Yet you cannot explain what it means. Shouldn't that give you pause? — Snakes Alive

I did explain it. Also, SEP has an in-depth article on the universals debate. Russell devoted a chapter to it. Plenty of people have found it intelligible. If you don't, then I don't know what to say.

Honestly, I feel like people are being disingenuous when they use this tactic in a discussion. Not saying Carnap was being disingenuous, because he provides an argument for his position, although I think his premises are wrong.

And a good reason for thinking Carnap's premises are wrong is precisely because plenty of people find arguments such as universals to be intelligible.

those debating it do not seem to understand what they are saying — Snakes Alive

Is that because you refuse to acknowledge hat what they're saying is meaningful? Because I find it meaningful.

but not really possible to be taken seriously on its own terms (and indeed, those who debate it seem not to take it seriously on its own terms either – it's a kind of game whose playing has other edifying effects). — Snakes Alive

I don't agree with this. Most metaphysics might not have implications for daily life anymore than a math or physics problem. But that doesn't mean it isn't taken seriously by those who engage in it.

The statements of a fairy tale do not conflict with logic, but only with experience; they are perfectly meaningful, although false. Metaphysics is not "superstition "; it is possible to believe true and false propositions, but not to believe meaningless sequences of words. — Ciceronianus the White

Right, and he provides the criteria for what makes a statement meaningful. In that paper, it's anything which is logical or can be verified by experience. It's an empirical grounding of meaning.

he point is that talk of universals does not merely "have issues" – there is no body there to have issues to begin with. It's just empty. — Snakes Alive

I've done my best to explain why it's not. Universals might be rubbish on closer inspection, but they're intelligible. If not universals, then something else is needed to explain similarity.

alk of properties is part of our pre-philosophical heritage. I see no reason to think of properties as philosophers have. If philosophers want to talk about properties, it's their job to pay respect to the pre-philosophical usage, not vice-versa. — Snakes Alive

You do realize that many of the concepts from ordinary, pre-philosophical language have their issues upon closer inspection, right?

Or should philosophers just respect what the common man means by free will, for example, and not try to do any further inquiry?

They disagree with him because they dispute his definition of the word 'meaningful'. But Wittgenstein tries to show how it is not possible to accurately derive the 'right' definition for a word like 'meaningful' and so disagreements are dissolved. — Pseudonym

And where exactly does that leave us? Because it doesn't leave me agreeing with Carnap. I still find metaphysical statements to be meaningful, at least some of them.

You could do, but you have three options; — Pseudonym

Clever. I'll opt for option 3, where some metaphysical statements are meaningful. That means Carnap's might be meaningful, with the qualification that it's the only exception to it's own rule.

Now is there a way to determine which metaphysical statements are meaningful and which ones aren't? Carnap argues that meaning is determined by verification and internality to a framework. But those like me who think some metaphysical statements are meaningful will disagree with his definition of meaning.

So basically, I disagree with his starting premises.

Here's the main competitor to universals. Let me know if tropes sound any more meaningful to you:

Trope theory is the view that reality is (wholly or partly) made up from tropes. Tropes are things like the particular shape, weight, and texture of an individual object. Because tropes are particular, for two objects to ‘share’ a property (for them both to exemplify, say, a particular shade of green) is for each to contain (instantiate, exemplify) a greenness-trope, where those greenness-tropes, although numerically distinct, nevertheless exactly resemble each other. — SEP

No, because I still don't know what a universal is, and saying that it qualifies as a possible answer doesn't make it so, because I have no notion of what they are, and so no notion of what they are supposed to "answer," or how. — Snakes Alive

You do know what a category is, and you admit that particulars can have the same properties and relations. So a universal would be applying the category to the world to explain sameness.

So by "do universals exist" do you mean "can more than one thing have the same property, or be in the same relation to something else?" Then the answer is yes. — Snakes Alive

Right, so this leads to the question of what makes it so. Universals are one possible answer to that. Tropes are another. It doesn't really matter what the answer is for this discussion (I have no idea). Only whether it's meaningful.

Betrand Russell’s exposition of such topics is as close as philosophy can come to being canonical. — Wayfarer

Russell was also a top notch logician, not that it makes his argument right. But he would likely have been aware of the critiques of metaphysics.

In my lexicon other universes or events outside the light cone are metaphysics. — andrewk

Does that mean you think it's meaningless to ask if an alien civilization exists one light year outside our light cone?

What do you mean by using it in a universal manner?

Are you asking how people tell when one thing is to the north of another? — Snakes Alive

Yes, where that one thing is any thing that can have another thing north of it. That's what makes the relation universal.

The difference between these two is that it is hard to imagine any experience that would answer the question about whether universals are real, but one can easily imagine one that would answer the question about physics inside a black hole. — andrewk

And why do we need to be able to experience something in order for it to be a meaningful statement? Does all of physics include only events or things which can in principle be experienced by us? What about outside or light cone or other universes?

If you ask them whether the relation 'north of' exists, or where it is, the only appropriate answer, it seems to me, is to ask what they mean, or to comment that the question is deeply confused. — Snakes Alive

The problem is accounting for how we can use north of in a universal manner when talking about the world. As Wayfarer asked, what makes north or the natural numbers so useful when dealing with the world? Is there something about the world that makes this so?

I fail to see how that question is meaningless.

Some have made arguments that they thought were rational. I don't agree with them on that. If they were rational they would be conclusively persuasive to anybody that understands logic, regardless of that person's prior opinion on the conclusion. Yet they are not. — andrewk

Doesn't that rule out any argument that people disagree on? It would certainly rule out Carnap's, since not everyone agreed with his anti-metaphysical arguments.

It reads to me as very bad philosophy. I'm not sure I would quote that passage in support of anything. — Snakes Alive

Russell is pointing out that "north of" is a universal relation that doesn't apply to any particular situation, but rather every situation in which one thing is north of another.

The programming language above employs the concept of a universal in the form of the class Dog. Two particulars (objects) are created with unique names and weight. They share the same behavior of barking their name, weight and color. The color is also the same between them.

However, the code actually shares the bark function in virtue of the class. But the color property exists for both objects, it just happens to be the same.

This is clearly meaningful in a programming language, and examples are often taken to be modeling how we think about the world, with it's individuals and categories.

If you ask me why two things can be tigers, I could give you a causal, biological explanation; but this is apparently not what you want. — Snakes Alive

You certainly can, but you're going to have to invoke universal processes like evolution and natural selection to do so. Also genes. What is a gene? It's a mechanism for passing information for how to build organisms along. All of that involves universalist language.

However, you've said nothing about them other than that they are an explanation; hence, I don't know what they are, and so don't know in what sense they're intended to be an explanation. Hence, the question of their existence is meaningless to me until this can be answered. — Snakes Alive

We have the concept of universals in our language and thought. Tiger is an abstract concept for the individual members having similar characteristics. Even better, E=MC^2 is a universal law applying to all matter and energy in the universe.

So do we have these abstract concepts because of something in the world which isn't particular? Well yes, the similarities between things. So what is this similarity? Are the abstract concepts of our language mirroring the similarities in nature?

I realized that some programming languages employ the concept of universals. A class is a universal definition for a group of objects that have the same kinds of properties and behavior. Once you define a class, you can create objects with particular properties as defined by the class.

In fact, the behavior (the functions each object can perform) lives in the class. All objects share the same behavior by virtue of the class.

And indeed, introductions to this kind of programming often use Dog and Cat as two different classes, and go on by saying that this style of programming models the real world. This kind of programming came into existence with a language focused on simulation.

What this shows is that at the very least, the concept of a universal is meaningful and coherent. Whether it is when applied to the world is the question. But certainly we possess universal concepts.

Again, if you're asking a psychological question, it's meaningful. What other question you might be asking, I can't understand. — Snakes Alive

I'm asking what allows for individual things in the world to have the same properties. How is that not meaningful?

Nothing. We can't. It's just one way of looking at things. — Pseudonym

Then I'll assume Carnap's argument is itself meaningless. Isn't it a metaphysical argument?

If you can't articulate the question meaningfully, then Carnap (and anyone else) is licensed to ignore it. It's your job to frame a question meaningfully: otherwise, the demand that others answer it doesn't make sense either. — Snakes Alive

But what gave rise to the question of universals remains. Carnap and others might take issue with the meaningfulness of the universal concept, but there is still a matter of how particulars can have the same properties such that we can categorize them.

This is a psychological question, and meaningful. But I don't see what it has to do with the existence of universals. — Snakes Alive

It could be psychological, and that would be conceptualism. But now you've taken a step toward the debate being meaningful.

The realist would ask how individuals have the same properties. Unless this can be answered by some other means, the realist can just say that universals have to exist to explain that fact. But if you answer the realist, then you've conceded that the debate is meaningful.

Carnap would say that realists, conceptualists and nominalists are wasting their time trying to answer a question without meaning. But shouldn't Carnap have to account for similarity?

The parallel was intentional: you said a universal was that which explained some fact. But simply introducing something as that which explains something else makes no sense, because introduced ex nihilo in this way it does no actual explaining, and so I don't know what it is I'm supposed to be arguing about. — Snakes Alive

A universal is meant to explain the discrepancy between a world of individuals, and the huge amount of categorization we perform.

If it's a tiger, it's a tiger. What's meant by "being a member of the tiger group" other than being a tiger? Are you asking me what makes it so that if something is a tiger, it's a tiger? — Snakes Alive

How is it that we have the concept of categories when the world we perceive is individual? Nobody ever perceives a tiger in the categorical sense. They perceive animals that are similar. What is it about the similarities that allows us to categorize?

"There are tigers. A flyger is that which explains this fact. Are there flygers? — Snakes Alive

But flygers hasn't been defined. So what makes an individual tiger a member of the tiger group? If it's not a universal, then what is it? I'm asking because if universals don't make sense to you, then how do you make sense of individuals having the same properties? Is it just a brute fact of existence?

I don't know what that means, because I don't know what it means for two things to have something in common "in virtue of" some third thing (or not). — Snakes Alive

By that do you mean you don't know what natural mechanism would allow for such a thing, or do you mean the concept really doesn't make sense?

If it doesn't make sense, then what do you think it means for individuals to have properties "in common"? Are they the same properties?

I simply don't understand the question. I know what it means for a dragon to exist (or not); I don't know what it means for a universal to exist (or not). — Snakes Alive

Well, I've tried to provide a pseudo-argument for what a universal means.

We can pick on universals. Do any of the following statements contain an appeal to emotion? It's not a formal argument.

We perceive individual things.
These individual things have similarities.
The similarities allow us to categorize the individuals.
Categorization is evidence of something the individuals within a category share.
This something explains how individuals have similarities.
This is called a universal.

You don't have to agree with the above pseudo-argument. This is a question fo whether it's meaningful (intelligible).

But this is begging the question. Carnap proposes that arguments for various metaphysical positions are irrational and you respond by saying that they are. What Carnap is really pointing to is how can you prove that they are? — Pseudonym

The form and validity of each step in an argument, I suppose? Don't we have a criteria for what structure a logical argument takes? It's true that often arguments are presented in ordinary language without the rigid logical structure, or to elaborate on the premises and steps in the argument.

But let's say for sake of argument that we can't tell what a logical argument is. What makes Carnap's argument logical and not irrational? How can we prove that Carnap is right?

I think some people are sociopaths and don't feel empathy, because that's how their brains formed. Other people might feel empathy, but they're emotionally scarred, or are able to justify their actions to themselves. We can all be selfish, get unreasonable angry, have irrational fear, etc. And if you're raised in an environment where you have to learn certain survival strategies, like street smarts or being tough, then that can overrule empathetic concerns.

'how would our experience of a world in which only matter exists differ from one in which only minds exist?' or 'how would my experience of a world in which only I exist differ from one in which other minds also exist?' — andrewk

But only if you limit the discussion to your 'experience of'.

'I tend to agree with Carnap that questions of ontology have no rational meaning. — andrewk

I don't see how this is possible since many people have made rational arguments for various metaphysical positions.

But those questions, especially the second one, are very emotionally meaningful to many people. — andrewk

I'm not emotionally attached to every metaphysical argument, but I can make sense of some of the ones I don't particularly care about. It doesn't really matter to my life whether universals are real, but it's interesting to think about sometimes, just like it's interesting to wonder whether the laws of physics really 'break down' inside a black hole, which is just as meaningful, except for the difficult math.

But as to the existence of universals, I can't make any sense of the question — Snakes Alive

As I understand it, universals come about by observing two aspects of the world we perceive:

1. The distinctiveness of things, thus particulars.
2. The similarities between particulars allowing us to categorize the world.

The question that arise is by virtue of what do individual things have the same properties? Sharing a universal object that has those properties is one possible answer. The realists would say that is by universals that we're able to categorize the world. Apples all share the same apple universal, thus making them apples. Otherwise, how would we put a bunch of individuals into the apple category?

It is a problematic concept, and it's easy to think that our minds are creating those universal categories, as opposed to them existing in nature. But that still leaves the matter of similarity.

At any rate, this isn't an argument for universals, only that I think it's meaningful one. Can you explain how you can't make sense of it.

If we were to take time travel as a process of reversing the universe's history while the time traveller stays within a bubble for instance, in a manner similar to rewinding a cassette tape, then everything stays within a single 3D universe and we can visit 1850 and kill out ancestors without problem. — Mr Bee

I guess, if there was a mechanism for rewinding* the universe. One could be invented for a story. Surely there must be some stories out there with this. I can only recall stories about visiting existent future or past points in time, or parallel timelines. The ones involving the same timeline often allow changes from the past to ripple forward to the present (or future) somehow. Star Trek time travel was portrayed that way.

* Actually, Thanos and Dr. Strange did the rewinding events thing in the Marvel movies. It was on a local scale, though. But that would support presentism in those stories, except I think the comics have the other forms of time travel as well.

Anyway, the point of these time travel stories is that we can make a meaningful distinction between the different notions of time, and if physics/technology allowed us to, we could time travel in a similar fashion, depending on which view of time is true.

Why not? We travel forward in time, obviously, and that makes perfect sense. We also can orient and move in space in any directions, and space is just as "abstract" as time, isn't it? — SophistiCat

On a certain view of time, the present is all that exists. Time is simply the world undergoing change. As such, it would be impossible to construct a wormhole or whatever to jump to a previous or future point in time, since neither exists. I believe this is a version of the A-series notion of time, or presentism. I don't know how that's made consistent with Relativity, but I guess some of the concepts of spacetime in GR are rejected (replaced by presentist concepts), although not the experimental results.

HG Wells The Time Machine could not be written under a presentist view of time. A machine can't be traveling from the future to kill Sarah Conner or her son, and there is no parallel timeline/universe for Donnie Darko to save his family from the end of the world (or whatever he was doing).

That's what you get when the colonized west makes a blockbuster Hollywood movie about what an uncolinized Africa would be like. — Noble Dust

Was uncolonized Africa that much different than the rest of the world? There have been plenty of empires and conquest from many different civilizations and groups prior to European colonization.

He was the voice of pain and anger that the movie had to provide, but they avoided condoning his aggression by making him a villain. — Fool

Well, he did want to basically use Wakunda's advanced tech to start a world war to get back at the world for colonialism and slavery. It would have been bad for everyone, Wakanda included, as Black Panther noted. Some of those other nations do have nukes, and large military forces.

The universe will chug along? What does that mean? — Metaphysician Undercover

That the universe is a choo choo train. Thought everyone was undoubtedly certain of this?