Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'fragments/reports', 'Brandom on Social Practices and Representations' and 'The Blue and Brown Notebooks'

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4 ideas

1. Philosophy / D. Nature of Philosophy / 7. Despair over Philosophy
19090 If we can't check our language against experience, philosophy is just comparing beliefs and words [Rorty]
     Full Idea: If we cannot check our language against non-linguistic awareness, then philosophy can never be more than a discussion of the utility and compatibility of beliefs - and, more particularly, of the various vocabularies in which those beliefs are formulated.
     From: Richard Rorty (Brandom on Social Practices and Representations [1998], iii.127), quoted by Danielle Macbeth - Pragmatism and Objective Truth p.178
     A reaction: I'm amazed at how many people I encounter in philosophy circles (compared with none at all outside those circles) who seem to think that we cannot check our language against our non-linguistic awareness. Rorty is their guru. Weird.
10. Modality / A. Necessity / 8. Transcendental Necessity
490 Everything happens by reason and necessity [Leucippus]
     Full Idea: Nothing happens at random; everything happens out of reason and by necessity.
     From: Leucippus (fragments/reports [c.435 BCE], B002), quoted by (who?) - where?
16. Persons / D. Continuity of the Self / 3. Reference of 'I'
22419 'I' is a subject in 'I am in pain' and an object in 'I am bleeding' [Wittgenstein, by McGinn]
     Full Idea: 'I' is used as a subject in 'I am in pain', ....and used as an object in 'I am bleeding'.
     From: report of Ludwig Wittgenstein (The Blue and Brown Notebooks [1936], pp. 66-7) by Colin McGinn - Subjective View: sec qualities and indexicals 4
     A reaction: How about 'my wound is painful'? Does that have the logical form of a conversation? This idea is incorrect. Shoemaker (1968) suggests that the subjective use is immune to error, unlike the object use.
19. Language / F. Communication / 6. Interpreting Language / b. Indeterminate translation
6318 The doctrine of indeterminacy of translation seems implied by the later Wittgenstein [Wittgenstein, by Quine]
     Full Idea: Perhaps the doctrine of indeterminacy of translation will have little air of paradox for readers familiar with Wittgenstein's latter-day remarks on meaning.
     From: report of Ludwig Wittgenstein (The Blue and Brown Notebooks [1936], II.§16 n) by Willard Quine - Word and Object II.§16 n
     A reaction: This may be right, and I am inclined to link the names of Wittgenstein and Quine among those who led philosophy up a relativistic and sceptical cul-de-sac for many years. You can think too hard, you know.