Elephant,
You wrote:
> I don't at the moment think we diagree as such, but that's because I don't
> think what you are saying is an intelligable opinion.
RICK: Yes, I know what you think about what I think and I DISAGREE WITH YOUR
OPINION (and your logic)!!!! I have tried to show you best I can how you've
allowed your self to be fooled by word play into dismissing logically
coherent thoughts. You prefer unnecessary circularity, that's fine, I am
perfectly willing to let you keep your opinion.
ELEPHANT:
....Being an exception and being not included are
> just *different* things so far as rules are concerned. You are mixing
them
> up, and, in a disputational frame of mind, not pausing to consider the
> confusion you are in. Go back and take another look at my last post and
> address that.
> Do you address that post in this one? No.
RICK: I didn't address the post line for line, but that's just because I
thought it was greatly a rehash your earlier post. As for the distinction
between exception/being not included--- Imagine we have a discussion in this
forum in which all but Horse participate. Would you say, "All members
participated in the discussion (except Horse)" or "All members (not
including Horse) partcipated in the discussion."???? What would be the
difference?
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
---------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > RICK: First, I think the examples with hangmen and
> > your pseudonym are spurious...
>
> ELEPHANT:
> Helpful people would insert an argument for that claim.
RICK: The hangman example seemed to make no sense to me whatsoever (perhaps
you can see the sense in it but I don't think what you wrote conveys it very
well). The Pseudonym rule (all named individuals are named elephant) and
the hangman example (best I can tell) are neither self referential nor are
they rendered false merely by their own expression. As we've agreed that's
the topic (see the two quotes below), I find your examples spurious and
misleading.
> RICK:
> >... The problem we're addressing deals with the
> > linguistic confusion surrounding rules which are seemingly rendered
"false"
> > or "illogical" solely by their own expression....
>
> ELEPHANT:
> Never doubted it.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------
------------------------------
> RICK:
> > A man woke up one morning and looked about world. He noticed that there
was
> > not one single rule which did not have an exception. But the moment he
said
> > so, it became untrue...?
>
> ELEPHANT:
> You went wrong at the start. It ain't possible to look at the world and
> discover there that not one single rule has no exceptions. Period.
RICK: Some support for this would be nice (It's not possible to look at the
world and discover that not one single rule has no exceptions but it is
possible to look at the world and discover that "it's not possible to look
at the world and discover that not one single rule has no exceptions"?)
ELEPHANT:
More patiently: whether or not the claim "all rules have exceptions" is
true is
> not an empirical matter but a logical one. One cannot take empirical
> evidence on the existence of square circles, and this case of your rule is
> exactly analogous (no, this parallel is NOT spurious, as I have argued the
> contradiction inherent in your rule several times over).
RICK: Here we disagree strongly. I don't think this like the square
circles. The fact that it is "empirically possible" to look at the world
and see that no rules have exceptions (other than that rule itself, of
course) means it is "logically possible". To say otherwise is to say that
logic does not accurately describe the world, and I would be compelled to
ask what value your "logical" argument would have then?
>
> ELEPHANT:
> I find this claim bizarre, but fascinating. You are basically extending
to
> the realm of logic the observation we have made about particular objects
of
> static quality: viz that they are what they are in virtue of our
evaluative
> thoughts.
RICK: No. This is most certainly not what I am saying. I am saying that
empirical observations must conform to logic to be valid else one of them is
mistaken. If you empirically observe something that logic would seem to
forbid than either the observation, or the logic, is wrong. Until one
formulates the rule "There is an exception to every rule" it would be
possible that no absolute rules could be found. In such a case, the rule
would be violated ONLY by its own expression. Thus, it is the very logic
employed that renders itself illogical ( a catch-22 of a sort). So one is
forced to decide whether the observation or the logic is wrong. You choose
the observation, I choose the logic.
>
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
--------------------------
> ELEPHANT:
> The idea that language can be distinguished from reason is false.
RICK: A bold assertion. One cannot reason without language? You got some
back up on this???
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
-----------------------------
>
> RICK:
> > The self-inclusion fallacy is the
> > mistake of misidentifying a linguistic problem as a logical problem.
>
> ELEPHANT:
> All genuine linguistic problems are logical problems. All logical
problems
> are linguistic problems. Logic is Language. Period. There isn't
Language
> on the one hand, and Logic on the other. You think symbolic logic isn't a
> language? Pah!
RICK: There are many different languages but LOGIC (like mathematics)
should be the same no matter what language it is expressed in (I realize
math is just another language of logic, but you get the point, right?). I
am saying the imperfections of the ENGLISH language have tricked you into
seeing a "contradiction" where logic doesn't demand one. (I know you
disagree, but that's what makes horse races).
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------
-----------------------------------------------
>
> ELEPHANT:
> I still can't find your description of this particular 'fallacy of self
> inclusion' in any book I've ever known, and none of my philosophical mates
> seem to have the slightest idea what you are talking about either. The
> question you always have to ask yourself, if you want to do philosophy,
is:
> do *you* have any idea what you are talking about? Well, do you?
RICK: See various works by IA Richards, Stephen Toulmin and Chaim Perelman
for the basics... I'd give you specific citations but most of books are in
storage as I live in tiny hole. I've got philosophical mates too (BA in
rhetoric and philosophy from Cornell) and they've all heard of it (and trust
me, your not alone in your criticism of this potential fallacy). And yes, I
know of what I write.
ELEPHANT:
> Look, you can't relieve a rule of circularity, if that rule is a rule
about
> rules. Being circular in that way is just what being a rule about rules
> amounts to.
RICK: Think of it as metarules. Rules of all other rules. The circularity
comes from the (unsupported and unnecessary) logical assumption that they
must address themselves. As for what I really believe about all this.... I
don't think that makes a damn bit of difference in assessing the validity of
my arguments. I thought we were just doing this for sport. I think that's
enough said.
thanks for the fun debate,
rick
>
>
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