Essentialism / what does a universal proposition mean?

Unbounded
21

I agree with you that Bayesianism has various extra errors not contained in OPAR’s epistemology and it’s reasonable to reject it for that reason. But I think it and OPAR’s epistemology share a fundamental error (which is prevalent elsewhere too) related to indecisive arguments, weights of evidence or arguments, the concepts of strong and weak arguments, etc.

Since my measurements here are so imprecise, it doesn’t make sense to have more than a handful of categories of confidence, let alone one category for each of the numbers between 0 and 1.

My short answer is that CF gets more complexity, for dealing with nuance and partial knowledge, by evaluating many different ideas (using simpler, binary evaluations), rather than trying to reach a single (or sometimes a few) more complex evaluations. A significantly larger number of evaluations can be more effective than having more complexity in each evaluation (plus black and white conclusions have major advantages over gray conclusions). (This is a separate point from CF’s other claim that non-binary evaluations don’t actually work at all as a method of effective thinking.)

22

I think “misconception” is a bad term to use to mean something that is capable of further progress/improvement. I think that’s related to what you were talking about earlier re inoptimal (not perfect, open to more progress).

There are also things where people should have known better, or are doing something wrong with their methods, so that terms like “mistake” or “misconception” are more appropriate. I also have no issue with calling tons of stuff a “mistake” or “misconception” in retrospect when we actually know better (while sometimes granting that it was reasonable to believe at the time if anyone asks but usually not preemptively stating that). But the proposal to call things misconceptions immediately when we come up with them is not speaking about them in retrospect; it’s calling stuff errors before we know of any error just on the basis that we expect to later discover something we could call an error.

Also if people don’t know what a “theory” or “idea” or “hypothesis” or whatever is (e.g. they don’t know it’s fallible), I don’t think switching the terminology is the right way to fix that. Changing the official terminology to try to get people to think differently sounds like something in the ballpark of propaganda to me. If you think a bunch of people are wrong, you need to remember your fallibility and respect their opinions as real opinions, not try to make them change without being persuaded. If you think they’re wrong, what you should want is debate, critical discussion, education, etc., not a different way of speaking (which isn’t going to substantively explain anything new to them).

And it’s important to have terminology to let us differentiate between an idea you think is wrong now, according to current knowledge (“mistake”, “misconception”, etc.) and an idea you agree with but expect to be improved in the future. Calling both things “misconceptions” would be really problematic. (We sometimes run into a similar problem when speaking about the past because we usually differentiate less regarding the past than the present, and e.g. the term “misconception”, referring to the past, could mean either something that was a misconception in its original context or a misconception in today’s new context.)

There’s also a difference between things that are the best current knowledge but turn out to be wrong in some kind of fundamental way vs. things that simply get more optimized later, with some details being wrong/inoptimal and changed. Some ideas fit well into later knowledge as a part of greater whole, while some don’t (and we don’t know very accurately in advance which will be which).

I think for some of my examples, you mistook them as being the best available knowledge which I just expect to be improved on in the future. But I didn’t mean them that way. Like with Western farming practices: there is a claim that the native Americans had a better way of farming (food forests), and the Europeans came here and were too dumb/stubborn/condescending/whatever to notice, so then they destroyed the farms and the culture and most of the people without even understanding what it was. Like the farms didn’t look like Europeans farms, so the Europeans thought the natives were too stupid to farm effectively and were just lucky to live in a land of natural abundance, but actually it wasn’t natural abundance or luck, it was a different farming method which created that “natural” abundance. But this idea isn’t totally lost; it’s available today to anyone who cares to research it (I have not researched it). There are other issues, involving ideas that exist today, like that maybe tilling is mostly bad. And that a lot of farming wouldn’t be profitable without government subsidies. And that maybe regenerative agriculture is good, maybe we should monocrop way less, maybe our selective breeding and GMO efforts have done major harm, and maybe our pesticides are causing a lot of harm like cancer. So I think it’s plausible that Western farming practices are wrong, in a bunch of different important ways, based on currently existing knowledge and that lots of farmers (and politicians) should make significant changes now. The example wasn’t intended as just a speculation that we’ll have better methods in the future.

(I do not consider it plausible that the native American farming method was strictly better. I think that, plausibly, it had major advantages and it (and variants on it) should be in widespread use along with some European-style or mixed farming too.)

23

A quick note (more to come in a few days):

I am sure that there’s much more I could learn about what CF says.

However, I will have you know that when I wrote the long post you are quoting, I was well aware that I was sharply contradicting CF (or at least, CF as I understand it). I know that CF rejects the ideas of supporting evidence, an evidentiary continuum, and non-decisive arguments, whereas—as can be seen from my post—I accept all those ideas in some form.

24

I’m confused about your position given your prior message:

Edit: I had also tried to find out about disagreements with CF earlier:

If you clearly knew in your mind at that time that you disagree with me/CF about “the ideas of supporting evidence, an evidentiary continuum, and non-decisive arguments” then it would have been good to say so then. I don’t know if something changed mid-conversation or not. If I knew earlier, I would have approached the conversation somewhat differently, e.g. by asking if you thought you’d found an error in CF’s reasoning about those issues (or found literature explaining an error).

25

I clearly knew it in my mind at the time.

And I saw what you wrote there, but I did not take it as an invitation to systematically list out and explain all of my disagreements with CF. I thought it would be a good idea to stick to the disagreement directly related to the topic with which I began the thread. (I still maintain that it is a real disagreement btw, though I can understand how—based on what I have said so far—you think it might be a terminology issue.)

The conversation ended up branching off to this place anyway, because of one sentence I wrote when talking about certainty. That’s fine with me, but I didn’t plan for it to happen at the outset.

I think it would be a good idea to continue this branch of the conversation in a new thread, where I will begin by explaining my position on these matters, and how I respond to CF’s criticisms.

26

I don’t know why you chose the topic for this thread over the decisive arguments issue, which seems more important to me as well as easier to discuss (IMO so far it’s been hard to nail down the issues in this thread or figure out very clearly what we’re discussing or why). It partly looks to me like you brought up a more subtle disagreement while having a more blatant one. My initial preference is to discuss decisive arguments first/instead, but if you explain your reasoning I’d consider alternatives.

27

My reasoning for starting with this topic was that 1) the disagreement I brought up is about something relatively low on the hierarchy of philosophy (lower than e.g. decisive arguments, since it’s about what an argument is), and 2) for some reason that I can no longer fathom, I thought that it would be easy to finish the topic.

I think it is likely that you will disagree that 1) is important. I have noticed that CF seems to mostly take things like theories, criticism, and concepts for granted, and instead focuses on what we should do with those things.

EDIT:

I should have explained a little bit more.

I don’t think it’s impossible for two people to have a productive discussion about something higher on the hierarchy of philosophy while disagreeing about something lower on it. But I do think that it will be harder, and that the lower-level things will come up. E.g. This and this, which I encountered yesterday while thinking about what I would say in a potential topic about evidence, seem to take definite stances about what theories and criticism are. While I don’t understand exactly what the stances being taken are, it seems likely that the higher-level things the articles are saying could depend on fine details of those stances.

28

I don’t disagree with that concept (1) but I think I didn’t understand your point enough yet to see how it fits that concept. (I take “low” to mean more basic, more fundamental, or coming first, which FYI clashes with some other uses of low/high terminology.)

Also, the decisive arguments issue also involves what an argument is.

FYI I don’t think I do that, and I’ve explicitly written about what those things are and how they work.

29

I have some very plausible guesses for what you’re thinking of when you say you’ve written about what theories/criticism are and how they work.

I have no such guess for where you think you’ve written the same about concepts. For example, there’s only one article on CF with concept in the title, and it doesn’t meet the criterion.

This wouldn’t be important if e.g. you agreed with ITOE, but I suspect that you have significant disagreements with it.

So could you direct me to an article/post that explains your view of what concepts are and how they work?

30

Why no response? @Elliot

(I had figured this question would be very easy for you to answer.)

31

The question is problematic and would require a complex meta-answer. There are multiple problems including ambiguity and that it looks like veiled, indirect debate.

And you blocked error correction in the relationships topic. You insulted me, expressed a lack of respect for me, and didn’t give constructive feedback: I don’t even know what you disagree with. So more discussion with you doesn’t sound beneficial, particularly when it brings up new issues instead of addressing prior ones.

32

Yes, it is good that you wouldn’t want to engage with people who don’t respect you. Conversely, I also wouldn’t want to engage with people whom I don’t respect.

So I want to be clear: I don’t have a generalized lack of respect for you, I only have a lack of respect for your views on certain topics. Very importantly for the present context, those topics do not include epistemology. I disagree with you about epistemology, but I think your theories about it are really interesting and that it’s worth my time to engage with them. If I didn’t think that, I wouldn’t be on CF at all.

I also think it is relevant that our epistemology conversations in the past year have not had the sorts of issues you’re concerned about. (Our long conversation 3 years ago, which touched a lot on epistemology, did devolve, and it was completely my fault, but I have changed a lot since then.)

I don’t want to get drawn into such a conversation. I don’t think it’s worth my time to do that, both because the topic is not a central interest of mine, and because of the fact that it sounds like that conversation will be unpleasant. This is why I regret posting in that thread in the first place. If I could go back in time and delete it I would, but I can’t. I would like to move on from it ASAP.

My question was a likely precursor to some form of debate (or at least, some future criticism of your ideas), but not debate as such.

E.g. One possibility I envisioned was that you’d link an article/post, and that I’d disagree that whatever article you linked actually does explain what concepts are and how they work. Another possibility I envisioned is that (since you have in the past self-identified as an Objectivist, and since you’ve praised ITOE before in some form (though you called it vague)) you’d say you agree almost completely with ITOE, and I’d explain why I don’t think that’s correct.

I can’t guess why you think it’s ambiguous.

Thoughts?

33

It feels like you don’t take the insulting Elliot part seriously. You did insult him. You blame it on the topic Elliot was discussing, that you chose to join, but you still chose to insult him on it. You insulted him without giving him feedback. That was your choice. I can understand not wanting to have a conversation about the SA stuff (and whatever else bothered you about that topic), however Elliot, and I (is this grammatically correct?), pointed out there are better ways to express disagreement/non-sactioning than insulting.

Also it sounds to me your view of Elliot is akin to something like this: you have someone you like/respect, but then learn of something really bad about them like they hit their wife, they cheat, they steal, their hypocrites, etc. You still think their ideas (or whatever) is good and you just evade the bad thing about them.

I don’t think your evading whatever you consider bad about Elliot. However, I think its bad you want Elliot to have a discussion with you when their is a certain part of you that thinks Elliot is bad (I assume thats what a lack of respect here would mean more or less versus regular disagreement).

Hmm. I think that makes sense. You’re saying Elliot is a bad person in some respect, telling him that, but don’t want to explain it. To me its something like this (two friends talking):
“I think you’re a terrible person in some respects.”
“Why would you say that? I thought we were friends.”
“We are. I just think certain parts of you are awful, and I just look past them.”
“Well could you tell me what they are?”
“Nah. The conversation will be unpleasant and I don’t want to talk about it. Just know that I think some parts of you are bad and lets move on/”

Did I misrepresent you/anything?

1 Like
34

You haven’t explained your reasoning and evidence for the lack of respect. You seem to expect me to take your word for whether it generalizes, but I’d rather see for myself.

35

Yes, indeed. It didn’t even occur to me that you might not (though it should have, because you’ve done this before). I have given you no cause to think I am being dishonest, which would be enough for normal people to accept my account of my inner state.

But I actually don’t think you believe that I am dishonestly reporting my evaluation of you, i.e. reporting it in a way that differs from how I classify it in my own mind. No, the premise behind what you say here, the reason why you want “reasoning and evidence,” is that you—absurdly—think you will understand the inner workings of my mind better than I do, based on the few meagre shreds of evidence that I might throw at you. In short, I think that you are a psychologizer.

This is even more reason for me not to have the conversation you’d want to have.

If I am to remain on this forum (and I could go either way at this point), I request that you deal with my conscious mind only, and keep your pseudoscientific fortune-telling about what’s secretly going on in the depths of my subconscious to yourself.

36

Hello, I could see how people would accept someone’s account about what they say, but I think that happens when you have a relationship with them or they trust you. It’s different on the forum cuz we are discussing about things objectively and we all don’t know each other like that. I don’t think ET wanting to judge for himself about what you respect means that you’re being dishonest.

If you want an example that I think applies to this situation it’s this: You watch a new movie and you think it’s the best one ever. You want to have a discussion with your friend about why it’s the best movie ever. You obviously wouldn’t tell them to take your word for it in the discussion. They would like to know your reasoning and logic about why it’s the best movie ever.

Now imagine if that movie is instead the subject about what you respect or not. It’s less about you and more about the subject itself. If you’re still not ok with talking about what you respect then do you not want to know more about that conflict instead? Like to me it sounds like you’re finding something unpleasant when others mentally model your actions/feelings/motivations.

I get that too in a way like it does feel unpleasant when someone is making a model about how I see something or what I’m going through internally. The cool thing is though you can discuss that too you don’t have to end it there. Like you can ask why arent you taking me on my word or why do we have to talk about the innerworkings of my mind? Or is what I said not enough? You for sure have some things you disagree about with ET that you could voice

1 Like
37

It’s common that strong negative judgments have reach or generality. They often involve believing someone is irrational, is using bad methods, is bad at logic, has poor reading comprehension, or something else that would apply to other topics. I was trying to find out what your major criticism was, that led to disrespect, not asking about your psychology. The hostility of your new post is consistent with there being a broad problem that could ruin discussions on any topic.

In your first link, anonymous44 argues with you about what a Wikipedia article says using quotes from it. Based on their textual analysis, they conclude you’re wrong and biased. That isn’t analyzing the inner workings of your mind or psychologizing. That kind of post can be replied to by debating the article text without discussing your psychology.

In your second link, I read your “Please enlighten me!” as snark. I cited a public source and thought it was snark in general (my judgment wasn’t related to you personally). The meaning and usage of English statements is open to interpretation and debate. Those issues aren’t about the details of your psychology. My post could be replied to by talking impersonally about word meanings or analyzing example usages from books and the internet. Instead, you asserted that it wasn’t snark, then I said that assertions weren’t arguments. Instead of e.g. engaging in impersonal debate about what those words mean in general, you (not me) steered the conversation to issues like your memory, intentions and psychology. I refused to be drawn into discussing those things.

At both links, the focus (by other people besides you) was on analyzing words and their meanings, as well as more broadly using logic, arguments and reasoning to have an explicit debate. The focus wasn’t on psychology or personal characteristics.

Sometimes people say a post or poster is (for example) biased, hostile, snarky, confused or dishonest. People often do this when something is shared online with the author omitted (so they don’t know any personal information about the author; they just see the text of one post). Judgments like “biased” are related to psychology but usually don’t involve detailed psychological analysis of personal or individual characteristics. These judgments typically come from analysis of words, facts, arguments, behavior and logic, not from pseudoscientific fortune-telling about the secret depths of anyone’s subconscious.

The context in this topic was that I didn’t respond to @lmf and he asked why. He wanted discussion, but I didn’t want to have another discussion with a person who doesn’t respect me and withholds criticism of my ideas. I’m responding here because of personal attacks combined with inaccurate statements about my posts and goals. @lmf, if you want me to reply to you, next time you should provide immediate value to me (not potential value later in the conversation), such as sharing useful criticism of my philosophy ideas (instead of seeking other discussion first and maybe saying criticism later). I’ve been trying for years to have impersonal debates about topics like epistemology or Silent Spring. I’d prefer that over discussing psychology or meta discussion.