From: Matt Kundert (pirsigaffliction@hotmail.com)
Date: Mon Feb 21 2005 - 21:29:58 GMT
Hey Scott,
To restate again, the definitions I’d like to use:
1) Metaphilosophy: What way of life are we going to follow?
2) Philosophy: How do things, in the broadest sense of the term, hang
together, in the broadest sense of the term?
3) Metaphysics: How do things _really_ hang together?
Scott said:
I think there is one additional distinction to make, though, within the
category "metaphysics". One might call it "finalizing" or "asymptotic"
metaphysics versus (as Whitehead describes his) "speculative" metaphysics.
Finalizing metaphysics matches your definition, but speculative metaphysics
doesn't quite. In the latter there is an acknowledgment that the hammering
cannot be finally carried through, and that it is only good until the next
Copernican revolution or whatever. It recognizes that it is working within
some contingent perspective. (Modern, non-fundamentalist theology is
generally speculative, by the way -- for a theologian, the theology is not
likely to determine the choice of form of life. What will is grace, so the
best that theology can do is make one more open to grace, using the
vocabulary of the present time. So it is metaphysical, in that it it does
try to have metaphilosophical consequences that are determined by Reality,
but it acknowledges its limitations.)
Matt:
Okay, I can except this point insofar as I think I need to amend my
explanations of the definitions. Because I wouldn’t take “speculative
metaphysics” to be metaphysical according to my definitions. To my mind,
speculators like Whitehead, Royce, Sanatayana, and Pirsig are not (in their
better moments) trying to get Reality to pin down their moves. They are
simply redescribing large amounts of reality in terms of whatever.
So, I should add some further explanation as to the interplay between
metaphilosophy and philosophy. I said that “when doing philosophy … we try
and develop a vocabulary with which we try and get the rest of our
vocabularies … to hang together. Doing metaphilosophy involves a
conversation about which form of life is better, which kind of philosophical
vocabulary we should be using to get our other vocabularies to hang
together. One way of describing metaphysics, then, is as a particular kind
of philosophical vocabulary, a kind of philosophy that tries to have
metaphilosophical consequences.” This last part about metaphysics isn’t
quite right, though you read it the way I want it to be read (based on my
further comments right afterward) when you say that metaphysics tries “to
have metaphilosophical consequences that are determined by Reality.”
As I see it, doing philosophy can vault us up into metaphilosophy, that
philosophy can have metaphilosophical consequences, or rather, some
philosophies won’t be appropriate for some forms of life. This isn’t so
much because of any “metaphysical hammering,” but because the two are more
like on a continuum, there isn’t a hard and fast distinction between the two
(which is why philosophers like Cavell say that there isn’t any such thing
as metaphilosophy and why Rorty himself doesn’t talk much about
metaphilosophy anymore). Sometimes when doing philosophy you are forced
into a discussion about what form of life we want to be. This happens when,
for instance, there isn’t anywhere else for the conversation to go, when a
straight out argument isn’t going to work because both sides seem to be
begging the question over each other. (This is what I see occurring with
our discussion of consciousness; we both appear to be begging the question
to the other, so we are forced to discuss which form of life we’d rather
be.) What distinguishes “metaphysical philosophy” from “speculative
philosophy” (which I’m stealing from you in place of “non-metaphysical”) is
that metaphysics tries to get things hammered down by something else, i.e.
Reality, whereas in speculative philosophy the only thing doing any
hammering are people.
I think this now sets the contrasts down right. Good call on the fault
line. The question for me now is why nominalism, Darwinism, and your
philosophy are metaphysical _according to the above definitions_. For
instance, you commented that you can do metaphysics without the
correspondence theory of truth, but I have no idea how you would do this,
partly because I was tailoring the definition of metaphysics to be identical
with representationalism/foundationalism. If I’m reading you correctly, you
think we can have foundationalism without representationalism, metaphysics
without correspondence, but I have no idea how that would be done. Part of
Rorty’s efforts in the last 20 years has been in showing how every attempt
to keep foundationalism-sans-representationalism intact, like Susan Haack’s
“foundherentism,” just devolves into Rortyan pragmatism unless it makes a
realist, representational move, which is the move I see you trying to make
with your Peircian claim. (It goes the other way, too, of course. The
other half of his efforts have been in continuing the attack on
representationalism-sans-foundationalism, which is all any realist is these
days. There are very few people who are both since the late seventies,
early eighties, surrounding the release of books like PMN.)
Scott said:
As always, I have difficulty seeing how this isn't an argument between two
metaphysical positions. I argue that reflection on physical pain (or any
percept) does tell us something about reality that reflection on
brain-states does not, namely, that consciousness transcends time, and so
time isn't fundamental. This is a metaphysical claim, so it seems that if I
am urged not to see something more in pain than brain-states, that must be
because one holds a different metaphysical position, one that says "there
once were no beings who could have had any use for an intentional
vocabulary, since there were no beings who had language."
Matt:
As I see it, there are three levels of conversation going on in our
discussion, all at once. (These three levels are typically all going on at
once at the MD, though they usually go unacknowledged, and I think in some
cases that leads to communication problems.) The highest level is, for lack
of a better term, meta-metaphilosophical (Rorty uses this term in that far
off essay and calls it the “pragmatist’s metaphilosopher,” to “keep the
conversation going,” but I’m not sure whether it’s inherent in being a
pragmatist or simply a function of all conversations). This is where we
talk about the definitions of metaphilosophy, philosophy, and metaphysics (I
think our forthcoming conversation about Darwinism and nominalism falls
within this range, but I’m not sure). This is where we determine the terms
of communication, the rules according to which we’ll each play so that we’ll
engage meaningfully and some result will emerge (depending on what the
purpose of our inquiry is; for us I think its simply a variation of, “What
the hell is the other one saying?”) The metaphilosophical discussion is the
one where we are trying to determine whether or not we should be a form of
life that thinks there’s more to pain than brain states, or one that
doesn’t. The philosophical discussion is the one where we are trying to
determine whether consciousness has been explained adequately or not (by
your, Pirsig’s, or my lights). (Don’t anybody ask whether me talking about
this now means we are having a meta-meta-metaphilosophical discussion. I
will kill you.)
So, as I see it, you are making a philosophical claim when you say that
“consciousness transcends time,” but are putting a metaphysical spin on it
when you add that this “tells us something about reality.” Saying that
consciousness and semiotics are ubiquitous makes you a speculative
philosopher involved in redescribing lots and lots of reality, but its only
when you add the bit about Reality that you are trying to hammer us down.
Our metaphilosophical discussion involves a debate about whether we want to
be the form of life who wants to add metaphysical addenda. When Dennett and
Rorty urge that we shouldn’t see pain as telling us something about reality,
they aren’t urging that we _only_ see pain as neural processes (as I
commented, we have a moral vocabulary that doesn’t describe pain as neural
processes), they are urging that we shouldn’t see pain as telling us
anything about epistemology—because we shouldn’t be the form of life doing
epistemology. In epistemological conversations, pain isn’t anything more
than brain states because if we do that, we’ll shut down one avenue of doing
epistemology.
Matt said:
In the above, you use such an opposition to enunciate the changes that have
undertook religious mysticism, but I think you need to look for a new
distinction to formulate the changes because what Wittgenstein, Gadamer, and
Rorty (and almost every other post-modernist) have taught us is that
_everything_ is embedded in a tradition, a social practice, a language game,
which is something I think you follow in by saying all experience is
semiotic. Reason isn't a faculty that swings free of a tradition.
Reasonableness arises within a tradition of discourse when certain criteria
have been met, criteria determined by each particular language game.
Scott:
But is this still true now that we are aware of the myriad ways reason has
been held captive by a tradition? The reason I have been arguing that
Intellect (which I am using interchangeably with Reason) should be treated
as being another name for Emptiness is that intellect can both work within a
language game and it can deconstruct them and build new ones. For sure, in
saying this I am still bound by a great deal of tradition, if for no other
reason that I am doing it in English. But that doesn't prevent me from
pointing to Emptiness, which is saying that every thing in every language
game is empty. Since 'Emptiness' is a word in the mystical language game, it
too is empty. On the other hand, it is ridiculous to say that this computer
I am typing on doesn't exist, or that I can't know anything, or that
everything is meaningless. That is nihilism. To resolve these two one has
recourse to the logic of contradictory identity -- which doesn't resolve it,
but keeps us in the Middle Way, in a vocabulary that is neither logocentric
nor nihilistic. Emptiness is not other than language games, language games
are not other than Emptiness. So the claim I am making is that the language
game of pragmatism/Wittgenstein/Gadamer, when augmented with the logic of
contradictory identity, and when the language of Darwinism is overcome, is,
or at least has potential to be, a final vocabulary. In any case, why I see
it as escaping the "no metaphysics" metaphilosophical maxim of pragmatism,
and Sam's view that all mysticism is within a tradition, is that I see no
way that the culture can move past this point of pointing out that
"everything is embedded in a tradition, etc." It can, of course, regress.
The big question in my mind is, should I be calling this metaphysics? I
think it is, in part because it requires changes in what I think of as the
unstated metaphysical view of contemporary intellectual society, which is
basically Darwinian and nominalistic. More importantly, though, if one
starts to say that everything "really is" a token in a language game (which
implies that it manifests a type, i.e., universals are as necessary as
particulars) then the logic of Nagarjuna starts to become more accessible.
Matt:
I think your saying that there is something other than tradition, language,
etc., like Emptiness, is a good reason for saying that you are right in
calling your philosophy metaphysics. I don’t think you need to, though. As
far as I can see, most of the pieces are in place, you just need to shunt a
few distinctions. For instance, by saying, “But is this still true [that
reason isn’t a faculty that swings free of a tradition] now that we are
aware of the myriad ways reason has been held captive by a tradition?” you
are still using a distinction between reason and tradition, one I don’t
think you are entitled to. If we dissolve the distinction between reason
and tradition, as I still see you as doing despite your wave towards
“Emptiness,” we can’t say reason was held captive by tradition, but we can
point to all the particular places where certain traditions (or more likely,
people) got in the way of inquiry or progress (which is another way of
saying some traditions got in the way of others). For instance, we can say
that the Catholic Church was trying to get in the way of the New Science (or
Bellarmine in the way of Galileo), or that Southern conservatives were
trying to get in the way of the Civil Rights Movement (or Strom Thurmond in
the way of MLK), but I don’t think it helps to say that reason was inherent
in the New Science or the Civil Rights Movement.
Now, as for Emptiness, I don’t see the point in saying that “every thing in
every language game is empty.” If I’m reading you correctly, this is
tantamount to saying that the correspondence theory of truth is bunk, our
language does not get at the Way the World Really Is. But by eschewing
representationalism, I’m not sure why we need a notion of “Emptiness.” This
almost seems like Kantianism. By saying that we need Emptiness to avert our
gait towards nihilism, it seems like you’re retaining the language/world
distinction by accepting the idealist gambit and saying, “No, our language
doesn’t hook up with the World, it only hooks up with itself, but yes, there
still is a World, a Reality, a Truth that we are moving asymptotically
towards.” But this doesn’t make sense with all of your eschewments of the
modern philosophical problematic.
For the pragmatist, it seems perfectly reasonable to deny the
language/reality distinction and not be in fear of nihilism at all. Sure,
our language only hooks up with other language, but why should that force us
to say that my computer doesn’t exist, or I can’t know anything, or
everything is meaningless? Knowledge and meaning are internal to language.
My computer exists because I can hit it with my fist. We have no problem
with saying that Emptiness/Intellect “can both work within a language game
and it can deconstruct them and build new ones,” except that we’re not sure
why we _need_ to call it Emptiness. I’m not sure what the logic of
contradictory identity does for us at all. The only use for it, it would
seem, is if you are a metaphysician trying to plug all the holes of
metaphysics, which is another way of saying, if you’re a metaphysician who
shouldn’t really be a metaphysician anymore.
In the end, as I see it, the difference between your vocabulary of Emptiness
and the logic of contradictory identity and the pragmatist vocabulary is
simply a vocable difference, a difference that makes no difference. You
want to say computers exist, so do pragmatists. You want to let science do
its thing, so do pragmatists. You draw on different conceptual resources
(Eastern mysticism and the like), but the effect of each vocabulary is the
same (barring Peircian claims of universal commensuration). I agree with
you that, in light of these vocabularies, our views about mysticism need to
be revised. I think the effect is that adding on mystical addenda about
piercing behind appearances to reality is harmless, so long as 1) we remain
conversational and 2) we keep them out of politics (and hell, as long as we
remain conversational, in the long run there’s no hard-line reason to keep
them out of politics; its just a matter of efficacy).
Now, for anybody who thinks that I’ve capitulated and let Pirsig off the
hook for using metaphysical/mystical language, I haven’t. My critique of
Pirsig is focused on several areas, but has never been simply, “He uses
confusing metaphysical language for his pragmatic purposes.” That would be
ticky-tack. Rather, given the metaphysical language, I’ve been trying to
uncover whether Pirsig has purposes other than pragmatic ones, or rather,
creates a philosophy that strays from his pragmatic theses. I think he has
and I’ve been coming to the conclusion in the last 6 months that my
strongest source of dissatisfaction with him is his unrevised mysticism,
which is what Scott and Sam are currently focusing on.
So, after all that, the question: why are Darwinism and nominalism
metaphysical theses? If Darwinism is an explanation of how we got to where
we are now, why is that metaphysical? If nominalism is the thesis that we
do not need Universals for language to refer to (ala Plato’s Forms), or to
put it another way, that the particular/universal distinction is internal to
a language game, why is that metaphysical? As far as I can see, neither has
to add on the claim (though they could, and have) that this is really how it
is.
Scott said:
As I see it, the reason that you and Rorty cannot imagine inquiry not
stopping is that you are Darwinians. I can imagine the inquiry stopping
because I include in my metaphysics that we are all ignorant, deluded
sinners, but that redemption (Awakening) is a-coming.
Matt:
Yeah, but still: what does the belief that we will all, in the end, have the
same set of beliefs and desires, i.e. be redeemed, do for us on our way
there? Remember, Rorty and I don’t deny that inquiry and conversation may
someday lead us all into universal agreement. Rorty and I are simply
predicting that a) it won’t happen and b) we wouldn’t want it to. But that
doesn’t mean that, given the full extent of free inquiry and conversation,
our culture won’t become one where people like Rorty and I (and our
predictions) don’t exist.
Matt
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