Are you kidding? There is no point in philosophers forming an argument if there is no thesis that they are working toward.
Of course it can be. But this is irrelevant if the chain of reasoning has no bearing upon the proposition for which it was introduced.
Is this some kind of argument?
They are working toward a thesis; it’s just a thesis we can’t disprove without disproving the reasoning, is all.
Fortunately, the chain of reasoning in this case does have a bearing on that proposition.
Yes. The reasoning in a philosophical argument can – objectively – be shown to be in error, at which point the reasoning can be proven wrong. Thus your thesis is incorrect: if a philosopher offers up, say, a piece of reasoning that isn’t internally consistent – well, then, we can prove that he’s as incorrect as your thesis.
If it is a thesis that cannot be proven, there is no point in trying to prove it. In this case of course the philosopher can advance a straw man argument and show it to be fallacious. But that is completely irrelevant.
No it doesn’t. If a proposition is unprovable, then by definition any chain of reasoning can have no bearing on it.
Again, straw men can be knocked down. Of course. That is irrelevant.
I’m telling you the proposition can, in fact, be disproven – by disproving the chain of reasoning leading up to it. Such a chain of reasoning therefore would have a bearing on it, since disproving it disproves the conclusion.
Again, compare it to the hypothetical math savant who proposes the hitherto-unknown Pythagorean theorem without producing a chain of reasoning: if her proposition were incorrect, then we could disprove that claim by simply producing a right triangle where the sum of the squares of the other sides don’t equal the sum of the hypotenuse; we don’t need a chain of reasoning that bears on it, we can just slay the beautiful proposition with an ugly fact.
In philosophy, we lack a way to disprove a proposition without disproving the chain of reasoning – which means (a) the chain-of-reasoning stuff is the philosophy, since (b) a “savant” who merely offers up a non-disprovable proposition without supplying a disprovable chain of reasoning isn’t really producing anything of value: we can’t apply it to, or slay it with, facts.
Disproving the chain of reasoning DOES NOT DISPROVE THE CONCLUSION. This is absolutely elementary.
Here is a very simple example to help you grapple with this apparently difficult concept:
Proposition: 2+2=4
Reasoning: I like unicorns
The reasoning is faulty, but the conclusion is not disproved.
Here is another simple example. This time I will give an example illustrating how reasoning has no bearing on an unprovable proposition:
Proposition: The moon is made of cheese, except when you look at it or try to measure its properties
Reasoning: Anything
No reasoning can prove or disprove the proposition. It is an unprovable and unfalsifiable assertion. It doesn’t matter whether the reasoning associated with it is faulty or not. That is irrelevant, because the truth value of the proposition is fundamentally undecidable.
Nor would a 2+2=5 proposition be disproved were the same reasoning used to establish it – or that 2+2=-57, or whatever; if the only reasoning ever advanced to establish that 2+2=4 were a liking for unicorns, then 2+2=4 would be as unsupported as any other conclusion.
The only reason the 2+2=4 proposition is so useful in these sorts of illustrations is because it can be backed up in another way – which helps show that it can remain standing even if a different piece of reasoning were cut out from under it. If you produce a proposition that can’t be backed up or cut down in some other way, then the reasoning is all you’ve got – and the proposition stands or falls with it.
Again, if you’d genuinely like to advance exactly that fundamentally undecidable proposition, then the only discussion would necessarily center on whatever arbitrary reasoning you’d then offer up to backstop it – and if the only thing backing you up is demonstrably bad reasoning, then we’d be left with a proposition that isn’t really of any value: one we can’t apply to, or slay with, facts.
Yes… but completely irrelevant to my point that disproving the chain of reasoning does not disprove the conclusion.
This statement is not self-consistent. If the proposition cannot be proven, then the reasoning is irrelevant. You somehow keep evading this basic fact.
Do you or do you not agree that the example I gave was:
It wouldn’t matter whether the reasoning was bad or good. The proposition, as you admitted, is UNDECIDABLE. Do you understand what that means?
The point is that one’s liking for unicorns is irrelevant to whether 2+2=4. To link the reasoning to the proposition, you’d need to posit (in a glossed-over final step) the relevance of liking unicorns; if the reasoning did have the requisite bearing on the proposition, then attacking the reasoning would attack the proposition. As it happens, the reasoning in question lacks any such relationship to the proposition – and pointing that out is likewise addressing a flaw in the reasoning.
Which is to say, the “unicorn” chain of reasoning has nothing to do with the “2+2=4” conclusion (or the “2+2=5” conclusion). In itself, there’s nothing faulty about it; possibly you do like unicorns. The flaw only comes in during the step you didn’t really make explicit: the part where you claim that liking unicorns has some bearing on what two plus two equals. If it did, then disproving it would disprove the conclusion. It doesn’t, which – disproves a different, but related, conclusion.
The moon-is-cheese proposition? As far as I can tell, it was neither philosophy nor subjective; it strikes me as an objective claim about a purely physical phenomenon.
Yes: it means that any chain of reasoning which purports to lead up to it must contain a flaw. Possibly it’s a flaw that comes in somewhere around the middle. Possibly the chain of reasoning contains no flaws right up until it allegedly links up to the proposition.
Again this is completely irrelevant. The point is:
disproving the chain of reasoning does not disprove the conclusion
Are you trying to evade the fact that you were wrong on this point? What are you arguing? Do you genuinely still dispute the above basic fact?
You think that the following:
Proposition: The moon is made of cheese, except when you look at it or try to measure its properties
Is an objective claim? Then you don’t understand what “objective” means. Any claim that is undecidable is by definition not objective.
Correct. If any chain of reasoning leading to X must contain a flaw, then any chain of reasoning purporting to lead to X is automatically void and without use.
Well, heck, if you’re right, then what difference would it make? I’d be wrong on the reasoning, but according to you the proposition would still remain untouched, right? 
No, all kidding aside, you’ve made a good point there, and I’ll gladly acknowledge it. I just think it fails to do what you think it does, and thus haven’t been timely enough in noting that it does something. I’ll admit it as often as you like, if it’ll help move you along to discussing what I consider the essential aspect: that the key to severing your “unicorn” reasoning from your “2+2=4” proposition is noting that the chain of reasoning in question is irrelevant to the conclusion in question, which crucially disproves a different but related conclusion.
What, are we going to break out the dueling dictionaries? This usually doesn’t end well on the SDMB, but, yeah, okay, sure. Mine offers as the first two “Of or having to do with a material object. Having actual existence or reality.” You’re claiming the moon (a) is an existing material object that actually has certain properties when it’s unobserved, and (b) has different properties under other conditions; I thus don’t see how your claim is anything but objective.
Let’s also check Webster’s:
It goes on to explain that “In the philosophy of mind, subjective denotes what is to be referred to the thinking subject, the ego; objective what belongs to the object of thought, the non-ego.” I don’t think that helps.
I – don’t quite see how that links back to whether an autistic savant could specialize in philosophy by skipping straight to X instead of dealing in chains of reasoning; the point of philosophy is to deal with those chains of reasoning.
The reason why your continued insistence on the point is irrelevant is because “irrelevant to the conclusion in question” is simply one form of fallacious reasoning. Can you not see that? Irrelevance is a basic type of logical fallacy.
You are acting purposefully obtuse, and taking it to bizarre extremes. My claim was not that the moon has different properties under other conditions, but that the moon has properties that are in principle impossible to be shown to have real material existence. If X cannot be shown in principle to have real material existence, then X is subjective. It (according to your definition), does not have “actual existence or reality”. Got it?
This “links back” because you are implying that those chains of reasoning have some utility that makes them relevant. If the proposition is undecidable then they have no utility; they are not relevant. The savant has just as much a right to undecidable propositions as does any philosopher.
I’m not even sure you’re disagreeing, at this point.
My argument is that disproving a chain of reasoning does disprove the conclusion – if the chain of reasoning has the requisite bearing on the conclusion. Whether it has that relevance can be asserted as one of the steps in the reasoning, or as a separate but related conclusion – or, as in the format you used, it can merely be implied, in which case I can’t say whether you meant for it to be a faulty step in the reasoning or a false conclusion.
Were you implying the relevance as a faulty step in the reasoning, or as a false conclusion? Clear that up and maybe I could respond more helpfully.
Whether they can be shown is irrelevant to whether those properties do have real material existence.
I’m afraid you’re doing it wrong. AFAICT, it’s the difference between “there’s some cheese on the table” and “the cheese tastes good”. The latter is my subjective opinion; the former is a matter of objective fact.
A savant – or philosopher – who merely produces an undecidable proposition with no reasoning behind it convinces no one. If nothing else, a philosopher can (a) do something useful by knocking down faulty reasoning, or (b) do something harmful by producing faulty but convincing reasoning, until someone points out the flaw in the reasoning.
Your argument is wrong, and betrays a basic misunderstanding of formal logic.
Suppose this is the chain of reasoning:
A => B
And A is proven to be false. This invalidates the chain of reasoning, but it does not disprove the conclusion, B.
I don’t want another possible equivocation to cross us up; spell out, word-for-word, exactly what you mean by “A => B”. No shorthand. No colloquialisms. I want to make sure we’re on the same page.
The statement “the moon is made of cheese, except when you look at it or try to measure its properties” is not tantamount to “there’s some cheese on the table.” It is tantamount to a statement of unprovable, unfalsifiable opinion. It is a subjective opinion, with no objective basis in reality. Saying “there’s some cheese on the table” is verifiable as objective fact. Saying “there is a unicorn in my backyard that no one can see but me” is superficially a statement about objective reality (in the completely facile sense of including words that describe material things), but it is in fact subjective – no one can prove or disprove it – it is as subjective an assertion as “the cheese tastes good.”
a) I have to repeat myself: knocking down faulty reasoning has no utility if the proposition that the reasoning supports is undecidable.
b) Philosophers can absolutely do this
You seem to believe that “no one can prove or disprove it” makes a statement subjective. You disagree with, but make clear that you understand, my position: that, as per the dictionary definition, a statement counts so long as it describes material things in objective reality (as opposed to the subjective perception that, say, a given piece of cheese tastes good). The definitions I’ve cited make no mention of provability; what definition are you using to establish that, absent provability, an otherwise objective statement becomes subjective?
Not if folks sign on for the proposition because – not yet having spotted the flaw – they incorrectly believe the reasoning supports it to the point of making it decidable.
Why isn’t it just the simple case that something isn’t true unless it is proven? So if the reasoning for something is faulty, so is that conclusion (lacking an alternative proof.) It doesn’t make sense you can have a conclusion without a reasoning.
I am not sure how I could possibly be any clearer without sacrificing generality, but here is a specific example:
Now someone else comes along and proffers:
If you construct an axiomatic system of logic, there exist true, false, and undecidable theorems, regardless of whether proofs exist. This is a basic fact in mathematics/logic theory.
I don’t know how I could be any clearer, but I want you to spell your examples out in big fine grammatical sentences; use plain English rather than symbols, with nouns and verbs and possibly some adjectives plus maybe a bunch of adverbs.