pretended that his scepticism was more than a possibility; he was exploring it n order to refute it.

You can't be moral when you're dead - so you compromise to stay alive. That's rational. The same person who made that compromise might still be honest with his friends, faithful to his wife, accurate in his court testimony, prompt in the payment of his debts and play a clean game of billiards.
Why insist that anyone be pure in both thinking and probity? That's just not human. The insides of our heads are never swept clean like Descartes imagined that one time. — Vera Mont

Yes, I agree with you. There's a kind of morality that makes black-and-white judgements and refuses to acknowledge complexity and ambiguity. Everyone has to duck and cover in order to get along. But without that society could not function. Keeping the peace and the show on the road are practically and morally important goals both for individuals and for the collective.

The difference between the two is that Galileo pretended to accept that his theory was an erroneous hypothesis when he believed that it was a true account and while Descartes never pretended that his scepticism was more than a possibility; he was exploring it n order to refute it. — Ludwig V

Of course, Galileo was both right and wrong. He endorsed the Copernican system (Copernicus himself was rational enough not to publish in his lifetime) and rejected the far more accurate Keplerian system.
Descartes God was a creative invention, just like his clockwork world. It's easy to play back-and-dorth with fiction; take no principles at all.

But I like the idea of a non-symbolically mediated understanding it, though I'm taking that as what is called "tacit" knowledge. — Ludwig V

Right. I term it 'implicit knowledge' with its explicitation (usually termed explication) being enabled by symbolic language.

Strictly speaking, instinctive behaviour is a set behaviour pattern that is not learned, but inherited. It is not, therefore, based on any process of learning or reasoning. It is capable of rational justification at the level of evolution as contributing to the ability of the creature to sruvive and reproduce. — Ludwig V

I think it is plausible to think that we and the other animals may have an instinct to copy behavior. So some behaviors may be a combination of instinctive and learned. Learned not in the sense of deliberately taught but in the sense of acquired by mimicry.

But we do have to learn much body language in order to read it and it does not follow from the fact that we can read human body language that we can read the body language of other creatures without learning. But small children do have to be taught to recognize the body language of dogs. — Ludwig V

I think we can instinctively read some body language both human and animal. I agree that the understanding of some body language must be learned. Not learned in the sense of being deliberately taught of course.

As far as we know only humans possess symbolic language.
— Janus

.
.research offers the first evidence that parrots learn their unique signature calls from their parents and shows that vocal signaling in wild parrots is a socially acquired rather than a genetically wired trait. — jkop

Does it follow that the parrot's signaling is symbolic though? I think part of what I would count as the possession of symbolic language consists in the ability to explicitly understand that such and such a sound, gesture or mark conventionally stands for whatever it symbolizes.

The same question as above regarding the dolphins. And not I am not denying that other animals might possess symbolic language. I'm questioning whether we have clear evidence that they do as opposed to having some evidence that they might.

Does it follow that the parrot's signaling is symbolic though? I think part of what I would count as the possession of symbolic language consists in the ability to explicitly understand that such and such a sound, gesture or mark conventionally stands for whatever it symbolizes.

↪mcdoodle The same question as above regarding the dolphins. And not I am not denying that other animals might possess symbolic language. I'm questioning whether we have clear evidence that they do as opposed to having some evidence that they might. — Janus

The true test for whether other animals have symbolic language is not empirical but depends on what is meant by 'language'. Other animals don't seem to have anything that resembles our verbal language, but they may have other kinds of languages, and so do humans.

All animals use signals or symbols in the basic sense that a symbol is something that stands for something else. For example, an insect identifies a scent or sound or gesture, which symbolizes the presence of nutrients, mates, predators etc. Animals who live in groups benefit from shared symbolic labor, hence the evolution of genetically wired and socially acquired symbol systems.

There are many different kinds of symbol systems, also among humans. Human language is a verbal symbol system which has some syntactic and semantic properties that distinguishes it from non-verbal systems such as pictorial or musical or gestural that we also use.

So we might agree that other animals don't have a symbolic language in the sense that the language has the kind of syntactic and semantic properties that human verbal language has. But that doesn't rule out the possibility that they have other symbolic languages. I find it uncontroversial that I'm using symbolic language based on gestures and sounds when I talk to my cat.

Descartes God was a creative invention, just like his clockwork world. It's easy to play back-and-dorth with fiction; take no principles at all. — Vera Mont

H'm. You seem to really have it in for Descartes. He is iconic and takes a lot of stick. But he wasn't the one who invented God, or even the argument he used to argue for the reality of that God. True, he contributed massively to the clockwork world, there were many others involved as well. But still, you're not wrong.

I think it is plausible to think that we and the other animals may have an instinct to copy behavior. So some behaviors may be a combination of instinctive and learned. Learned not in the sense of deliberately taught but in the sense of acquired by mimicry. — Janus

That's perfectly true and I think that mimicry is more important to our learning that is generally recognized. People seem to prefer to emphasis association. I don't know why. Aristotle knew better, of course, and I think he may be alone amongst the canonical philosophers in that.

I think part of what I would count as the possession of symbolic language consists in the ability to explicitly understand that such and such a sound, gesture or mark conventionally stands for whatever it symbolizes. — Janus

There's a bit of a problem with that. Articulating our understanding of how to use words and construct sentences is much more difficult than it seems. For the most part, mostly our use of language is underpinned by skills that we do not, and often cannot, articulate.

So we might agree that other animals don't have a symbolic language in the sense that the language has the kind of syntactic and semantic properties that human verbal language has. — jkop

I see our language capability as a hyper-development of abilities that (all? most?) animals have to a greater or less extent. Other species have hyper-developed other abilities, such as the hyper-development of echo-location in bats and dolphins or vision in hawks and other predator birds.

You seem to really have it in for Descartes. He is iconic and takes a lot of stick. — Ludwig V

In for? You mean judge him as I would any mortal making his way in the real world? Okay, I do hate what he and his cohort did to our relationship with nature and other species, the two hundred years of suffering they inflicted on helpless animals. He's not responsible for that; he's just a participant who was clever enough to make himself an icon. My insignificant opinion won't deter any of his fans.

But we were not talking about that. I was referring to his very sensible use of God to avoid confrontation with the Inquisition. Spending time in the more tolerant Netherlands was a smart move, too. Icons are for the faithful. I have no faiths. But I would have pretended whatever was required if the inquisitors had their eye on me; I certainly don't fault anyone for doing it, and if they're clever enough, turning it to their own advantage.

But he wasn't the one who invented God, or even the argument he used to argue for the reality of that God. — Ludwig V

He just pretended to rediscover it after ridding himself of all learned beliefs. It was merely an example of rational thinking not subjugated to truth.

I do hate what he and his cohort did to our relationship with nature and other species, the two hundred years of suffering they inflicted on helpless animals — Vera Mont

That's fair enough. I actually agree about the suffering. It's just that I doubt that he and his colleagues made much practical difference. It's not as if animal welfare has ever been a moral issue before our time.

I was referring to his very sensible use of God to avoid confrontation with the Inquisition. — Vera Mont

That's a question of his motivation. There's a passage in the Discourse on Method where he says that while he is subjecting his beliefs to methodical doubt, he sticks to conventional views. That can certainly be read as pragmatic rather than sincere.

He just pretended to rediscover it after ridding himself of all learned beliefs — Vera Mont

It would prefer "after supposedly ridding himself of all learned beliefs". It is hard to believe he hadn't read Aquinas' Five Ways and it wouldn't be surprising if he did a bit of cherry-picking through the rubbish.

I actually agree about the suffering. It's just that I doubt that he and his colleagues made much practical difference. It's not as if animal welfare has ever been a moral issue before our time. — Ludwig V

It was a moral issue in Descartes' time.

The response to Descartes I want to look at here though, is not modern. It belongs to a now little-known philosopher called Ralph Cudworth (1617-1688), a younger contemporary of Descartes. Cudworth was an Anglican theologian, a keen Classicist, and for most of his career, Cambridge University’s Professor of Hebrew. Along with the aforementioned Henry More, he was a leading member of a group of philosophers known as the Cambridge Platonists, who promoted the relevance of Platonic philosophy to contemporary life and thought. Although he agreed with Descartes on many things, Cudworth thought (as did More) that Descartes’ view of animals as mindless machines was implausible.

He defended his entrenched mechanistic position in many arguments. His main theme was: They have no souls; therefore they feel neither pleasure nor pain. But admitted that they can exhibit "passions".... The guy had a dog in his house. Was he unable to see the dog's responses as being like his own, or he did he choose to ignore the similarity because it wasn't convenient? Remember, this is not a stupid man; he's defending a theory - at least in public.

It would prefer "after supposedly ridding himself of all learned beliefs". — Ludwig V

I was skeptical, too. But it's what he claimed as the object of the exercise: get to the truth by doubting everything he'd ever been taught or believed. (Except that.)
Why are you going on out on a plausibility limb to defend a hypocrisy that can't be sanctioned or punished at this late date? It served his purpose, so that was the rational path.

Sure it can depend on how you define "symbolic language". Via symbolic language as I understand and define it we can explicitly understand ourselves to be whatever it is we take ourselves to be. We can understand ourselves to be possessed of symbolic language on account of being possessed of symbolic language for example. Do you believe there is any evidence that any other animals can do that?

There's a bit of a problem with that. Articulating our understanding of how to use words and construct sentences is much more difficult than it seems. For the most part, mostly our use of language is underpinned by skills that we do not, and often cannot, articulate. — Ludwig V

I was referring to a more modest capacity—the ability to articulate that we can use words and construct sentences. I wasn't claiming that we can articulate in any comprehensive sense how it is that we are able to do that.

Via symbolic language as I understand and define it we can explicitly understand ourselves to be whatever it is we take ourselves to be. We can understand ourselves to be possessed of symbolic language on account of being possessed of symbolic language for example. Do you believe there is any evidence that any other animals can do that? — Janus

Yes, because the ability to understand things in the environment remotely via symbols (natural or socially constructed) is a function of any animal's interest.

Bees, for instance, are interested in flowers, and benefit from having a specific symbol system (waggles) for sharing the direction and distance to flowers. Bees can identify their own and each other's functions and symbolic behaviours.

However, to understand oneself or one's possession of symbolic language is either necessary nor sufficient for possessing symbolic language.

Why are you going on out on a plausibility limb to defend a hypocrisy that can't be sanctioned or punished at this late date? It served his purpose, so that was the rational path. — Vera Mont

Well, if you said that Galileo was a hypocrite, I would agree on the basis that it was, technically, but justified on the basis that being tortured or burnt at the stake was an unreasonable price to pay for following a purely academic line of research and so lying was a rational way to get out of his situation, even though, if you are a Kantian, lying is always wrong. Why? Because he explicitly contradicted himself. Descartes' case is much less clear. I'm just calling it as I see it.

I was skeptical, too. But it's what he claimed as the object of the exercise: get to the truth by doubting everything he'd ever been taught or believed. (Except that.) — Vera Mont

There's a genuine argument against radical scepticism, that no-one can seriously doubt that he is now sitting beside a stove, which will burn one if one isn't careful. Descartes isn't quite in that bracket because he frames his doubt as "merely" theoretical.

Was he unable to see the dog's responses as being like his own, or he did he choose to ignore the similarity because it wasn't convenient? — Vera Mont

There's not way of knowing, and consequently no evidence that it was just a matter of convenience.

It was a moral issue in Descartes' time. — Vera Mont

Cudworth thought (as did More) that Descartes’ view of animals as mindless machines was implausible.

I had heard of Cudworth. But I didn't know he crossed swords with Descartes. However, his critique is milder than yours, in my book.
I would expect, however that Cudworth did not think that animals had souls and did think that because they did not, they were of less or no moral value and consequently eating them was perfectly OK.

I was referring to a more modest capacity—the ability to articulate that we can use words and construct sentences. I wasn't claiming that we can articulate in any comprehensive sense how it is that we are able to do that. — Janus

Well, yes. Animals cannot articulate anything in that way. But that takes us back to the question what the significance is of the various species-unique abilities we can learn - given that every species is unique in some way.

Well, if you said that Galileo was a hypocrite, I would agree on the basis that it was, technically, but justified on the basis that being tortured or burnt at the stake was an unreasonable price to pay for following a purely academic line of research and so lying was a rational way to get out of his situation, — Ludwig V

Of course it was. Wouldn't you? Joan of Arc was crazy; Giordano Bruno was an ideologue. Most of us normal people practice some degree of hypocrisy, simply to get by, and more to get along.

even though, if you are a Kantian, lying is always wrong. — Ludwig V

I'm not, and that's a ridiculous, unrealistic position. Also, in many case, immoral.

Descartes' case is much less clear. — Ludwig V

He learned a lesson from other men's examples. He was smarter than most of his contemporaries - smarter than Galileo who seems to have considered himself the smartest man alive.

Descartes isn't quite in that bracket because he frames his doubt as "merely" theoretical. — Ludwig V

That doesn't persuade me of his sincerity. If it persuades you, all's well.

However, his critique is milder than yours, in my book. — Ludwig V

Yes. He was encumbered by the 'soul' issue; I'm not.

I would expect, however that Cudworth did not think that animals had souls — Ludwig V

That's just how he did justify the moral position held by a minority of thinkers at the time that it's wrong to torture animals.

But Cudworth didn’t think that the similarity between man and beast was purely biologically based, as most of us would argue today. Instead, Cudworth argued that animals, like humans, have souls.

Descartes also preferred to replace "vivisection/torture" with "killing and eating" in the moral argument. It's way more acceptable to defend throwing chunks of beef in a pot than dislocating a dog's shoulders and hips, then nailing his paws to a plank and slitting his belly open, all the while he's screaming in agony. Most people who object to torture (then and now) do not object to killing enemies in war, or eating humanely-killed flesh. Most people in the argument do not draw the moral line at possession of a soul or human language (though some philosophers still do) but at deliberate infliction of pain on a sentient being, for whatever reason. Let's shift those posts back to the real issue.
Of which vivisection was an offshoot. It does demonstrate hypocrisy: he could maintain - paraphrased by the French philosopher Nicolas Malebranche - that animals “eat without pleasure, cry without pain, grow without knowing it; they desire nothing, fear nothing, know nothing.” and yet take Monsieur Grat for a walk, fully expecting that the dog would not shit on his rug, expecting him to obey commands and and appreciate treats.
But it's the God argument I originally mentioned.
Had he been entirely honest in that meditation, he would have questioned all beliefs, rather than making the church's case. Theoretically. Funny, how it all works out, innit?
I never blamed him for that hypocrisy: it was the rational choice.

That God/soul problem persisted in all philosophical arguments as long as the HRC held Europe in its grip. After the Reformation, thinking became a little more free and diverse, even though most Protestant sects were also intolerant of agnostic ideas - but at least they didn't have an Inquisition to cow their own congregants into silence. A couple of them still persecuted witches and expelled heretics, but they were less dangerous than the unchecked (and profoundly corrupt) Catholic church.

There's not way of knowing, and consequently no evidence that it was just a matter of convenience. — Ludwig V

Convenience was my guess. You have other choices: absolute conviction in the teeth of all evidence, willful self-delusion, subconscious delusion, fear of prosecution, sadistic monster.... More if you can find them. But I still don't understand why you want to, when it's independent of the serendipitous discovery of God (....the majority of whose creatures are nothing but noisy machines. Pretty damn disrespectful of the Creator for a devout Christian - but that, too, is beside the point.) All humans compartmentalize their beliefs and attitudes. There are no sane, intelligent, totally honest humans.