The Fall of Western Civilization

Page 3 of 8 [ 118 posts ] Go to page Previous 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 ... 8 Next

Previous topic | Next topic

nominalist
Supporting Member

Joined: 28 Jun 2007
Gender: Male
Posts: 2,740
Location: Lower Rio Grande Valley of Texas (born in NYC)

21 Dec 2007, 3:50 pm

Odin wrote:

This why we we need to move away from verificationism to Popper's falsificationist "critical rationalism." Foundationalism is not necessary.

There are also other options, including William James' pragmatism and Richard Rorty's neopragmatism.

_________________
Mark A. Foster, Ph.D. (retired tenured sociology professor)
36 domains/24 books: http://www.markfoster.net
Emancipated Autism: http://www.neurelitism.com
Institute for Dialectical metaRealism: http://dmr.institute

ouinon
Supporting Member

Joined: 10 Jul 2007
Age: 61
Gender: Female
Posts: 5,939
Location: Europe

21 Dec 2007, 3:58 pm

nominalist wrote:

There are also other options, including William James' pragmatism and Richard Rorty's neopragmatism.

In what way might William James' pragmatism be relevant to systems of human organisation? I found those of his ideas which i read about re psychology very interesting but am surprised to see him ref to here.

nominalist
Supporting Member

Joined: 28 Jun 2007
Gender: Male
Posts: 2,740
Location: Lower Rio Grande Valley of Texas (born in NYC)

21 Dec 2007, 4:11 pm

ouinon wrote:

James, a nominalist, believed that the utility of a proposition was demonstrated in what is "good" or useful. To James, truth was nothing more than a name for what works. In terms of social groups, a good group would be one which conforms to its purpose or function. Propositions or hypotheses are evaluated on their utility not based on metaphysical speculation concerning their isomorphism with some notion of reality.

ouinon
Supporting Member

Joined: 10 Jul 2007
Age: 61
Gender: Female
Posts: 5,939
Location: Europe

21 Dec 2007, 4:30 pm

Thank you. I still don't see how that is going to help people decide on the right purposes/goals though. On what is the right/good thing to aim at.

For example; I can see that dissolving the socially constructed and oppressive classes of "child" and "adult" would probably be a good thing, but only cos i believe it has done damage to tens of thousands of people. Not because i can point to some kind of final usefulness in removing discrimination against people under-18.

Well, except in so far as the liberty of those people now called children might impact very positively on the lives of their current principal carers. But even so...

What usefulness would there be in liberating the most sensitive and gifted brains from the strait jacket/stranglehold/drowning pool of "childhood"? It might lead to the end of many important and profit making institutions and vast organisations on whom millions of "adults" depend for their livelihood !

In fact that the revolution/liberation for some might be the end of western civilisation for others.

Awesomelyglorious
Veteran
Veteran

Joined: 17 Dec 2005
Gender: Male
Posts: 13,157
Location: Omnipresent

21 Dec 2007, 4:51 pm

Odin wrote:

This why we we need to move away from verificationism to Popper's falsificationist "critical rationalism." Foundationalism is not necessary.

I conceptualize these things differently as I see foundations as a necessity for action and thus every theory from my perspective ends up being implicitly a form of foundationalism. Then again, I think that man implicitly relies upon his logic to know the world and everything else stretches out from premises based upon that logic. Essentially speaking, no matter what direction we go, I still claim we are foundationalists as if we understand the world by reason then all differences will fall down to the basic foundational truths we accept.

Odin
Veteran
Veteran

Joined: 12 Oct 2006
Age: 38
Gender: Male
Posts: 2,475
Location: Moorhead, Minnesota, USA

21 Dec 2007, 6:15 pm

nominalist wrote:

Odin wrote:

This why we we need to move away from verificationism to Popper's falsificationist "critical rationalism." Foundationalism is not necessary.

There are also other options, including William James' pragmatism and Richard Rorty's neopragmatism.

I have a huge problem with the Pragmatists' definition of truth as what useful or practical or whatever as well as pragmatism's annoying anti-realist side-kick instrumentalism. I adhere to the definition of truth as correspondence with reality, the more a statement is to corresponding with the nature of reality the more true it is.

_________________
My Blog: My Autistic Life

nominalist
Supporting Member

Joined: 28 Jun 2007
Gender: Male
Posts: 2,740
Location: Lower Rio Grande Valley of Texas (born in NYC)

21 Dec 2007, 7:05 pm

Odin wrote:

Most people in the West are ontological realists (essentialists), so they would have a problem with James' pragmatism, Rorty's neopragmatism, or Dewey's instrumentalism. However, from my standpoint, asserting isomorphism or correspondence between our observations and some "reality" is purely metaphysical or speculative.

You would probably prefer Peirce's pragmaticism. He was a realist. He altered the spelling to avoid confusion with James.

Bodorus
Yellow-bellied Woodpecker

Joined: 17 Jun 2007
Gender: Male
Posts: 71

24 Dec 2007, 5:23 am

the future is for localism, not globalism. The more globalisation the worse life will become.

Averick
Veteran
Veteran

Joined: 5 Mar 2007
Age: 45
Gender: Male
Posts: 2,709
Location: My tower upon the crag. Yes, mwahahaha!

24 Dec 2007, 5:36 am

I believe it is going as planned...

The aeons of the world may come and go. But life will flourish each time, unique and never the same as previously before.

Awesomelyglorious
Veteran
Veteran

Joined: 17 Dec 2005
Gender: Male
Posts: 13,157
Location: Omnipresent

24 Dec 2007, 10:30 am

Bodorus wrote:

the future is for localism, not globalism. The more globalisation the worse life will become.

Only if the future includes primitivism and privation. The more that we have globalized, the better life for individuals has become. This is because globalization is efficient, it tends to promotes the most efficient use of resources in the world. The idea is just basic economics, as globalizing allows more trades to occur. The issue many people have with globalization is pollution and distribution of wealth. Pollution is an externality and honestly I would argue it would be best to just find a way to compensate for it. As for distribution of wealth, well, the poor nations are now getting industries and their workers are getting jobs, even if these jobs are abominable from our standard, the issue within the rich nations is the fact that trade has some bad distributionary effects, but those from technology are often believed to be worse and really all else equal, just redistributing money would be better than stopping free trade.

nominalist
Supporting Member

Joined: 28 Jun 2007
Gender: Male
Posts: 2,740
Location: Lower Rio Grande Valley of Texas (born in NYC)

24 Dec 2007, 12:40 pm

ouinon wrote:

Thank you. I still don't see how that is going to help people decide on the right purposes/goals though. On what is the right/good thing to aim at.

Sure, but that was not James' concern.

Bodorus
Yellow-bellied Woodpecker

Joined: 17 Jun 2007
Gender: Male
Posts: 71

25 Dec 2007, 1:55 pm

Awesomelyglorious wrote:

Bodorus wrote:

the future is for localism, not globalism. The more globalisation the worse life will become.

the basic economics make the rich richer and the poor poorer. You dont have to agree, time will open your eyes.

Odin
Veteran
Veteran

Joined: 12 Oct 2006
Age: 38
Gender: Male
Posts: 2,475
Location: Moorhead, Minnesota, USA

25 Dec 2007, 2:09 pm

nominalist wrote:

Odin wrote:

We seem to be using different definitions of Essentialism and Nominalism. I am both a Realist and a Nominalist and I think Essentialism is a crutch that promotes bad, tautological "something acts the way it does because it is it's nature to do so" thinking that gets in the way of good explainations.

I am a Realist in that I think there is a reality outside our minds that our phenomenalogical world is an approximation of

I am a Nominalist in that I think the only things that can be said to exist are the fundamental physical objects described by physics and processes made up of interactions of those funamental objects such as stars, galaxies, organisms, societies, etc. Universal concepts like "dog" and "chair" don't exist outside the mind.

_________________
My Blog: My Autistic Life

nominalist
Supporting Member

Joined: 28 Jun 2007
Gender: Male
Posts: 2,740
Location: Lower Rio Grande Valley of Texas (born in NYC)

25 Dec 2007, 2:27 pm

Odin wrote:

I am using these terms as they were classically used in the Middle Ages. Realism and nominalism reflect different views of universals. A middle position was conceptualism, but I do not find it to be tenable.

Quote:

I am a Realist in that I think there is a reality outside our minds that our phenomenalogical world is an approximation of

The philosophy of nominalism, as generally defined, would be inconsistent with the idea of "a reality outside of our minds" if, by reality, you mean a single reality. If you are referring to particular realities (separate realities), such as you and I are separate realities (aka particularism), then your view would be in line with nominalism.

Nominalists generally reject the legitimacy of ontology and metaphysics, not epistemology. In other words, while nominalism is anti-realist (in the medieval sense of the word), it is not necessarily an idealist position. Most nominalists are not idealists, but some, like George Berkeley, were idealists.

Quote:

I am a Nominalist in that I think the only things that can be said to exist are the fundamental physical objects described by physics and processes made up of interactions of those funamental objects such as stars, galaxies, organisms, societies, etc. Universal concepts like "dog" and "chair" don't exist outside the mind.

Okay, then we are using different terms. Nominalism was a reaction against ontological realism, not epistemic realism. I was speaking of ontological realism; you were discussing epistemic realism, i.e., that objects exist. Epistemic realism is anti-idealist. Ontological realism is anti-nominalist.

Awesomelyglorious
Veteran
Veteran

Joined: 17 Dec 2005
Gender: Male
Posts: 13,157
Location: Omnipresent

25 Dec 2007, 3:51 pm

Bodorus wrote:

the basic economics make the rich richer and the poor poorer. You dont have to agree, time will open your eyes.

Yeah, I love self-righteous preachers. They usually are *SO* smart!! :roll:

Most experts can't predict past their noses, so I am glad I have random guys on forums who can predict with absolute accuracy. What is the weather going to be like tomorrow? :twisted:

Elemental
Pileated woodpecker

Joined: 4 Apr 2007
Age: 43
Gender: Male
Posts: 182

25 Dec 2007, 4:38 pm

Chuchulainn wrote:

Is it happening?

Iraq War... morals degrading... violence increasing... psychotic murderers...failing education...

Don't deterioriate into religious arguments, I'm trying to avoid that.

The collapse of civilisation is around the corner, and has been around the corner for millenia. There are tablets from ancient Assyria complaining about how society is going down the tubes.

Page 3 of 8 [ 118 posts ] Go to page Previous 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 ... 8 Next

Jump to:

The Fall of Western Civilization Post Reply New Topic

The Fall of Western Civilization