Let’s not let a good thread go to waste!
As I see it, both Plato and Aristotle believed there were grounds for our descriptions of what is real or true, grounds that verify and justify our claims. Where they differed is that Plato believed the grounds were abolute ideals, whereas Aristotle believed they were natural phenomena. Descartes search for certainty reveals the problems of seeing grounds in either way. Kant tried to show how you can have it both ways. But, can you? That’s what most post-Kantian philosophy is about–how to reconcile the personal “feel” with the impersonal description. 20th century philosophers address the situation with attacks on justification or verification that exclude social, historical biases.
Although Aristotle was a stickler for parsimonious expression, his take on givens did not resolve the problem of verification. I’ve heard that all philosophy since the Greeks amounts to footnotes on Aristotle and Plato. But, I really don’t think either of them would have believed that the problem of verification can be resolved by lingustic analysis.
As I learned logic (in the formal deductive sense) by playing with digital circuits and then making and programing computer, I tend to treat most things as “information”.
Also, I see thinking/reasoning/logic/etc as “information processing”.
In addition to these, I tend to think in concepts/perspectives and then translate then into words.
So, it’s normal/usual for me to see underlying logical structure even within a single word (depending on the context, though).
In other words, observing “micro logic” isn’t really “linguistic analysis” but more like perspective analysis, to me.
Seemingly simple concept may already have layers of logical structure and conditional perspectives.
This is one reason I think it’s strange to leave the statement/premises without due examination in traditional logic.
I can understand that this can be hard to see for some people as these can be done nearly totally subconsciously for them.
About the ground:
As the focuses that make up different perspectives and logic are already relative to criterion, I don’t think there is absolute ground in logical thinking or reasoning.
About authority:
I feel that people of old continent are more inclined to pretend the authority.
If you compare how Brits or French people talk, you may be able to sense that it’s more pretentious than American or French Canadian, for example.
And I think this is coming from the pretended sense of certainty (at the base), which is expanded into pretended sense of authority, civilization, intelligence, knowledge, and so on.
It’s lovely as long as they are just pretending to be the authority of love affair or cuisine (like some French do), though.
Do you see that premises often (if not always) contains logical structure (in the sense of deductive logic)?
For example, “All men are mortal” already has presumption that we can know of all men and we can know if they are mortal or not.
Now, I do understand traditional logic isn’t concerned once we consider something as a premises.
However, in the spirit of seeking reliable thinking process, why should we leave the verification of validity of argument structure that can be detected in premises?
As a programmer, I use it (among other methods), nearly daily.
Clearly, you are not thinking well, here.
I learned truth table and things like that when I was a kid. I thought it was interesting.
I learned and used it with making digital circuits and computer. I didn’t feel strange about logic, at first, because we actually check the premises (voltage and also sometime current that go into the chip). When an input isn’t connected to any output and thus uncertain, we usually “pull it up” or “pull it down” to make sure it would have the Low (more or less associated with 0 or False) or High (1 or True).
I felt strange about it when I re-learned silly but famous example like “all men are mortal.” and when I saw not many people into checking premises, and especially when religious people using valid argument and pretending to be thinking well, among others.
I did feel strange about math, actually, a few years ago. I found it strange to “count” things, to begin with.
I thought about it a few months. I thought about the presumptions that let us “count” things.
And I understood several things and lost the sense of certainty/reality and interest in counting and math, altogether, 
I can still count and calculate but there is “virtual” feeling.
First, it’s a conditional claim that seeing it in the context of thinking well (reducing mistakes, more precision, etc).
I would say it’s about 87% certain in my subjective certainty scale considering the possibility that I’m making mistake somewhere, etc.
I agree if you are including subconscious evaluations and reflexes in logic.
I see logical structure (in the sense of focuses and their relations and evaluations of them) in pretty much everywhere.
But i don’t think this type of logic is about (definitive) Truth.
Lots of presumptions of absolutes happens in subconscious evaluation.
Reflex and many of emotional evaluation seem to work in the absolutes sense, just like how most kids thinks.
By being specific and conditional rather than assuming generic absolutes.
I think it’s more practical and we focus on each matter.
Maybe we can put it this way: “The theory of everything” often ends up in bullshit beliefs.
Presuming Truth and expanding the territory of Truth isn’t so different from Christian Science.
Feeding bad premises in a valid argument isn’t rational logical thinking, at least to me.
Nah -
Sure.
Yup. But it’s an argument I have never made. I don’t have a dog in this fight.
I don’t know what “verification of validity of argument structure” means. If we don’t wish to accept the truth of this premise, then I see no reason to use it in an argument.
Then what are you complaining about? You use it. It seems to me your argument, then, is with yourself.
I’m sorry to hear that. Presumably, you had someone else balance your checking account for you.
And so what is the difference, in your life, between 87% and 100%?
Nah,
So computer input and output cannot be described as involving a language? What ground of certainty is there that can separate knower from known, since only the knower seeks certainty? Is computer language in any way the something other than the self-other relationship that some see as necessary for an unbiased or unattached evaluation of that relationship? Is language in general this Rosetta Stone? Is representation? Is intention or will? You’ve only scratched the surface of these deeper issues.
I know it’s not your bone.
I’m simply saying that I felt strange that “deductive logic” doesn’t bite what it can chew well (logical structure in the sense of deductive logic) when someone says the magic word “It’s a premise”, among other things.
And I also felt strange that most people seem to eat the magic word and shut their eyes on premises.
Maybe you can understand if I say like this.
To me, lots of premises (statement) are already argument themselves in the sense they have multiple logical relations (either clearly visible or easily guessed). As the (micro) argument contained within premises can be studied by deductive logic just like treating any argument, I think it’s better to check them IF we want to think in precise/reliable manner.
I don’t have 100%, unless it’s about something very well defined and pretty limited (like simple math).
In even in these matter, I know I may make a simple mistake that I don’t usually feel 100% certainty.
Nah -
There is a psychological component to logic, because there’s a psychological component to everything that we do. But it’s important to separate that component from logic itself. Logic is just a tool.
Well, an if-then statement is just as much an implication as any entire argument is, yes. But not checking on these is not a flaw in logic, but in the logician.
The reason that I harp on this is that I agree with you, to an extent, but also think you are guilty of a similar sin. People are forever asking logic for something that it cannot deliver and then faulting “logic” because it cannot deliver.
Okay, but again, this is a psychological effect. Logic is useful even if we “know” the premises to be false, or if we don’t “know” them to be true. Scientists use arguments like that all the time. We accept a truth value or we don’t. We may accept as provisionally true a statement that we’re only 87% sure of.
Attempts have been made to introduce an epistemic element into logic - to ask the question you seem to be asking - how can we use logic if we don’t have access to “truth”? Even my hero Russell explored this issue. I think it’s gobbledygook. Russell was surely capable of that. Logic is purely mechanical in that regard - either a statement is true or it’s false. Logical systems have been employed to deal with probabilities, but in the end, we accept a provisional truth or we don’t.
It depends on the context, scope, perspective, etc, I guess.
If you consider the change of voltage level from 0V to 5V, for example, as a language, pretty much everything a computer does can be described as involving a language.
And some software can recognize human language in written form, speech, etc, too.
Which words of mine are you interpreting in this way?
About the (presumed) “separation” of observer and observed (which might be at the different layer than the separation of knower and known):
I think there are many layers of separation (or impression of it) that create the sense of separation we may have against what we perceive.
Also, I think the certainty (or the sense of certainty, which seems to be an illusion) is a necessary element for the awareness, perception, and so on.
We are “self-aware” when there is (subconscious) sense of certainty of the awareness of perceiving., I’d say.
In other words, the awareness is the ground of certainty that separate observer and observed.
As for knower and known, it’s probably more specific than thn awareness, and probably the sense of reality we may feel with the recognition of specific things might be the ground of (subconsciously presumed) certainty.
Computer is a model of how we think, But it’s relatively a new model and not very elaborated one.
We may see the type of programming that would allow computers to be more “aware” of different contexts/perspectives, in the future. Currently, computer is both strict like an stiff old man and naive and not very aware like small kids.
Languages are just symbols to me. It does sometime help us in thinking, but it can be confusing us, too.
And probably any evaluation we make is biased and attached, in some way.
If we are not attached at all, I don’t think we would think about it.
And without any bias, I don’t think we would have an perspective in whicn we can evaluate things.
Any perspective is a bias, and attachment.
As I think of Logic as the matter focuses and their relations, Logic has a lot to do with deeper issues.
Well, if you want to bring up psychology, I’d say that it’s Logic (in the sense of focuses and their relations) that creates psychological make up.
And the “relationship” part is pretty similar to deductive logic (although not really valid, most of time).
If the arguments that make up our psyche are more valid, we might be more logical/rational.
That’s what I have been saying, though.
I’m mainly accusing Aristotle and monotheistic scholars (and people who followed them).
I think you are misinterpreting my intention/attitude.
Look at how I started this thread:
Also, Logic (focuses and their relations) is so basic that it’s pretty powerful and useful.
It has its limit, but I don’t ask too much from it and I’m not frustrated about it.
Sure. I’m not saying that is useless.
However, IF we care about overall precision/reliability, I think it’s better to check premises.
If someone cannot understand this, I would say that the person isn’t very rational.
Here you are mixing two things I was saying.
First, I’m advocating to check premises, since they usually have (micro) argument and thus they can be checked by current deductive logic.
Second, I’m thinking that formal logic can have the concept of “delimiter” (although I don’t think I wrote about it in this thread).
It’s slightly similar to “quantifier” in the sense it specifies the condition or range in which the relationship can be applicable.
If you know a bit about computer language, it;s similar to the safe guard for the input parameters of a function. When we know a function should take lowercase letter, we can put a routine to check this and cause an error (exception, whatever) when it’s fed with anything else.
Some computer languages have this type of things already built in, and it can make the language more robust (although this can slow it down and make the code bigger).
Then there is the question of 100% certainty.
From my preferred point of view, I don’t think there is any definitive separation.
It means we cannot identify something, focus on something, by separating it from the rest with perfect certainty and accuracy.
So, I think we may need to incorporate the concept of gray zone, or focus precision rating, to evaluate the relations between different focuses (well identified subject matters).
And this type of Logic may need to incorporate the concept of “dimension” in the sense any focus (identification of a matter) can be considered as a creation of temporal virtual layer in which the focused area is considered as the whole, All. It’s a bit similar to the set theory.
I guess, it can be considered like the issue of “precision” in math.
In multiplying numbers, it will preserve the precision of them (if they are the same).
But in addition, it’s the precision of the greater number that counts.
Probably, we can create a way to incorporate the precision of guesstimates in logical evaluation (if things like this hasn’t been done, already).
I’ll attempt to be more precise. When I am seen as not addressing exactly what you state, my mind is wandering through the philosophical implications of what you say as other philosophers interpret them.
My take, for what it is worth, is that mathematics and formal logic share certain properties. I think maybe Whitehead made much of this. What I see that they share is a type of structure that is able to use relationships and contants to arrive at conclusions. This ability provides “mathematical” or “logical” certainties, which are not always descriptive of experiential “certainties”. So, the problem remains–how to describe organic, dynamic experience in a way that is neither static nor abstract.
It is the structure that provides constants for descriptions of motion and change. And stucture is not an end of creativity or imagination. The structure of my piano allows music composition.
Yah, I got that feeling. So, I went along with your perspectives, more or less.
The differential, or the rate of change and the rate of change of the rate of change, and so on, is useful in analyzing motion.
Also, I tend to think that our notion of motion is made by the awareness of the differences.
There is even a possibility that there is no such thing as fluid motion and everything, including our awareness is changing step by step.
And the notion of motion is relative to the time. With different type (or model) of time, we may see things differently, as well.
And then, what is “experiential certainties”?
Sometime, I do have the sense of certainty so strong, not coming from any reasoning.
So, it’s not a logical certainty. However, often, I found out that it can be reasoned logically (not necessarily only with deductive logic, though) to the same conclusion (or perspective, to be exact).
But I wouldn’t call it as “experiential certainties”.
Nah -
I think most people would call their direct experience the most certain of everything they “know”. Some rationalists wouldn’t, but even then they would call direct experience certain with some qualifications. Most users of logic, however, would not call a “logical” certainty such without reference to either their own experience or the experience of someone whose testimony they would rely upon, for whatever reason.
You seem to be talking about another kind of certainty - but I don’t know what that could be. The major alternative is “intuition” - but that’s usually a fuzzy notion. Is that what you’re referring to?
Good stuff!!! By “experiential certainty” I mean the ontological underpinnings of all descriptions. From that vantage point we can arrive at intersubjective verifications or justifications of ideas–yet another human experience. To assume that the verifications and justifications entail anything more than human adaptational stances–how a this relates to a that–is assuming a universal or God perspective of reality, a declaration of absolutes and universals.
I’m not so sure if “most” people take physical sensory world and experiences in it as certain.
I mean, there are too many people who place more certainty on god and other things than what they experience, for example.
But I’d agree that there are lots of people who do not doubt/think bout the certainty/reliability of their sensory (or physical) experiences. And I guess it’s mostly natural for us.
I guess it can be seen as something some people may call as “intuition”, without knowing much about it.
In my case, there seems to be underlying mechanism for it.
When I think about something, and hold certain perspective about it and stay with it (especially without conscious thinking process) for a while, it seems there is an automatic scanning for related concepts/perspectives stored in the memory. And when a concept (or chunk of information around it), which has been (subconsciously) considered to be certain, is found to have no solid basis, the sense of certainty associated with it is dropped and this seems to give me the new sense of certainty as the negation of the concept/perspective.
This can happen on its own accord when I’m relaxing after thinking about something, or I can induce this to happen.
It’s similar to the system used in computer language/system to delete unused/unreferenced objects to free up unused memory (a,k.a. garbage collection).
And the automatic scanning seems to include dependency chain analysis, and verification of logical relations. So, I can slowly trace back (what was done automatically) and come up with logical explanations of the certainty (from different perspectives).
I’ve been using this since I was 11 years old or so. I don’t know how I started to do this, yet.
Anyway, it’s not the certainty of a concept or the relation between concepts, but the certainty of the lack of the relation or the baseless nature of the concept.
To be even more precise, it’s the certainty about the misplacement of the certainty that was there, previously. It can be seen as the byproduct of loosing wrongly held (and/or overly evaluated) usually subconscious certainty about something (installed probably due to cultural indoctrination, etc).
I think the same mechanism works for finding previously unnoticed relation between two or more things. But it doesn’t produce the sense of certainty, in this case.
I see. It’s similar to what rackedrick was saying in this thread, I guess: viewtopic.php?f=25&t=171807
Personally, I’m not really 100% trusting my own sensory information nor that of others.
I had my sensory data giving contradicting information, for example, and I’ve seen people reporting and assuring wrong interpretation.
And I don’t bring up bullshit like God, either.
So, “experimental certainty” for you is just “possibly practical information” to me.
I think it’s a bad habit of us to try to see things as certain. It makes our thinking more complicated (in order to accommodate the boosted level of certainty attached to too many things).
And I think it influenced the classical logic, too.
The default position, assumption of stupid monotheistic culture is the presence of all knowing god that assumes perfect certainty over everything.
And we stupid humans are treated as if the representative of this God over others (nature, other creature, etc).
So, I guess it’s normal for people from monotheistic culture to presume too much certainty over too many things with this type of over boosted self-esteem.
Also, scholars/philosophers were supposed to know more than other humans, thus they developed the tendency to presume and/or to pretend to know (with certainty). We can probably see this as a kind of illness associated with the profession.
And I don’t think these helped the development in the study of logic.
They behave as if they do. Or they’d be bumping into walls as they walk, and shoving food past their mouths, or failing to procreate.
There is no reason for philosophy to completely ignore everyday life.
I don’t think they do. We wouldn’t be likely to attribute the healing of a wound to God is we didn;t think the wound was actually healed.
What you seem to be describing in the rest of your post is pattern recognition.
“Sensory”? Who said that provides an algorithm for all experience? Certainly not I. So, I’m more with your take than against it. Maybe I can’t really communicate how this is so. Logic depends on structural relationships. What more is there to logic than this, except for logic’s pragmatic applications? A good case against the idea of sensory data as reflecting reality can be found in Richard Rorty’s “Philosophy and The Mirror of Nature” (1979). We separate and bracket in order to describe; this does not mean anything is actually separated or bracketed. There is no ontological gap between experience and description; there is only us transacting with what is other than us–an indivisable process.
I’m not really concerned with what “philosophy” should be. I don’t consider myself to be a “philosopher”.
I know a bit about your preferences in what you consider as “philosophy”, but I don’t really share it.
To think freely, I don’t think it’s a good idea to have any self-imposed limitation.
I guess we can reduce most of thought/evaluation to “pattern recognition”.
What you have done is a pattern recognition, too.
The rest of your life, you will be doing pattern recognition. 
Ahh. So I suspected. You’ll forgive my assumption that we were talking about philosophy, I am sure.