I wasn’t sure if this should be in philosophy or psychology. Take your pick.
I don’t understand how someone who denies a priori reason can speak or write. Without a priori reason, the allocation of properties to words as parts of speech doesn’t make sense. For example, how does someone who denies a priori reason recognize the difference between subjects, objects, predicates, and descriptives? The idea of a noun, verb, adjective, etc. wouldn’t exist. The entity-relationship modeling of words in syntax wouldn’t exist either.
I’m just baffled at how someone can honestly deny a priori reason while at the same time conjure the attention span to write a sentence. It seems that they write entirely out of pragmatism, but then there really isn’t any conversation being had at all. It’s just an utterance of stimulus to garnish a result. Talking with someone who denies a priori reason would be meaningless because there’s literally no exchange of ideas.
Anyway, it seems you have a fundementally different philosophy than I do, I mean I wouldn’t even know where to begin to explain how one can not believe in a prior reason and still function. I guess you could tell me something, anything, that is a priori and I could show why it’s not. What I find interesting is how much you know about some areas of philosophy and related subjects, in an extremely impressive way, and then you seem to completely unaware of the arguments surrounding the issues in this thread.
There are many approaches to this problem, but they all end in telling you that you don’t have to let the conscept of “a priori” rule your life. I think our limitations are all we need for that.
I read it about five times, I don’t know where I interpreted your argument wrong, nor do I understand how the above statements reflect the OP. Maybe you could explain more, I really am interested in trying to figure out what you are saying.
Basically, I’m saying that someone who denies a priori reason is merely looking for an output of aesthetic symbols. Someone is not looking for ideas behind words as intrinsically valuable. Someone just wants to read or hear another literally say something.
There was a debate on another thread recently about intrinisic value, it seems that people’s definiton of that phrase varies, but generally speaking I’d have to say it doesn’t exist. Are you claiming that intrinsic value is real, and if so could you explain?
I’m saying intrinsic value is ideal. Extrinsic value is real. Without a priori reason, all someone’s left with is the real extrinsic aesthetic of language. There’s no general schematic or framework obtained that can be extrapolated to outside situations. All that’s obtained is a particular practice given the situation at hand.
I don’t believe in extrinsic value either. When I originally read your OP I thought you were objecting to the denial of some fundemental a priori reason for saying something, I think I understand now, were you just speaking to the denial of a more casual reason for an action? For example, there is no fundemental reason I’m writing this post, but I could give you a reason, such as that I want to understand what you’re saying and express my own views, but that’s just the reason I’m giving now, a few weeks from now I might tell you was being delusional and I only wrote this from boredom. You can tell me I’m writing this because I’m confused and this post of mine couldn’t be written for any reason other than confusion. It doesn’t matter, reasons for actions are always in retrospect and debatable.
It sounds to me like you’re saying that someone who doesn’t believe in a priori reasons wouldn’t have a priori reasons–but there’s a difference between the nature of our minds and what we understand about our minds–the latter doesn’t (always) determine the former, and we rarely understand our own minds in any great depth.
Just like in many other debates one side is insisting on the existence of something and one side is insisting it doesn’t exist, being the latter let me use the typical argument tactic and say if you want to show that a priori reason exists then show me it, or being that it’s conceptual and can’t be show then give me an example. I mean you probably think my reasoning for the non existance of a priori is too strange to do other than gloss over, but why shouldn’t it be, it’s hard to disprove something, but the obligation is on you to prove that which you claim to exist.
Causation and a priori reason are the same. People need to imagine in advance of experience how words ought to be structured before structuring them.
Without a priori reason, “people” merely regurgitate what they’ve learned from experience in emotionally hoping that they’ll get a satisfying response.
Yes, I’m saying that having a priori reason implicitly believes in a priori reason. From within, someone can’t be deluded into believing one merely learns from experience. It would deny the origination of thought. Without this, the notion of understanding would be impossible.
Well it’s basically, “This exists, or else.” If a priori reason doesn’t exist, then the value of participating in discourse is moot. All that would exist is an exchange between biological robots. In ethics, this requires a turn around of the is-ought problem to the ought-is problem - we “ought” to recognize a priori reason in order to know what it is to do.
Technically speaking, a priori reason might not exist, but then so what? The implication is meaningless since that’s where meaning comes from.
I was mostly speaking to Gib in my previous post, because he took it for granted that a priori meaning existed and my claims to the contrary were simply viewed as ignorance of ‘what is really going on in the world behind the scenes’.
Meaning doesn’t really exist, there is nothing meaningful that can be fully grasped logically or intuitively. But, if I were to humor the idea, which I often do, meaning must be made subsequent to action, not prior to it.
If I set up a bunch of dominos and say if I knock one (cause) the effect will be that they’ll all fall, then I do so, well what a determination on my part! But, maybe they were set up wrong, maybe the carpet had glue on it, or a million other reasons, then it they wouldn’t fall. How could I be so wrong! But, then I’ll find the ‘reason’ I was wrong, and say that was the cause as to why my cause didn’t have any effect. Either way it seems I conclusively am clarevoyent or I understand the ‘laws of nature’. But, wait what if the dominos all fell after I knocked one, but I found out I set them up wrong, therefore they couldn’t all have fallen because of me, instead the all fell because of a small earth quack, it suddenly seems as if I’m all over the place with my a priori reasons.
Yes, I agree with the last sentence, but it doesn’t prove me wrong, it shows the nessesary paradox of speech; everything is and isn’t, therefore nothing is true including this statement. If you want to express a paradox free view on the world go ahead and try.
We act and speak as if we believe in meaning, how can we help it, I’m writing these words to express what I mean after all. I understand what you mean by biological robots, I used to wonder about that myself, but actually I now realize to imagine ourselves without meaning is to simply try imagining nothingness, of course impossible. What’s really going on when we imagine oursleves as biological robots is that we are only trying to imagine ourselves with a different meaning, where we obey ‘the laws of physcics’ and can’t do otherwise.
The problem is that the laws of physics is only a working model for whatever area of research or study they’re involved in, such as theorizing about further laws, building or designing technology, or predicting events. But, it’s always subject to error or misinterpretation because they’re simply changing laws that were not prewriiten in some inaccesible world behind the scenes. So the biological robot is only based on our error in thinking that these laws were prewritten, that is precreated somehow, in a world behind the scenes. And this persception or misperception which we give meaning is the meaning that replaces our traditional meaning.
The ideas biological, robots, may have been pre-written, the biological robot is a complex idea, which may or may not have (as yet) present applicability or meaning. Nonesense meaningless ideas such as the "sphynx" may or not ever meaning, and yet meaning has been assigned to it. Meaning is not necessarily not based on a pre-judgement. All meaningful ideas connected can be assigned meaning on basis of contingency. Literature and imagination share a higher symbolism.
However, I’m not sure why you said meaning “must” be “subsequent”. Literally, what’s necessary for action to happen is what precedes it.
Therefore, meaning arrives before, not after, action.
You have to be careful with your use of the word “reason” there. Nature isn’t reasonable. It just exists. It doesn’t say what ought to be.
Do you believe in intelligent design?
Eh…
…the “laws of nature” are a figment of our imagination. Don’t get me wrong. I recognize thermodynamics, aerodynamics, electromagnetism, gravity, and the works like everyone else…
…but what’s actually happening is particles are playing rational games all the time, so they yield the same approximate outcomes over and over.
If you want proof, consider two things:
One, the ethical necessity of panpsychism to avoid inductive behaviorism (such that consciousness isn’t extinguished on accident for appearing “impractical”), and
Two, which would you rather pay: a cheap price or an expensive price for the same product? Would you make that decision again? Twice over? Thrice over? Four times over? Five times? Ten times? A hundred times? A thousand times? A million? A billion? A google?
Would you make that choice an infinite amount of times?
That infinity is what’s happening in the world around us. The particles around us are playing rational games all the time. It’s not that they’re united in common or predetermined by some external force. It’s just they’re behaving rationally in their own self-interest…
…with their own a priori reason.
It can be very easily helped:
Burden of proof is on the affirmative. It isn’t someone’s obligation to assume the risk of another being unreliable.
That which isn’t necessarily proven is unworthy of one’s judgment.
Therefore, if another expects to be necessarily acknowledged despite a lack of proof, another is unworthy of someone’s judgment.
The external, physical, natural, emotional sensation someone feels when stimulated by phenomena is independent of someone’s internal, mental, artificial thoughtfulness.
Eh… again, you have to divide natural emotions from artificial thoughts. Yes, what we feel is determined by the laws of physics, but how we think starts from a blank slate (which is, literally, nothingness).
If you’re emotionally frustrated to the point of needing to express yourself, then you express that frustration until it’s completely expressed. Then, the slate goes blank again.
I’m familiar with Chomsky’s argument. I just don’t think that proves your point because it’s purely philosophical, not neurological. Actually, his opponents refer to empirical evidence instead: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poverty_of … e_argument
Personally, I don’t buy Chomsky’s argument either. One, people are capable of distinguishing ideas from words (such as when people have difficulty communicating why they’re doing what they’re doing, or when people believe correct beliefs after deliberation yet can’t communicate “why”).
Two, if you’ve ever learned multiple languages, philosophies, talents, or had similar relationships with different types of people, you’ll notice that the bedrock of your mind actually restructures to accommodate how ideas come together. Even as you mature, you notice this happening. Your beliefs change, and your perspective on when to use what words in language to represent what you intend changes.
As a Kantian, I agree. Kant merely outlined what was already there. His ideas are incredibly original. In fact, the beginning of his first critique emphasizes how important “anticipation” is to conceive of an appropriate sense of time.