A Critique of Ayn Rand's Contextual Theory of Knowledge

[George H. Smith]

I agree with the savage and the sum or the syllogism example, however--vox flatus enim.

Okay, let's be absolutely clear about this....

Suppose a person has merely memorized some syllogisms without any understanding of why they are valid. He says: All men are mortal; Socrates is a man; therefore, Socrates is mortal."

Would you say that this syllogism is not a syllogism at all? -- that it is neither valid nor invalid, but completely meaningless?

If so, please explain.

Ghs

[kiaer.ts]

I agree with the savage and the sum or the syllogism example, however--vox flatus enim.

Okay, let's be absolutely clear about this....

Suppose a person has merely memorized some syllogisms without any understanding of why they are valid. He says: All men are mortal; Socrates is a man; therefore, Socrates is mortal."

Would you say that this syllogism is not a syllogism at all? -- that it is neither valid nor invalid, but completely meaningless?

If so, please explain.

Ghs

Syllogisms don't instantiate themselves.

A syllogism, as a syllogism, is an argument. An argument is an inherently intentional existent. The savage mnemonist would not be making an argument. He would be making sounds, sounds that he might come at some point to understand can represent an argument if uttered by a human with a certain understanding and a certain intent. But without understanding, mere sounds without actual denotation. Vox flatus.

Now, someone hearing those sounds might comprehend their connotation, and might, imagine a context in which the words make sense. But that's about as significant a fact as the story in On the Beach where, thinking they have heard a morse code message from a survivor of the northern hemisphere nuclear war, the submarine crew finds a shutter banging on a transmitter that randomly typed out a word. It is an immoral waste of time to interview babbling madmen and to search the manuscripts of monkeys for messages.

Edited September 15, 2010 by Ted Keer

[George H. Smith]

I agree with the savage and the sum or the syllogism example, however--vox flatus enim.

Okay, let's be absolutely clear about this....

Suppose a person has merely memorized some syllogisms without any understanding of why they are valid. He says: All men are mortal; Socrates is a man; therefore, Socrates is mortal."

Would you say that this syllogism is not a syllogism at all? -- that it is neither valid nor invalid, but completely meaningless?

If so, please explain.

Ghs

Syllogisms don't instantiate themselves.

A syllogism, as a syllogism, is an argument. An argument is an inherently intentional existent. The savage mnemonist would not be making an argument. He would be making sounds, sounds that he might come at some point to understand can represent an argument if uttered by a human with a certain understanding and a certain intent. But without understanding, mere sounds without actual denotation. Vox flatus.

Now, someone hearing those sounds might comprehend their connotation, and might, imagine a context in which the words make sense. But that's about as significant a fact as the story in On the Beach where, thinking they have heard a morse code message from a survivor of the northern hemisphere nuclear war, the submarine crew finds a shutter banging on a transmitter that randomly typed out a word. It is an immoral waste of time to interview babbling madmen and to search the manuscripts of monkeys for messages.

I understand your point, but you haven't addressed my question. I am not talking about Peikoff's "savage" who may not understand the words he has memorized. I am talking about a relatively normal person who has memorized a few syllogisms and who understands the words he is using, but who has no understanding of syllogistic reasoning. When he says "All men are mortal" and "Socrates is a man," he knows what these sentences mean, but he cannot begin to explain why the conclusion "Therefore, Socrates is mortal" necessarily follows from them. From his viewpoint, these are simply sentences that are strung together with no logical connections.

So again: Would a syllogism when uttered by this person have meaning qua syllogism, if he only understands them qua unrelated sentences? Could his uttering of the Socrates syllogism be said to be valid, even though he has no notion of what "valid" means?

Ghs

[sjw]

Sounds like the validation of induction by bypassing the problem completely--that is, put X number of particulars into a context and go with those only.

--Brant

Yes, like a tautology.

Shayne

[kiaer.ts]

I agree with the savage and the sum or the syllogism example, however--vox flatus enim.

Okay, let's be absolutely clear about this....

Suppose a person has merely memorized some syllogisms without any understanding of why they are valid. He says: All men are mortal; Socrates is a man; therefore, Socrates is mortal."

Would you say that this syllogism is not a syllogism at all? -- that it is neither valid nor invalid, but completely meaningless?

If so, please explain.

Ghs

Syllogisms don't instantiate themselves.

A syllogism, as a syllogism, is an argument. An argument is an inherently intentional existent. The savage mnemonist would not be making an argument. He would be making sounds, sounds that he might come at some point to understand can represent an argument if uttered by a human with a certain understanding and a certain intent. But without understanding, mere sounds without actual denotation. Vox flatus.

Now, someone hearing those sounds might comprehend their connotation, and might, imagine a context in which the words make sense. But that's about as significant a fact as the story in On the Beach where, thinking they have heard a morse code message from a survivor of the northern hemisphere nuclear war, the submarine crew finds a shutter banging on a transmitter that randomly typed out a word. It is an immoral waste of time to interview babbling madmen and to search the manuscripts of monkeys for messages.

I understand your point, but you haven't addressed my question. I am not talking about Peikoff's "savage" who may not understand the words he has memorized. I am talking about a relatively normal person who has memorized a few syllogisms and who understands the words he is using, but who has no understanding of syllogistic reasoning. When he says "All men are mortal" and "Socrates is a man," he knows what these sentences mean, but he cannot begin to explain why the conclusion "Therefore, Socrates is mortal" necessarily follows from them. From his viewpoint, these are simply sentences that are strung together with no logical connections.

So again: Would a syllogism when uttered by this person have meaning qua syllogism, if he only understands them qua unrelated sentences? Could his uttering of the Socrates syllogism be said to be valid, even though he has no notion of what "valid" means?

Ghs

Well, again, a syllogism, per se, is an argument, a logically connected series of premises meant to support a conclusion. The intentionality is essential. Arguments are not the sort of thing that would exist if people didn't want to support conclusions by showing the connections by ideas.

Now it happens that communicated ideas are necessarily embodied in some perceivable form: spoken or written words or gestures or symbols or pictures or so forth. And since these forms are perceivable, they must be physically embodied, and hence as physical objects or events they take on a material existence of their own. But as material objects they are just material objects - -without an understanding mind with some intentional stance they have material form but no intellectual substance.

Your logically illiterate mnemonist is making noises. This is physically true even if he is brain dead. He may also be uttering words, opposed to nonsense syllables, assuming he is voicing terms whose meaning he comprehends. He may be uttering sentences, if they are complete ideas which he comprehends. But if he does not understand the connections between the sentences, he cannot be said actually to be making an argument himself, even if the words have the form of an argument.

Now, since we are not mind readers with a collective consciousness, we normally attribute to a speakers utterances the meanings which we ourselves would give to their words. This is normally a justified and successful procedure. But this is an assumption on our part, not an intrinsic, mind independent fact. Since we normally want to communicate cooperatively, we normally guess at the other's meaning and attribute to the sounds they are making the meaning which we would likely have if we were making the same sounds. This is basically a type of wish. We wish to live in a world of people who make sense and who mean what they say. We wish to be able to take people at their word. In most cases the desire is reasonable, and things work out. We do this so automatically that when we encounter such Trojan horse forms as "How can we pay for these tax cuts?" or "This sentence is false" we not only accept them at face value, we tow the destructive invaders inside our defenses ourselves.

But in reality, all that exists are the noises, the movements of the hand and face, the scribbles. And hence not only do we on occasion encounter sounds with the form of words or sentences, but without the substance of thoughts behind them, we also encounter jokes, and irony, and word play, and we encounter cloaked attacks on the conscious faculty, sounds made by mind parasites that embody lies and newspeak, and anti-concepts and utter nonsense.

[George H. Smith]

I understand your point, but you haven't addressed my question. I am not talking about Peikoff's "savage" who may not understand the words he has memorized. I am talking about a relatively normal person who has memorized a few syllogisms and who understands the words he is using, but who has no understanding of syllogistic reasoning. When he says "All men are mortal" and "Socrates is a man," he knows what these sentences mean, but he cannot begin to explain why the conclusion "Therefore, Socrates is mortal" necessarily follows from them. From his viewpoint, these are simply sentences that are strung together with no logical connections.

So again: Would a syllogism when uttered by this person have meaning qua syllogism, if he only understands them qua unrelated sentences? Could his uttering of the Socrates syllogism be said to be valid, even though he has no notion of what "valid" means?

Ghs

Well, again, a syllogism, per se, is an argument, a logically connected series of premises meant to support a conclusion. The intentionality is essential. Arguments are not the sort of thing that would exist if people didn't want to support conclusions by showing the connections by ideas.

Now it happens that communicated ideas are necessarily embodied in some perceivable form: spoken or written words or gestures or symbols or pictures or so forth. And since these forms are perceivable, they must be physically embodied, and hence as physical objects or events they take on a material existence of their own. But as material objects they are just material objects - -without an understanding mind with some intentional stance they have material form but no intellectual substance.

Your logically illiterate mnemonist is making noises. This is physically true even if he is brain dead. He may also be uttering words, opposed to nonsense syllables, assuming he is voicing terms whose meaning he comprehends. He may be uttering sentences, if they are complete ideas which he comprehends. But if he does not understand the connections between the sentences, he cannot be said actually to be making an argument himself, even if the words have the form of an argument.

If a logically illiterate person understands the sentences he is uttering, then he is not just "making noises." He is uttering coherent sentences, while failing to understand their logical connections, i.e., how they can be integrated to form a valid deductive argument.

This is a relatively minor objection, however, since you obviously understand the essential points, as illustrated by the rest of your paragraph. So let's continue...,

Now, since we are not mind readers with a collective consciousness, we normally attribute to a speakers utterances the meanings which we ourselves would give to their words. This is normally a justified and successful procedure. But this is an assumption on our part, not an intrinsic, mind independent fact. Since we normally want to communicate cooperatively, we normally guess at the other's meaning and attribute to the sounds they are making the meaning which we would likely have if we were making the same sounds. This is basically a type of wish. We wish to live in a world of people who make sense and who mean what they say. We wish to be able to take people at their word. In most cases the desire is reasonable, and things work out. We do this so automatically that when we encounter such Trojan horse forms as "How can we pay for these tax cuts?" or "This sentence is false" we not only accept them at face value, we tow the destructive invaders inside our defenses ourselves.

But in reality, all that exists are the noises, the movements of the hand and face, the scribbles. And hence not only do we on occasion encounter sounds with the form of words or sentences, but without the substance of thoughts behind them, we also encounter jokes, and irony, and word play, and we encounter cloaked attacks on the conscious faculty, sounds made by mind parasites that embody lies and newspeak, and anti-concepts and utter nonsense.

This is a very thoughtful response, and I thank you for it. Before responding in detail, however, I want to see if you agree with the implications that I would draw from your conclusions.

Suppose you understand syllogistic reasoning but I do not. Would you then say that the same Socrates syllogism is valid for you but not for me?

This kind of relativism would also extend to true propositions. Suppose we both understand the meaning of a true proposition, but you also know the reasons why it is true, whereas I have no inkling of why it is true. Would you then say that the same proposition is true for you but not for me?

I am not trying to score polemical points here, honestly. There is a logic to your position, but before exploring it in more detail, I want to see if we agree about its implications, which I would describe as a relativistic theory of knowledge. Indeed, if you read my excerpt from Why Atheism? you will see that I objected to the Peikovian approach precisely because it lands us in epistemological relativism.

Ghs

[kiaer.ts]

I understand your point, but you haven't addressed my question. I am not talking about Peikoff's "savage" who may not understand the words he has memorized. I am talking about a relatively normal person who has memorized a few syllogisms and who understands the words he is using, but who has no understanding of syllogistic reasoning. When he says "All men are mortal" and "Socrates is a man," he knows what these sentences mean, but he cannot begin to explain why the conclusion "Therefore, Socrates is mortal" necessarily follows from them. From his viewpoint, these are simply sentences that are strung together with no logical connections.

So again: Would a syllogism when uttered by this person have meaning qua syllogism, if he only understands them qua unrelated sentences? Could his uttering of the Socrates syllogism be said to be valid, even though he has no notion of what "valid" means?

Ghs

Well, again, a syllogism, per se, is an argument, a logically connected series of premises meant to support a conclusion. The intentionality is essential. Arguments are not the sort of thing that would exist if people didn't want to support conclusions by showing the connections by ideas.

Now it happens that communicated ideas are necessarily embodied in some perceivable form: spoken or written words or gestures or symbols or pictures or so forth. And since these forms are perceivable, they must be physically embodied, and hence as physical objects or events they take on a material existence of their own. But as material objects they are just material objects - -without an understanding mind with some intentional stance they have material form but no intellectual substance.

Your logically illiterate mnemonist is making noises. This is physically true even if he is brain dead. He may also be uttering words, opposed to nonsense syllables, assuming he is voicing terms whose meaning he comprehends. He may be uttering sentences, if they are complete ideas which he comprehends. But if he does not understand the connections between the sentences, he cannot be said actually to be making an argument himself, even if the words have the form of an argument.

If a logically illiterate person understands the sentences he is uttering, then he is not just "making noises." He is uttering coherent sentences, while failing to understand their logical connections, i.e., how they can be integrated to form a valid deductive argument.

This is a relatively minor objection, however, since you obviously understand the essential points, as illustrated by the rest of your paragraph. So let's continue...,

Now, since we are not mind readers with a collective consciousness, we normally attribute to a speakers utterances the meanings which we ourselves would give to their words. This is normally a justified and successful procedure. But this is an assumption on our part, not an intrinsic, mind independent fact. Since we normally want to communicate cooperatively, we normally guess at the other's meaning and attribute to the sounds they are making the meaning which we would likely have if we were making the same sounds. This is basically a type of wish. We wish to live in a world of people who make sense and who mean what they say. We wish to be able to take people at their word. In most cases the desire is reasonable, and things work out. We do this so automatically that when we encounter such Trojan horse forms as "How can we pay for these tax cuts?" or "This sentence is false" we not only accept them at face value, we tow the destructive invaders inside our defenses ourselves.

But in reality, all that exists are the noises, the movements of the hand and face, the scribbles. And hence not only do we on occasion encounter sounds with the form of words or sentences, but without the substance of thoughts behind them, we also encounter jokes, and irony, and word play, and we encounter cloaked attacks on the conscious faculty, sounds made by mind parasites that embody lies and newspeak, and anti-concepts and utter nonsense.

This is a very thoughtful response, and I thank you for it. Before responding in detail, however, I want to see if you agree with the implications that I would draw from your conclusions.

Suppose you understand syllogistic reasoning but I do not. Would you then say that the same Socrates syllogism is valid for you but not for me?

This kind of relativism would also extend to true propositions. Suppose we both understand the meaning of a true proposition, but you also know the reasons why it is true, whereas I have no inkling of why it is true. Would you then say that the same proposition is true for you but not for me?

I am not trying to score polemical points here, honestly. There is a logic to your position, but before exploring it in more detail, I want to see if we agree about its implications, which I would describe as a relativistic theory of knowledge. Indeed, if you read my excerpt from Why Atheism? you will see that I objected to the Peikovian approach precisely because it lands us in epistemological relativism.

Ghs

I'll reply when I have the time, George.

[George H. Smith]

I'll reply when I have the time, George.

Do you mean to say that you actually have a life and sometimes have more important things to do than to engage in esoteric philosophical arguments on OL?

Well...okay. While waiting for you to return from the real world, here is my take on the issue at hand.

I said before that Peikoff doesn't really have a theory of propositions. A proposition is the abstract form of an assertion. (Logicians often call this a "judgment.") An assertion presupposes someone who does the asserting -- a specific and concrete rational being. In contrast, a proposition abstracts the meaning-core from an assertion, and this enables us to analyze the proposition without referring to individual expressions of it. A proposition is universal, whereas an assertion is particular. Different assertions can express the same abstract proposition.

All this is obvious enough, and I doubt if even Peikoff would disagree with it. (I know it is not your intention to defend Peikoff, but your arguments so far closely resemble his.) But the distinction between concrete assertions and abstract propositions is key to the matter we have been discussing.

To illustrate my point, I shall use a very simple example, viz: "Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations was first published in 1776."

Suppose I ask someone who has never heard of Adam Smith what year WN was first published. And suppose this person makes a wild and lucky guess that happens to be correct. He says that WN was published in 1776. So here is the key question: Is his statement true even though he had no justification to believe it is true?

I would say Yes. I would say this because the proposition "Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations was first published in 1776" corresponds to a fact, and this fact remains a fact regardless of who has sufficient justification to assert it as a fact. (The preceding is implied whenever we say that someone made a correct guess.)

Although the statement by the guesser in my example would not be justified, it would nevertheless be true. Justification pertains to concrete assertions, not to abstract propositions per se. A proposition (p)is true if it "corresponds" to a fact, but no one would be justified in claiming to know that p is true without adequate justification.

Thus, when we say that p is true, we don't mean that so-and-so had sufficient justification on such-and-such occasion to assert that p is true. We don't mean that p is true because someone correctly judged p to be true. Rather, we mean that p is true -- i.e., that it corresponds to a fact -- regardless of who makes the judgment, and for whatever reason. The truth of p is universal, not particular. We learn that p is true as we learn the reasons for it. P does not somehow become true as we learn the reasons for it.

I hope the application of my argument to valid syllogisms is obvious.

None of the above should be construed to mean that abstract propositions exist in their own right, apart from knowing minds. I can explore this issue later, if necessary.

Ghs

[kiaer.ts]

I'll reply when I have the time, George.

Do you mean to say that you actually have a life and sometimes have more important things to do than to engage in esoteric philosophical arguments on OL?

Well...okay. While waiting for you to return from the real world, here is my take on the issue at hand.

I said before that Peikoff doesn't really have a theory of propositions. A proposition is the abstract form of an assertion. (Logicians often call this a "judgment.") An assertion presupposes someone who does the asserting -- a specific and concrete rational being. In contrast, a proposition abstracts the meaning-core from an assertion, and this enables us to analyze the proposition without referring to individual expressions of it. A proposition is universal, whereas an assertion is particular. Different assertions can express the same abstract proposition.

All this is obvious enough, and I doubt if even Peikoff would disagree with it. (I know it is not your intention to defend Peikoff, but your arguments so far closely resemble his.) But the distinction between concrete assertions and abstract propositions is key to the matter we have been discussing.

To illustrate my point, I shall use a very simple example, viz: "Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations was first published in 1776."

Suppose I ask someone who has never heard of Adam Smith what year WN was first published. And suppose this person makes a wild and lucky guess that happens to be correct. He says that WN was published in 1776. So here is the key question: Is his statement true even though he had no justification to believe it is true?

I would say Yes. I would say this because the proposition "Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations was first published in 1776" corresponds to a fact, and this fact remains a fact regardless of who has sufficient justification to assert it as a fact. (The preceding is implied whenever we say that someone made a correct guess.)

Although the statement by the guesser in my example would not be justified, it would nevertheless be true. Justification pertains to concrete assertions, not to abstract propositions per se. A proposition (p)is true if it "corresponds" to a fact, but no one would be justified in claiming to know that p is true without adequate justification.

Thus, when we say that p is true, we don't mean that so-and-so had sufficient justification on such-and-such occasion to assert that p is true. We don't mean that p is true because someone correctly judged p to be true. Rather, we mean that p is true -- i.e., that it corresponds to a fact -- regardless of who makes the judgment, and for whatever reason. The truth of p is universal, not particular. We learn that p is true as we learn the reasons for it. P does not somehow become true as we learn the reasons for it.

I hope the application of my argument to valid syllogisms is obvious.

None of the above should be construed to mean that abstract propositions exist in their own right, apart from knowing minds. I can explore this issue later, if necessary.

Ghs

In the meantime:

To an inordinate degree Hillary Clinton thinks for Bill Clinton.

Specifically, she is Bill Clinton's access to the laws of logic, without which no thinking is possible. Leon Wieseltier of The New Republic has discussed Clinton's blindness to logic on a number of occasions. On February 1, 1993, he wrote, "The most disturbing quality about Clinton is his indifference to contradiction. Not excluding the political middle by not excluding the logical middle, that appears to be Clinton's strategy. And so he can hold in his mind simultaneously, and sincerely, notions that cannot really be held together." And, again in the July 19-26, 1993 issue: "He lives without the law of contradiction."

Hillary Clinton provides Clinton with certain narrow logical skills of which he is singularly bereft. This does not imply that she is Aristotle, any more than a seeing-eye dog is a cartographer. It implies only that as compared to Clinton, the blazing Bubba, Mrs. Clinton is on speaking terms with logic, and he cannot function without her.

[kiaer.ts]

Bump.

BTW, is there a way to mark a post as unread or to bookmark it?

Edited September 17, 2010 by Ted Keer

[kiaer.ts]

BTW, is there a way to mark a post as unread or to bookmark it?

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Ted,

I don't think so.

If you subscribe to a thread, you will get email notifications (hopefully, but this seems to be a bit buggy). Thus you can put the pertinent email in a folder of posts you want to return to later.

One suggestion I can offer is to open a notepad file on your computer's initial workspace. Call it "Posts" or "Blank" or something like that. Then if you find a post you want to return to later, copy the URL (right-click the little post number on the upper right of a post and select "copy URL" or whatever your browser says for this) and paste it into the Notepad file. Once you have answered the post you can delete the URL from the Notepad file.

There might be something else in this forum software. I will look around just to make sure.

Michael