radical relativity, and realism vs. idealism vs. skepticism
Jan Dejnozka
I should have said that an utlimate subject of predication is a thing
that *cannot* be said of other things, while other things can be said
of it. An apple would be a standard example.
I also forgot to answer your request for a list of radical relativists.
The only people I name as looking like the real thing are Protagoras and
Carnap, though I suspect many neo-Wittgensteinians and neo-Quineans are.
It is important to me that there can be (and apparently are) some radical
relativists, because I am proposing radical relativity and modified
realism as genuinely classificatory and in that sense informative
concepts, or more accurately, theses.
Dear Bruce,
On Sun, 3 Dec 2000 15:51:00 -0800 Bruce Denner <bde...@sonic.net>
writes:
> >Jan Dejnozka wrote:
>
> quoting Butchvarov and his definition of realism:
>
> >> Very roughly, I shall mean by...realism with respect to x the
> >> view that (1) x exists and has certain properties, a nature, and
> >> (2) that its existence and nature are independent of our
> >> awareness of it, (3) of the manner in which we think of
> >> (conceptualize) it, and (4) of the manner in which we speak of
> >> it. (Butchvarov 1989: 3)
>
> 1. You write "realism with respect to x" which suggests (to me)
> specfic things, objects, found in time and space, which reflect
> light rays and agitate sound molecules. So, by this definition, I'm
> a realist because I recognize that cows exist but not unicorns (or
> at least the evidence isn't there).
The definition does not at all restrict realism to
spatiotemporal things with causal capacities. You are a realist with
respect to cows, according to his rough definition, if and only if you
believe that cows satisfy all four clauses of the definition. Likewise
for numbers, universals, relations, God, or whatever.
Butchvarov understands the concept of existence to be highly
generic. His final definition, if I may call it that, is that
anything that is identifiable indefinitely many times is an
entity. Once again, entities can include anything-- bodies, numbers,
universals, relations, or whatever-- but only if they are identifiable
indefinitely many times. Curiously enough, when he comes to decide on
his own categories of entities, he rejects material things because he
believes that they are not identifiable, and that attempts to
re-identify them lead to paradox. He also rejects relations because
he believes they cannot be singled out even once, much less
indefinitely many times.
You can be a realist, an idealist, or a skeptic about
anything, if you can find reason to be. Concerning realism,
Butchvarov's rough definition is consistent with that.
Please note that I noted in an earlier excerpt that even minds
can be real, according to Butchvarov's rough definition. That's right
after I quote the definition in my "mix and match" post of 11/28.
Cannot minds exist and have a nature independently of how they are
thought of and spoken of?
> 2. But anti-realists don't deny that there are specific objects.
> Rather they claim that the objects are mental constructs or perhaps
> figments of our imagination. Anti-realists argue against any
> purported evidence, generically, for Butchvarov's 2-4.
I suppose there could be sub-kinds of anti-realism depending on how
many of the four clauses of the rough definition you reject. But
according to the definition, to be a realist with respect to a
specific object, you have to accept that all four clauses of the
definition are true of that object. You can admit all the specific
objects you want and still not be a realist with respect to them, if
you don't accept that all four clauses are true of them. So I think
you are basically right.
> 3. Anti-realists typically deny that the "existence and nature are
> independent of our awareness of it (objects)... (and) of the manner in
> which we think of (conceptualize) it (objects)" That's what Kant claims.
> Yet he doesn't deny the empirical reality of everday objects. And that is
> because he doesn't start from the sceptical tradition.
Kant is replying to the skeptical tradition as represented by Hume. He
is starting from the skeptical problem posed by Hume. He takes public
empirical phenomena as given and says we cannot help but impose
concepts of substance and causation on our phenomena so as to organize
them into a coherent world. This is a brief summary of a subtle and
complex position. You might call him a quasi- or ambiguous
realist. However, as I note in my book, "Kant admits things in
themselves in _Prolegomena to any Future Metaphysic_ (...sect. 32),
and admits noumenal moral agents [in _Foundations of the Metaphysics
of Morals_]" (my book, p. 274). These facts are often forgotten in
discussing in what sense Kant is a realist or idealist.
> To me the realism vs. anti-realism choice only makes sense within that
> tradition. One in which philosophy argues for Butchvarov's 2-4. The
> problem, as I see it, is deciding upon what would constitute
> evidence for
> or against.
>
> Am I on track?
>
> bruce
Well, one motive of idealism is to eliminate the problem of skepticism
about the real world by eliminating the real world. "In effect, Plato
answers the skeptic with regard to the senses by denying that there is
anything, or at least anything important, to be skeptical about."
Butchvarov, _Skepticism about the External World_ (New York: Oxford U.
Press, 1998), p. 10. This concerns Plato's view that objects of
sense-perception are fleeting, relative, and unreal. This is also how
Kant is replying to Hume, though the details differ. Kant says we
unconsciously impose reality on the world of public empirical
phenomena, by imposing concepts such as substance and causation on it
so as to organize it into a world of causally interacting material
substances. Butchvarov too belongs to this broad tradition, since he
says we organize the world into a world of entities by making
judgments of what is identical with what.
But another reason to be anti-realist concerning material
things is that the very concept of a material thing is
incoherent. This seems to be Butchvarov's most direct attack on
material things-- he argues that we cannot even re-identify them. The
attack is conceptual, not epistemological. This amounts to rejecting
clause (1) of the rough definition with respect to material
things. Leibniz arrives at idealism by rejecting clause (1) too, where
what he finds problematic about material bodies is their apparent
infinite divisibility, which he takes to entail that they are
ultimately composed of nothing materially real. That too seems
unrelated to epistemology.
Perhaps you mean simply that historically speaking,
philosophers had to wonder about and doubt the material world before
some of them came to question whether there is an external world at
all. Historically, skepticism seems on the whole to predate idealism,
in the Western philosophical tradition. You are right that evidence of
real things is basic, if only because philosophy is a rational
pursuit. It is the hallmark of philosophers to give reasons for their
views. If there is no evidence that there are real things, then there
is no reason to believe that there are real things. You are right on
track there!
Best wishes,
Jan
http://www.members.tripod.com/~Jan_Dejnozka/index.html includes vitae,
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