Have there been any autistic savants of philosophy?

[The_Other_Waldo_Pepper]

@iamnotbatman

Is the perception of the color “red” objective just because I described it as being inside physical human brains? Of course not. Similarly, is the cheese-moon objective simply because it has been described as being a ‘thing’ in ‘physical’ outer space?

The cheese-moon either exists or doesn’t regardless of how you describe it. The question isn’t simply whether someone describes as being a thing in physical outer space, but whether it is a thing in physical outer space.

Where did I refer to the “mind-independent cheese-moon”? I have only referred to an imagined cheese-moon.

Well, there was the following:

[QUOTE=iamnotbatman]

[QUOTE=The Other Waldo Pepper]
Because the cheese-moon is precisely the opposite of that: it’s the moon as unperceived by any subject, and either exists or doesn’t as a matter of objective fact independent of subjective perception.
[/QUOTE]

It is not the moon as unperceived by any subject, it is the cheese-moon as unperceived by any subject.
[/QUOTE]

But leave that aside to look at the early back-and-forth:

[QUOTE=The Other Waldo Pepper]

[QUOTE=iamnotbatman]
Do you or do you not agree that the example I gave was:

1. philosophy (if not, please tell me what it is)
   and
2. subjective in nature
   [/QUOTE]

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.
[/QUOTE]

As far as I could tell, it wasn’t subjective – specifying that it struck me as an objective claim about a purely physical phenomenon. You replied as follows:

[QUOTE=The Other Waldo Pepper]

[QUOTE=iamnotbatman]
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.
[/QUOTE]

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.
[/QUOTE]

You didn’t object to – but, rather, copy-and-pasted – my explanation that the moon in question was purely physical; you merely replied that “any claim that is undecidable is by definition not objective.” If we haven’t yet been discussing the mind-independent moon – namely, the moon when unobserved and unmeasured and so on – then, by all means, let’s do so now; as I stated at the outset, what you’d written struck me as an objective claim about a purely physical phenomenon.

[BrainGlutton]

[SOUTH PARK: Stan runs into church in the middle of service, shouts:]

“Philosopher fight!”

[church empties]

[The_Other_Waldo_Pepper]

@iamnotbatman

I did not “flatly declare” anything. The exchange is quoted in the post you are responding to. I said:

It conveys an intelligible idea, but it is not meaningful. It has not function, use, or purpose.

That is a flat declaration: it conveys an intelligible idea, you wrote, but it is not meaningful. Never mind the new “translation”; what you wrote couldn’t be clearer.

[QUOTE=The Other Waldo Pepper]
Being listed second in an “A or B” form doesn’t make it invalid; it makes it optional rather than required.

As far as I am aware, this is false, though I can imagine it may be true for some dictionaries (cite?).

Actually, your statement here doesn’t make any sense. Consider this definition:

2. A crafty, sly, or clever person.

You are saying that the definition could not possibly read:

2. A clever, sly, or crafty person.

?
[/QUOTE]

Do you really not get this? Of course you could word it either way; wording it either way would make “clever” a perfectly acceptable option separable from the rest, and do likewise for “sly”, and for “crafty”, because wording it either way would make each listed element an optional alternative rather than requiring their combination; wording it with an “and” would require all of 'em. That’s what “or” does: it makes each alternative an option. And, sure, I’ll provide a cite, if you like;

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/or

–conjunction
1.
(used to connect words, phrases, or clauses representing alternatives): books or magazines; to be or not to be.

It goes on to cite the World English Dictionary:

— conj

1. used to join alternatives: apples or pears ; apples or pears or cheese ; apples, pears, or cheese

[iamnotbatman]

The Other Waldo Pepper – you’re contradicting all over yourself.

You wrote:

@The Other Waldo Pepper

Being listed second in an “A or B” form doesn’t make it invalid; it makes it optional rather than required.

AFAICT, your point being that if a definition is of the form “A or B”, then A is required, but B is optional.

Now you seem to be implicitly retracting your previous point while at the same time continuing to obfuscate, this time pretending that I don’t understand what “or” means. “A or B” means “A is required, or B is required”. It does not mean A is required, but B is optional.

[iamnotbatman]

@The_Other_Waldo_Pepper

That is a flat declaration: it conveys an intelligible idea, you wrote, but it is not meaningful. Never mind the new “translation”; what you wrote couldn’t be clearer.

Funny how you leave out the important bit:

I did not “flatly declare”, nor did I even imply, that “meaning” requires an extra element beyond intelligibly conveying intent.

Indeed what I wrote couldn’t be clearer, and I did not even imply that meaning requires an extra element beyond intelligibly conveying intent.

[iamnotbatman]

@The_Other_Waldo_Pepper

[…]what you’d written struck me as an objective claim about a purely physical phenomenon.

That is because you seem unable to grasp a basic point:

When you say the following:

@The_Other_Waldo_Pepper

The question isn’t simply whether someone describes as being a thing in physical outer space, but whether it is a thing in physical outer space.

The description of a thing questioned to exist in physical space is the same as asking whether “it is a thing in physical space”, since in order to ask whether it is a thing in physical space one has to describe it. I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt here – try to be more clear in your wording, and please respond again.

Also, you failed to respond to my analogy with the perception of color. It is a good analogy, and I would like to see you respond to it.

[iamnotbatman]

This has been delightful, Pepper, it really has. Got to to some traveling, but I’ll check back in a couple days. Before the ambien kicks in, I’ll throw down a little more:

I have cut-and-pasted from the first mention of the cheese-moon:

Proposition: The moon is made of cheese, except when you look at it or try to measure its properties

Do you agree or disagree that, implicit in the above statement is the fact that the cheese-moon has been imagined (if not – was it discovered? Was it observed? Whence did it come if not from imagination?)

If so, can we agree that said proposition might be more explicitly written:

I have imagined a moon that is made of cheese, except that it is objectively indistinguishable from the ordinary moon. I propose that this moon exists, because subjectively it has distinguishing characteristics from the ordinary moon.

Objectively, the cheese-moon is indistinguishable from the ordinary moon. Therefore can we agree that if one were to call the proposition objective, it would be referring to the ordinary moon, as opposed to the cheese-moon, since the two are objectively indistinguishable? And can we agree that if the proposition reduces to a mere proposition about the existence of the ordinary moon, then of course the proposition is objective, and it is irrelevant to my point?

If so, then can we agree that the cheese-moon proposition can only be objective if it is trivial – ie referring to the ordinary moon rather than a separate moon with distinguishing characteristics?

On the other hand, subjectively, the cheese-moon is distinguishable from the ordinary moon. Imagination allows it. It is this distinguishing characteristic made possible only within one’s imagination that allows the proposition to be well-formed.

[Frylock]

@iamnotbatman

I have cut-and-pasted from the first mention of the cheese-moon:

Proposition: The moon is made of cheese, except when you look at it or try to measure its properties

Do you agree or disagree that, implicit in the above statement is the fact that the cheese-moon has been imagined (if not – was it discovered? Was it observed? Whence did it come if not from imagination?)

Haha, now I interrupt your conversation.

On the standard usage of “implicit” the answer is “no.” For a fact to be implicit in a statement (standardly) it should be either a presupposition or an implication of the statement.

A presupposition is another statement which must be true in order for the present statement to be true. But it need not be true that the cheese-moon be in my imagination in order for “moon is cheese when unobserved” to be true. “Moon is cheese when unobserved” could be true independently of whether its origin is in my imagination or not.

An implication is another statement which follows (with certainty or probability, it doesn’t really matter in this case, though usually a deductive implication is the kind meant by calling something “implicit”) from the present statement. But from “moon is cheese when unobserved” it does not follow (neither with certainty nor probability) that the cheese-moon is imagined by me. It is perfectly consistent that “moon is cheese when unobserved” might be true even though neither I nor you nor anyone else may ever have imagined such a thing.

So much for “implicit.” But what you’re trying to say, IMO, is that since there can be no evidence for a statement like “moon is cheese when unobserved,” it follows that in order to account for what would cause a person to make the claim, we can’t look around in the world for something corresponding to the claim. Instead, we have to “look” in the guy’s imagination or in the imagination of some person who related the claim to him (or someone who related it to someone who related it to him and so on).

It’s not really correct usage to call the one claim “implicit” in the other. But that doesn’t really matter. I think I understand what you’re saying, and what you’re saying is right. The only reason I said anything about whether it’s right to call this the relation of “implicitness” is because one who applies that term here might get confused when trying to assimilate the concept intended here with the concept intended in other, correct uses of the word “implicit”.

For similar reasons, it’s not right to call the other sentence you gave in italics a “more explicit” version. Your “more explicit” version has different truth-conditions than those intended by any plausible utterer your original version, but a “more explicit” version of a sentence should have the same truth conditions as those intended by the speaker or writer of the original version of the sentence.

[The_Other_Waldo_Pepper]

@iamnotbatman

Being listed second in an “A or B” form doesn’t make it invalid; it makes it optional rather than required.

AFAICT, your point being that if a definition is of the form “A or B”, then A is required, but B is optional.

No, my point wasn’t that A is required; it’s that A is optional if you choose B, and B is optional if you choose A. Re-read it in that light and see if it makes sense.

The description of a thing questioned to exist in physical space is the same as asking whether “it is a thing in physical space”, since in order to ask whether it is a thing in physical space one has to describe it. I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt here – try to be more clear in your wording, and please respond again.

If someone merely imagines the idea of a physical object, said imagined idea (which is mind-dependent and exists as in a human brain) is quite different from said physical object (which may or may not exist, as a mind-independent entity). Otherwise, what Frylock said.

Also, you failed to respond to my analogy with the perception of color. It is a good analogy, and I would like to see you respond to it.

“Is the perception of the color ‘red’ objective just because I described it as being inside physical human brains? Of course not. Similarly, is the cheese-moon objective simply because it has been described as being a ‘thing’ in ‘physical’ outer space?”

The perception of the color ‘red’ is like the imagined idea of of the cheese-moon: mind-dependent, existing as an idea in the brain, and so on. It is not like a physical cheese-moon, which may or may not exist as a mind-independent entity out there in physical space.

(Or, as I’d put it in my response to your analogy: “The cheese-moon either exists or doesn’t regardless of how you describe it. The question isn’t simply whether someone describes as being a thing in physical outer space, but whether it is a thing in physical outer space.”)

[iamnotbatman]

@Frylock

Haha, now I interrupt your conversation.

On the standard usage of “implicit” the answer is “no.” For a fact to be implicit in a statement (standardly) it should be either a presupposition or an implication of the statement.

A presupposition is another statement which must be true in order for the present statement to be true. But it need not be true that the cheese-moon be in my imagination in order for “moon is cheese when unobserved” to be true. “Moon is cheese when unobserved” could be true independently of whether its origin is in my imagination or not.

An implication is another statement which follows (with certainty or probability, it doesn’t really matter in this case, though usually a deductive implication is the kind meant by calling something “implicit”) from the present statement. But from “moon is cheese when unobserved” it does not follow (neither with certainty nor probability) that the cheese-moon is imagined by me. It is perfectly consistent that “moon is cheese when unobserved” might be true even though neither I nor you nor anyone else may ever have imagined such a thing.

So much for “implicit.” But what you’re trying to say, IMO, is that since there can be no evidence for a statement like “moon is cheese when unobserved,” it follows that in order to account for what would cause a person to make the claim, we can’t look around in the world for something corresponding to the claim. Instead, we have to “look” in the guy’s imagination or in the imagination of some person who related the claim to him (or someone who related it to someone who related it to him and so on).

It’s not really correct usage to call the one claim “implicit” in the other. But that doesn’t really matter. I think I understand what you’re saying, and what you’re saying is right. The only reason I said anything about whether it’s right to call this the relation of “implicitness” is because one who applies that term here might get confused when trying to assimilate the concept intended here with the concept intended in other, correct uses of the word “implicit”.

For similar reasons, it’s not right to call the other sentence you gave in italics a “more explicit” version. Your “more explicit” version has different truth-conditions than those intended by any plausible utterer your original version, but a “more explicit” version of a sentence should have the same truth conditions as those intended by the speaker or writer of the original version of the sentence.

Thanks for this clear response. I appreciate that even though you think my use of the implicit was wrong, you took the time to understand what I meant and agree that it was correct.

I have to say, however, that I don’t understand your assessment of the word implicit. The deduction here:

@Frylock

since there can be no evidence for a statement like “moon is cheese when unobserved,” it follows that in order to account for what would cause a person to make the claim, we can’t look around in the world for something corresponding to the claim. Instead, we have to “look” in the guy’s imagination or in the imagination of some person who related the claim to him

Is consistent with the definition of implicit you provided:

@Frylock

An implication is another statement which follows (with certainty or probability, it doesn’t really matter in this case, though usually a deductive implication is the kind meant by calling something “implicit”) from the present statement.

Anyways, got to go…

[Frylock]

@iamnotbatman

Thanks for this clear response. I appreciate that even though you think my use of the implicit was wrong, you took the time to understand what I meant and agree that it was correct.

I have to say, however, that I don’t understand your assessment of the word implicit. The deduction here:

Is consistent with the definition of implicit you provided:

Anyways, got to go…

A = “In order to account for what would cause a person to make the claim that the moon is cheese when unobserved, we can’t look around in the world for something corresponding to the claim.”

B = “There can be no evidence for a statement like ‘The moon is cheese when unobserved.’”

C = “The moon is cheese when unobserved.”

D = “The moon is not cheese when unobserved.”

I said that A follows from B.* But I wouldn’t say that A follows from C. So I wouldn’t agree that A is implicit in C in any standard sense. Also, I wouldn’t say A follows from D, so I wouldn’t agree that A is implicit in D in any standard sense.

*Actually, I’d hedge around that claim, but doing so here would probably just be a distraction.

[iamnotbatman]

@Frylock

A = “In order to account for what would cause a person to make the claim that the moon is cheese when unobserved, we can’t look around in the world for something corresponding to the claim.”

B = “There can be no evidence for a statement like ‘The moon is cheese when unobserved.’”

C = “The moon is cheese when unobserved.”

D = “The moon is not cheese when unobserved.”

I said that A follows from B.* But I wouldn’t say that A follows from C. So I wouldn’t agree that A is implicit in C in any standard sense. Also, I wouldn’t say A follows from D, so I wouldn’t agree that A is implicit in D in any standard sense.

*Actually, I’d hedge around that claim, but doing so here would probably just be a distraction.

But does not B follow from C? By definition of unobserved in statement C? Stating X has property Y when unobserved logically implies that there can be no evidence for that statement. By the transitive property, A follows from C.

[boarding plane … … don’t think it has wifi though :(]

[bachcole]

I am a philosophical savant. Those prophets and saints that you speak of have higher consciousness. They have less mental impressions of ego and desires, and thus their consciousness is less burdened than ours is. Trust me, being a philosophical savant is not necessarily a blessing nor is it widely appreciated, because everyone has an opinion and they fancy that their opinion is right. Part of being a philosophical savant is the ability to appreciate other people’s philosophy, perspective. Normal philosophical types and normal people don’t do that; they fancy that their philosophy is the true philosophy.

[Frylock]

@iamnotbatman

But does not B follow from C? By definition of unobserved in statement C? Stating X has property Y when unobserved logically implies that there can be no evidence for that statement. By the transitive property, A follows from C.

[boarding plane … … don’t think it has wifi though :(]

Having been reminded of this thread, I would like to respond to the above, but having read my post immediately prior to this, I have no friggen clue what I was talking about.

I will need to reread the thread…

[Annie-Xmas]

Bela Lugosi?

[Frylock]

@iamnotbatman

But does not B follow from C? By definition of unobserved in statement C? Stating X has property Y when unobserved logically implies that there can be no evidence for that statement. By the transitive property, A follows from C.

Okay, I’ve gathered my wits.

“X is Y when unobserved” doesn’t imply “There can be no evidence that X is Y when unobserved.” For the moon is made of rock when unobserved, and there is plenty of evidence that the moon is made of rock when unobserved.

[astro]

@bachcole

I am a philosophical savant. Those prophets and saints that you speak of have higher consciousness. They have less mental impressions of ego and desires, and thus their consciousness is less burdened than ours is. Trust me, being a philosophical savant is not necessarily a blessing nor is it widely appreciated, because everyone has an opinion and they fancy that their opinion is right. Part of being a philosophical savant is the ability to appreciate other people’s philosophy, perspective. Normal philosophical types and normal people don’t do that; they fancy that their philosophy is the true philosophy.

Seems like that would be more of a philosophical Epicurean than a philosophical savant.

[iamnotbatman]

@Frylock

Okay, I’ve gathered my wits.

“X is Y when unobserved” doesn’t imply “There can be no evidence that X is Y when unobserved.” For the moon is made of rock when unobserved, and there is plenty of evidence that the moon is made of rock when unobserved.

Again, by the definition of ‘unobserved’ I think you are wrong. There is zero evidence that the moon is made of rock when unobserved, at least by the definition I am working with. The moon is a macroscopic object. As such, the impacts of meteoroids, the reflection of the light from the sun and stars back towards earth, etc, generate correlations with the environment and therefore decoherence of the wave function; this means that the moon is constantly being observed in the sense that we can follow backwards lines of causation and correlation to make inferences about its past. Suppose we can infer that the moon was made of rock at times t1 and t2 through said observations, but there are gaps of observation between these two times. Then, by the definition of observation, there is no evidence that the moon was made of rock between times t1 and t2 unless you can find an observation at time t_n such that t1 < t_n < t2.

[Frylock]

@iamnotbatman

Again, by the definition of ‘unobserved’ I think you are wrong. There is zero evidence that the moon is made of rock when unobserved, at least by the definition I am working with. The moon is a macroscopic object. As such, the impacts of meteoroids, the reflection of the light from the sun and stars back towards earth, etc, generate correlations with the environment and therefore decoherence of the wave function; this means that the moon is constantly being observed in the sense that we can follow backwards lines of causation and correlation to make inferences about its past.

Making an inference based on observation is not a kind of observation. But your argument here (and in what follows) appears to presume otherwise. Is that your intention?

Suppose we can infer that the moon was made of rock at times t1 and t2 through said observations, but there are gaps of observation between these two times.

I can only make sense of your use of the phrase “gap of observation” here if I ascribe to you a notion that inference based on direct observation is itself a kind of observation. Again, am I understanding you correctly?

Then, by the definition of observation,

Which is?

there is no evidence that the moon was made of rock between times t1 and t2 unless you can find an observation at time t_n such that t1 < t_n < t2.

If the moon is not rock when unobserved, the science is impossible. Whatdyathinkathat, then?

(Because if it’s not rock when unobserved, by the logic of the argument leading to that conclusion, the moon could be anything when unobserved (or even nonexistent). But tha means that when unobserved, the moon (or whatever is in its place) could do anything. There are no limits to what it might do other than the bare limits concomitant with physical existence. This, in turn, means it is impossible to predict what might happen in the spatial region around the moon. That makes science literally impossible to carry out.)

[Sampiro]

Jeremy Bentham was undeniably brilliant but a notorious eccentric who did things like hopping on one leg or skipping when he walked, not to be silly but more of an “it feels good so I’ll do it” thing. He most famously requested his dead body be preserved and attend meetings of his department, which it did for well over a century. No idea if that’s indicative of autism but it definitely speaks to extreme self indulgence.
Bentham’s remains- the head is made of wax due to the decay of the real item, which is retained in a special case; the skeleton and some of the skin are under the clothes along with a lot of padding. To this day he attends meetings and is marked “Present but not voting”.