David B. Calhoun’s Blog

Does possibility require time in order to be conceived? And more specifically, can possibility be conceived of only in future occurances (and not in the past or present)?

Regarding the second question - though everyday use of possibility seems to be used in reference to future events, we do also seem to use language of possibility in discussion past events, such as “It is possible that the Germans might have won WWII?”. And we don’t mean this in the sense of our ignorance of WWII (if it was, we could say in the same way “It is possible that the Germans lost WWII”), but in the sense that those events, in actuality, might have taken place.

The past is an unusual thing, though.. events in the past have already occurred. It is a fairly commonsense notion that things in the past cannot be changed (err.. unless you’re Doc or Marty, which is a different story.. and a good one by the way). So in some sense, though it is admittedly strange to say so, it seems we can say that things in the past happened necessarily the way they did. Here’s what I’m saying:

1. Everything that can occur only one way is said to occur this way necessarily. (everything that can occur more than one way is said to have possible occurrances)
2. Things in the past have occurred only one way (i.e. Germany either won or lost WWII, not both).
3. Therefore, things in the past occur necessarily.

Premise 1 is suspect..

Some clarification - before the event takes place, it is not necessary that it happen some way. But after the event takes place, because it cannot be changed it must have necessarily occurred the way it did.

What this seems to imply, if correct, is that only future events can be said to occur possibly, for, presuming non-determinism (there’s probably a better word for that..) things in the future can occur more than one way (I have a choice to show up to class tomorrow or not show up to class tomorrow).

Anyhow, what say you?

I have been reading Coppelston’s History of Philosophy in the Medieval Era, and was reading through the section on the Medieval fascination with the problem of universals. The problem as simply stated as I can get it is as follows:

We no doubt have knowledge of particular things in the world. Thus on a walk to the park one day, we may see a particular dog or a particular child. But it is also evident that we have a more general or broader knowledge. For instance, we may take a walk to the park on another day and see a different dog or a different child. And though very different, we know the one dog is similar to the first dog. They are both dogs. Similarly, we know the child, though different, is similar to the first child. They are both children.

We call these concepts, dogs and children, general abstract concepts. What exactly this is was a matter of huge debate in the middle ages. Does the general concept refer to some entity “dogs”, which contains the essential nature of “dogness” (naive realism), or is the general concept merely a linguistic entity (extreme nominalism) - simply a word we’ve created to help us see the similarity between particular instances of dogs (the two different days at the park)? Or perhaps general concepts are something between these two extreme positions (i.e. trope theory)?

I don’t intend to solve this problem right here and now. Hopefully the above paragraph is sufficient to understand the main problem. This is one of the major problems that was the fascination of medieval philosophers, so much so that John of Salisbury (c. 1115-1180) remarked that with this problem of universals the world had grown old, as more time was spent on the question of universals than the time it would take for the Caesars to conquer and govern the world (Policraticus 7, 12; found on Coppelston II p. 153).

One comment I have about this is that the question of universals and particulars is entirely too complicated - this is evident even on a gloss over some of the terminology coined to study this problem. However, we need not take this step until we’ve satisfied ourselves with another step: clarifying the relation between the world and our idea of the world. One of the major problems with the universals dispute is that the general/universal abstract term is entirely dissimilar to the particular thing in the world. Thus, “dogs” is completely different than the particular dog we saw in the park. “Dogs” has no name, doesn’t have a body, etc, since it’s abstact. Part of the problem with universals is this dissimilarity, but we see that this dissimilarity need not require universal and particular terms.

All that is needed is one particular instance. Say, the dog I saw in the park today. Already, when I’m talking about the dog I saw in the park, I’m using words to stand in for the dog itself, since I don’t have access to it when I’m talking about it later on in the day. In short, I’m using the concept of the dog. But surely the concept of the dog isn’t the dog itself - after all, it’s only for referring to the actual living, breathing dog in the external world. And as it turns out, we again run into the dissimilarity problem: my concept of the dog doesn’t wag its tail because concepts have no tails - in fact it has no body, since concepts have no bodies. How then could my idea of the dog, which has no body, resemble to actual dog, which has a body and in fact can wag its tail perfectly fine?

So we see that the fundamental problem of universals, i.e. the dissimilarity between abstract/universal terms and the particular terms, can actually be examined without the use of abstract/universal terms, and simply with particular terms (and particular things in the world).

Behind the world in which we live, far in the background, lies another world, and the two have about the same relation to each other as do the stage proper and the stage one sometimes sees behind it in the theater. Through a hanging of fine gauze in seems as it were, a world if gauze, lighter, more ethereal, with a quality different from that if the actual world, Many people who appear physically in the actual world are not at home in it but are at home in that other world.

-Kierkegaard, The Seducer’s Diary (Hong edition of “Either/Or” p. 306)

I’m not sure if philosophy in its present state will continue. It has more or less already died off. It’s not the kind of thing that’s likely to be popular again, or even funded by universities. Given the choice between some research grant for scientists to find a cure for a disease and a research grant for philosophers to squabble with little to no theoretical output and NO practical output, what would you put your money in? I certainly would want to fund the scientist.

School ends soon, maybe it’s just that time of the year when everything is stressful and philosophy, along with everything else, looks completely useless.

This semester I’ve been in a seminar on 20th Century Analytic Philosophy, and have been participating generally poorly (as I do in most seminar classes when I’m not that familiar with the subject material). My impressions of Analytic Philosophy are somewhat varied: at times I’m DEEPLY disappointed, as if reading the piece was like slowly and bitterly swallowing down mashed sweet potatoes. Each bite is as bad as the last, and when close to finishing one feels the urge to vomit…

At other times I am truly inspired and in awe. (more…)

What is Moorean shift?

Before I discuss my modification (I’m likely not the first to make this modification) to the Moorean shift, I need to explain what exactly this elusive “Moorean shift” is! Simply put, it is when the negation of a conclusion is more certain than the premises for that conclusion. The “shift” is named after common sense philosopher G.E. Moore.

To better understand this, it is best to use an example:

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Ok, a comprimise for the last entry. Maybe I could write about teleology within philosophy and in the same paper explain that even philosophy has a teleology.

This might be what I was looking for.. this seems fairly revolutionary that teleology should be put above philosophy itself…

I am very disgusted right now with my current feeling at the utter incompetance of contemporary philosophy to be anything other than some esoteric trade that has no application outside of academia. This is completely depressing and is actually starting to make me change my outlook. I’m in my senior year of undergraduate studies at the university now, and you’d think I would have figured this out by now, but oh well… better late than never.

I have two choices:

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So I guess we’re right now in the middle of the age of art. I just was browsing through the internet and I found a book called “The Substance of Style”, a recently published book which argues this point. Fashion is becoming the obsession of the entire world.

I know that we’ve always been fashionable people, but are we more fashionable today than ever before? Maybe. What else is there, after all? The postmodernist has made Truth something not to be desired, so let’s instead feast on entertainment, aesthetics, and ourselves!

My greatest fear is that there will be no waking up from this deep slumber that the world is in. We are all too content publishing millions of meaningless books. This includes Romance novels. (more…)

Thank goodness the blogging marathon is almost over! I’m gonna go nuts over this! Haha.

I was thinking of what to say here - I think it’s just another pessimistic comment about the state of philosophy today. Basically, philosophy today is something made by and for philosophers. Now that I start to write, this sounds awfully familiar. Sorry if I’m being repetitive with this, but it’s gonna be a short entry, so no excuses!

Ok, back to the point. Philosophy is by and for philosophers. There is little, if no, interested in non-philosophers. It is the epitome of what it means to live in the Ivory Tower and not associate with the rest of the world. In a very real sense, philosophers are the monks of academia. They have retreated from the world in order to learn Truth. It is assumed that the reason they don’t show interest in helping the rest of the world to this Truth is because they have not yet come up with a satisfactory answer of what Truth is (and do not want to deceive the masses and be held accountable for it), or possibly because they do not even believe the masses capable of coming to the Truth.

Philosophy is insufficient. There is something to be admired even in monks in a monastery, when on certain conditions they allow distraught total strangers into their ranks for a while. Or nuns who reach out to their community, such as the late great Mother Theresa. But there is no Mother Theresa of philosophy. The old philosophers, like Socrates, who lived and died for their philosophy, are gone now.

We find no groups of philosophers helping out with relief efforts, or helping kids in the inner city as the Christian Church and others do. How odd it would be to read in the newspaper something like “Epistemological Reliabilists Traver to Hurricane-Battered East Coast to Help With Hurricane Relief Efforts” (that would be one of the longest headlines anyhow, I guess). PLEASE, philosophers, PLEASE contribute to society or it is all for naught. PLEASE forego your burning desire to leave an impact on intellectual thought for years to come, and make a definite impact in a current need in society. Philosophers are called to be lovers of wisdom, and to WALK in wisdom. As someone on the newsgroups has recently said, show compassion first. Show interest in logic secondly.

I find philosophy very necessary, but in its present state totally insufficient. I don’t know if this is the way it should be or not, I’d just like to point it out…

“Better to be poor and walk in integrity
than to be crooked in one’s ways even though rich.”
Proverbs 28:6

“Whoever gives to the poor will lack nothing,
but one who turns a blind eye will get many a curse.”
Proverbs 28:27