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Ideas for 'works', 'Ideas: intro to pure phenomenology' and 'Vagueness: a global approach'

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9 ideas

7. Existence / A. Nature of Existence / 3. Being / a. Nature of Being
Our goal is to reveal a new hidden region of Being [Husserl]
     Full Idea: We could refer to our goal as the winning of a new region of Being, the distinctive character of which has not yet been defined.
     From: Edmund Husserl (Ideas: intro to pure phenomenology [1913], II.2.033)
     A reaction: The obvious fruit of this idea, I would think, is Heidegger's concept of Da-sein, which claims to be a distinctively human region of Being. I'm not sure I can cope with the claim that Being itself (a very broad-brush term) has hidden regions.
7. Existence / A. Nature of Existence / 3. Being / h. Dasein (being human)
As a thing and its perception are separated, two modes of Being emerge [Husserl]
     Full Idea: We are left with the transcendence of the thing over against the perception of it, ...and thus a basic and essential difference arises between Being as Experience and Being as Thing.
     From: Edmund Husserl (Ideas: intro to pure phenomenology [1913], II.2.042)
     A reaction: I'm thinking that this is not just the germ of Heidegger's concept of Da-sein, but it actually IS his concept, without the label. Husserl had said that he hoped to reveal a new region of Being.
7. Existence / D. Theories of Reality / 3. Reality
The World is all experiencable objects [Husserl]
     Full Idea: The World is the totality of objects that can be known through experience.
     From: Edmund Husserl (Ideas: intro to pure phenomenology [1913], I.1.001)
     A reaction: I think this is the 'Nature' which has to be 'bracketed', when pursuing Phenomenology. It sounds like anti-realist empiricism, which has no place for unobservables.
7. Existence / D. Theories of Reality / 4. Anti-realism
Absolute reality is an absurdity [Husserl]
     Full Idea: An absolute reality is just as valid as a round square.
     From: Edmund Husserl (Ideas: intro to pure phenomenology [1913], II.3.055)
     A reaction: Husserl distances himself from 'Berkeleyian' idealism, but his discussion keeps flirting with, perhaps in some sort of have-your-cake-and-eat-it Hegelian way. Perhaps it is close to Dummett's Anti-Realism.
7. Existence / D. Theories of Reality / 10. Vagueness / a. Problem of vagueness
Local indeterminacy concerns a single object, and global indeterminacy covers a range [Fine,K]
     Full Idea: Vagueness concerns 'local' indeterminacy, such as whether one man in the lineup is bald, and 'global' indeterminacy, applying to a range of cases, as when it is indeterminate how 'bald' applies to the lineup. But how do these relate?
     From: Kit Fine (Vagueness: a global approach [2020], 1)
     A reaction: This puts the focus either on objects or on predicates which are vague.
Conjoining two indefinites by related sentences seems to produce a contradiction [Fine,K]
     Full Idea: If 'P is red' and 'P is orange' are indefinite, then 'P is red and P is orange' seems false, because red and orange are exclusive. But if two conjoined indefinite sentences are false, that makes 'P is red and P is red' false, when it should be indefinite.
     From: Kit Fine (Vagueness: a global approach [2020], 1)
     A reaction: [compressed] This is the problem of 'penumbral connection', where two indefinite values are still logically related, by excluding one another. Presumably 'P is red and P is of indefinite shape' can be true? Doubtful about this argument.
Standardly vagueness involves borderline cases, and a higher standpoint from which they can be seen [Fine,K]
     Full Idea: Standard notions of vagueness all accept borderline cases, and presuppose a higher standpoint from which a judgement of being borderline F, rather than simply being F or being not F, can be made.
     From: Kit Fine (Vagueness: a global approach [2020], 3)
     A reaction: He says that the concept of borderline cases is an impediment to understanding vagueness. Proposing a third group when you are struggling to separate two other groups doesn't seem helpful, come to think of it. Limbo cases.
7. Existence / D. Theories of Reality / 10. Vagueness / c. Vagueness as ignorance
Identifying vagueness with ignorance is the common mistake of confusing symptoms with cause [Fine,K]
     Full Idea: We can see Epistemicism [vagueness as ignorance] as a common and misguided tendency to identify a cause with its symptoms. We are unsure how to characterise vagueness, and identify it with the resulting ignorance, instead of explaining it.
     From: Kit Fine (Vagueness: a global approach [2020], 1)
     A reaction: Love it. This echoes my repeated plea in these reactions to stop identifying features of reality with the functions which embody them or the patterns they create. We need to explain them, and must dig deeper.
7. Existence / D. Theories of Reality / 10. Vagueness / f. Supervaluation for vagueness
Supervaluation can give no answer to 'who is the last bald man' [Fine,K]
     Full Idea: Under supervaluation there should always be someone who is the last bald man in the sequence, but there is always an acceptable way to make some other man the last bald man.
     From: Kit Fine (Vagueness: a global approach [2020], 1)
     A reaction: Fine seems to take this as a conclusive refutation of the supervaluation approach. Fine says (p.41) that supervaluation says there is a precisification for every instance.