SCORECARD! Can't tell the players without a scorecard!

[merjet]

Merlin:

~ He wasn't? Thanx for that tid. Interesting. Will check it out. Uh, so?

~ 2nd question: what do you mean by 'so-called' re Mill's methods? They weren't actually methods, or, that Hume covered 3 of them?

~ 3rd question: why don't we refer to them as "Hume's methods (with Mill's 'supplements' "?

1. You're welcome.

2. I used "so-called" because Mill's name is most attached to them, even though he did not originate at least three of them.

3. We (you, I and a few others) could, but the tag "Mill's methods" is quite entrenched (and shorter).

[BaalChatzaf]

Baal:

~ No one said that the end product of concept formation was set in stone (least of all any 'open-ended' concept "O-ist"). Relevence of this point of yours is...?

I agree. The fact that a concept is open ended is what makes $concept-formation different from induction. Induction (that is enumerative induction) produces a universally quantified assertion which is either true or false, namely the generalization from the particular instances. Should a refuting instance be found later on, the generalization is refuted. It is gone, dead, blown up. On the other hand if an instance that does not quite fit the concept as originally conceived is found, the concept is modified to handle the variance. That is what my example with the Taco Belle ™ dog is all about. So the two processes, $concept-formation and induction are quite distinct. The end results are different and the result of a variant instance is different.

Ba'al Chatzaf

:NB: I precede O'ist locutions with a dollar sign ("$" ) to indicate the peculiar neologisms and non-standard usage by the O'ists, this to prevent confusion between such locutions and the standard usage of the terms in the non-O'ist community.

Edited September 22, 2007 by BaalChatzaf

[Ellen Stuttle]

I've taken the liberty of copying posts #312 (REB) and #313 (Bob K.) to the new thread started by Daniel here. Bob, I think it would also be helpful to getting discussion going on a clearer basis if you'd copy your post #327 to that thread.

Ellen

___

Edited September 22, 2007 by Ellen Stuttle

[Ellen Stuttle]

I've expanded the quotes from Rand on "essence"/"essential characteristic" which I first posted in my #230 (here). I think this series of quotes makes abundantly clear that she thought of the differentia ("rational" in the case of her definition of "man") as identifying the "essence"/"essential characteristic" of a concept. I think the quotes also make abundantly clear why Popper would have considered her approach, along with Aristotle's, "essentialism."

Here's another quote which well illustrates her sharp divergence from Popper on the nature and role of definitions:

[emphasis in original]

The truth or falsehood of all of man's conclusions, inferences, thought and knowledge rests on the truth or falsehood of his definitions.

I'll post this on the "Two Kinds of 'Induction'" thread as well.

An objective definition, valid for all men, is one that designates the essential distinguishing characteristic(s) and genus of the existents subsumed under a given concept--according to all the relevant knowledge available at that stage of mankind's development. [iTOE, 61 original; 46 expanded]

[Notice she says two parts there: the essential characteristic AND the genus; thus she isn't considering the genus to be the essential distinguishing characteristic.]

The rules of correct definition are derived from the process of concept-formation. The units of a concept were differentiated--by means of a distinguishing charactersitic(s)--from other existents possessing a commensurable characteristic, a "Conceptual Common Denominator." A definition follows the same principle: it specifies the distinguishing characteristic(s) of the units, and indicates the category of existents from which they were differentiated.

The distinguishing characteristic(s) of the units becomes the differentia of the concept's definition; the existents possessing a "Conceptual Common Denominator" become the genus.

[....] The differentia isolates the units of a concept from all other existents; the genus indicates their connection to a wider group of existents.

[in later quotes she says the essential characteristic differentiates from ALL other existents; obviously the genus doesn't do that but instead, as she says, connects to a wider group.]

[....] In the definition of man ("A rational animal"), "rational" is the differentia, "animal" is the genus. [iTOE 53 original, 41-42 expanded]

When [the maturing person (she says at about the time of adolescence)] grasps that man's distinctive characteristic is his type of consciousness--a consciousness able to abstract, to form concepts, to apprehend reality by a process of reason--he reaches the one and only valid definition of man, within the context of his knowledge and of all mankind's knowledge to date: "A rational animal."

[....]

Now observe, on the above example [that of the stages she describes in defining "man"], the process of determining an essential characteristic: the rule of fundamentality. When a given group of existents has more than one characteristic distinguishing it from other existents, man must observe the relationships among these various characteristics and discover the one on which all the others (or the greatest number of others) depend, i.e., the fundamental characteristic without which the others would not be possible. This fundamental characteristic is the essential distinguishing characteristic of the existents involved, and the proper defining characteristic of the concept.

Metaphysically, a fundamental characteristic is that distinctive characteristic which makes the greatest number of others possible; epistemologically, it is the one that explains the greatest number of others.

For instance, one could observe that man is the only animal who speaks English, wears wristwatches, flies airplanes, manufactures lipstick, studies geometry, reads newspapers, writes poems, darns socks, etc. None of these is an essential characteristic: none of them explains the others; none of them applies to all men; omit any or all of them, assume a man who has never done any of these things, and he will still be a man. But observe that all these activities (and innumerable others) require a conceptual grasp of reality, that an animal would not be able to understand them, that they are the expressions and consequences of man's rational faculty, that an organism without that faculty would [not be a man--and you will know why man's rational faculty is his essential distinguishing and defining charactersitic.

If definitions are contextual, how does one determine an objective definition valid for all men? It is determined according to the widest context of knowledge available to man on the subjects relevant to the units of a given concept.

[....]

An objective definition, valid for all men, is one that disignates the essential distinguishing characteristic(s) and genus of the existents subsumed under a given concept--according to all the relevant knowledge available at that stage of mankind's development.

[....]

This does not mean that every man has to be a universal scholar and that every discovery of science affects the definitions of concepts: when science discovers some previously unknown aspects of reality, it forms new concepts to identify them (e.g., "electron"); but insofar as science is concerned with the intensive study of previously known and conceptualized existents, its discoveries are identified by means of conceptual sub-categories. For instance, man is classified biologically in several sub-categories of "animal," such as "mammal," etc. But this does not alter the fact that rationality is his essential distinguishing and defining characteristic, and that "animal" is the wider genus to which he belongs.

[iTOE, ?-59 original, 44-47 expanded]

Let us note, at this point, the radical difference between Aristotle's view of concepts and the Objectivist view, particularly in regard to the issue of essential characteristics.

[Popper of course, had he known of Rand's theories, wouldn't have considered this a "radical difference"; both Aristotle and Rand propose the idea of "essences."]

It is Aristotle who first formulated the principles of correct definition. It is Aristotle who identified the fact that only concretes exist. But Aristotle held that definitions refer to metaphysical essences, which exist in concretes as a special element or formative power, and he held that the process of concept-formation depends on a kind of direct intuition by which man's mind grasps these essences and forms concepts accordingly.

Aristotle regarded "essence" as metaphysical; Objectivism regards it as epistemological.

Objectivism holds that the essence of a concept is that fundamental characteristic(s) of its units on which the greatest number of other characteristics depend, and which distinguishes these units from all other existents within the field of man's knowledge. Thus the essence of a concept is determined contextually and may be altered with the growth of man's knowledge. The metaphysical referent of man's concepts is not a special, separate metaphysical essence, but the total of the facts of reality he has observed, and this total determines which characteristics of a given group of existents he designates as essential. An essential characteristic is factual, in the sense that it does exist, does determine other characteristics and does distinguish a group of existents from all others; it is epistemological in the sense that the classification of "essential characteristic" is a device of man's method of cognition--a means of classifying, condensing and integrating an ever-growing body of knowledge. [iTOE, 68 original, 52 expanded]

___

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Ellen,

Since you repeated your previous post from the thread in the Epistemology section, here is an observation I have about it (posted over there).

[Notice she says two parts there: the essential characteristic AND the genus; thus she isn't considering the genus to be the essential distinguishing characteristic.]

Ellen,

(sigh)

Some day you will get it. The essential distinguishing characteristic is a characteristic included in the genus that can be measured, and the way it is measured is what makes it stand out from other members of the genus.

The distinguishing characteristic is the differentia, so it is obvious "she isn't considering the genus to be the essential distinguishing characteristic." Rand defined definition to consist of differentia and genus. This is getting pretty elementary.

A concept has (among other things):

1. A CDD (conceptual common denominator), which is one or more commensurable characteristics, meaning some feature or features you can measure that sets that category apart from other things that exist.

2. A distinguishing characteristic, which is measurable according to the CDD (or at least some part of it).

A definition has:

A genus that includes the CDD, (i.e., not is the CDD)

A differentia, which is the same as the distinguishing characteristic of the concept.

(See ITOE, p. 41) I admit that Rand is not clear about the relationship between the CDD and the distinguishing characteristic, but it is strongly implied. Peikoff is a bit more explicit (OPAR, p. 87).

Miss Rand proceeds to develop the concept of the Conceptual Common Denominator (for short, the CCD). The CCD is "the characteristic(s) reducible to a unit of measurement, by means of which man differentiates two or more existents from other existents possessing it."(17) For example, one can differentiate tables from chairs or beds, because all these groups possess a commensurable characteristic, shape. This CCD, in turn, determines what feature must be chosen as the distinguishing characteristic of the concept "table": tables are distinguished by a specific kind of shape, which represents a specific category or set of geometric measurements within the characteristic of shape—as against beds, e.g., whose shapes are encompassed by a different set of measurements.

[Reference footnote "17" is given as ITOE, p. 15.]

Notice the phrase, "This CCD, in turn, determines what feature must be chosen as the distinguishing characteristic..." This means that you have to be able to measure the distinguishing characteristic by the CDD or one of the standards in it.

Just for the record, in case there is any confusion on measurement, here is a quote from Will Thomas's essay Ayn Rand’s Theory of Concepts: A Brief Overview (p. 7).

Although Rand uses cardinal measurement as her paradigm examples (“length” and “table”), she intends the term “measurement” to apply to a wide variety of means of objectively comparing two or more existents. Mental states, for example, may be measured by “the scope of factual material involved in a given cognitive process and by the length of the conceptual chain required to deal with that material.” She states that “concepts pertaining to evaluation” maybe be measured ordinally, in a process she terms “teleological measurement,” which grades or ranks its objects in terms of “the degree to which they achieve or frustrate” some goal or end.

Also, "essential distinguishing characteristic" is not "essence." Here is Rand's definition of "table," in ITOE (p. 41):

An item of furniture, consisting of a flat, level surface and supports, intended to support other, smaller objects...

Genus - Furniture.

Differentia - Flat, level surface and supports, intended to support other, smaller objects.

This is not "tableness." Tableness would be an essence in essentialism.

What characteristics can be measured here? Surfaces and supports (i.e., shape), and purpose. All items of furniture have these. That would be the CDD. Will Thomas does not include "purpose" or "function" in his chart in the Appendix (p. 10) of his essay linked above, but function can be measured in ordinal terms to other furniture (supporting smaller, nor larger objects), and even teleological measurements can be made like supporting objects, not people, if "importance of things to support" is the standard.

Maybe the following from the workshops in ITOE will better show the difference with essentialism and Objectivism (ITOE, 2nd, p. 139):

Prof. A: So the Aristotelians thought there really was an attribute of blueness as such—like a kind of little banner sticking up from blue objects saying "blue." Whereas the Objectivist position is that there is a Conceptual Common Denominator uniting a red and two blues, and that the two blues are close together on the measurement range within that Conceptual Common Denominator, and that all the different shades of blue can be integrated because they fall within that range.

AR: Exactly.

Michael

[Ellen Stuttle]

Ellen,

Since you repeated your previous post from the thread in the Epistemology section, here is an observation I have about it (posted over there).

Responded over there (See).

Ellen

___

[John Dailey]

Merlin:

~ You say, in answer to my question (about "Mill's methods" vs "Hume's 'Methods'")...

2. I used "so-called" because Mill's name is most attached to them, even though he did not originate at least three of the.

3. We (you and I and a few others) could, but the tag "Mill's methods" is quite entrenced (and shorter).

~ My question was, well, 1/2 rhetorical. I see good reasons for such; am surprised you don't. As I see things, Hume didn't consider such as actual, worthwhile 'methods', so much as, to use your phrase, 'so-called' ones that others mis-justifiably used to induce causality in reality. He identified these 3, but as mere 'appearance' useability, of no real 'induction'-value, correct? --- Mill, o-t-other-h, pinned them down (+ his 2 identified additions) as necessary and sufficient in actual scientific methodology.

~ A difference of 'metaphysics' 'twixt the two, I'd say, is what makes them Mill's rather than Hume's. What say you?

LLAP

J:D

[John Dailey]

Merlin:

~ (Couldn't fit this statement on the previous) My 'question' was about the 'why' of what you clearly point out as the historical 'attachment.'

LLAP

J:D