From nobody@digitalkingdom.org Wed May 17 15:40:33 2006 Received: with ECARTIS (v1.0.0; list lojban-list); Wed, 17 May 2006 15:40:33 -0700 (PDT) Received: from nobody by chain.digitalkingdom.org with local (Exim 4.61) (envelope-from ) id 1FgUgP-0006tl-Dx for lojban-list-real@lojban.org; Wed, 17 May 2006 15:39:57 -0700 Received: from web81302.mail.mud.yahoo.com ([68.142.199.118]) by chain.digitalkingdom.org with smtp (Exim 4.61) (envelope-from ) id 1FgUgO-0006te-5C for lojban-list@lojban.org; Wed, 17 May 2006 15:39:57 -0700 Received: (qmail 14621 invoked by uid 60001); 17 May 2006 22:39:15 -0000 DomainKey-Signature: a=rsa-sha1; q=dns; c=nofws; s=s1024; d=sbcglobal.net; h=Message-ID:Received:Date:From:Subject:To:In-Reply-To:MIME-Version:Content-Type:Content-Transfer-Encoding; b=qzQvkEvovAq9NrYrP/M0/WZK+w3BoNHaL+/UVMnyW47SA34OXcHp2eYqSkIETdp7/FE+yzJ3TNmTWU6WuALVHxuER5J69cJF2Nld9oHT1tpwRzXdrK+1TCzvaaAV+Ly/FkL51bqbWPm7kOXT06GFIr6gcKmfWj8jIvOr2tKng7Q= ; Message-ID: <20060517223915.14619.qmail@web81302.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Received: from [70.237.229.49] by web81302.mail.mud.yahoo.com via HTTP; Wed, 17 May 2006 15:39:15 PDT Date: Wed, 17 May 2006 15:39:15 -0700 (PDT) From: John E Clifford Subject: [lojban] Re: A (rather long) discussion of {all} To: lojban-list@lojban.org In-Reply-To: <2d3df92a0605171008g7e953a6ag2501fc9c09d813a8@mail.gmail.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Spam-Score: -0.7 (/) X-archive-position: 11589 X-ecartis-version: Ecartis v1.0.0 Sender: lojban-list-bounce@lojban.org Errors-to: lojban-list-bounce@lojban.org X-original-sender: clifford-j@sbcglobal.net Precedence: bulk Reply-to: lojban-list@lojban.org X-list: lojban-list --- HeliodoR wrote: > > > > 2. In every situation (a discourse > carried > > on in a given environment), for any object or > > group of objects, there is a description > that > > applies (and will be seen to apply) to > exactly > > that object or group. Further, this > description > > does not rely on the flow of discourse and > > relies on the environment only for ostention; > > that is, it relies only on overtly mentioned > > properties and deixis. It thus avoids the > > difficulties that make Lojban descriptions so > > fallible. And, being not relativized to the > > discourse, it can introduce things that are > not > > already relevant to this discourse. > > > I doubt it. I doubt it very much. > Here's a link about a theory or metaphysical > POV called nominalism: > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nominalism > Consider one of the simplest possible groups: > how do You explicitly > describe {lo cribe} to a nominalist who doesn't > quite believe that there > are nearly identical things as bears? I think you would say {lo cribe} or "bears" or whatever is appropriate in the language in use. As nominalists have had to point out time and again, Nominalism is a metaphysical position, about what lies beneath the ordinary world, not one about the ordinary world. So a nominalist has no trouble with bears. He might have trouble with a set of bears and he certainly would have trouble with bearness, some property that all and only bears have. That is, he deals with the ordinary world like an ordinary person, but, if you ask him, how it is that all these things are bears (and those over there aren't), he will say something like "They look enough alike that conventions allow us to call them all by the same word." But, he would add, that doesn't mean that there is any real thing they have in common. > How do > You explain what You > have in mind? Assuming that I have bears in mind, I wouldn't need to explain, if our nominalist knoows about bears. If he does not, I would draw him a (visual or verbal) picture. Being a nominalist doesn't make one stupid. > I think the differences of personal > point-of-views prevent us from > talking about one "objective reality". This is another metaphysical point: is the world that I experience the same as the one you do, given that my experience off the (or "a") world is different from yours? And that we cannot actually compare our experiences even, except verbally (and visually) where we cannot check that we mean the same things by what we say. Of couse we can talk about objective reality -- to question whether there is such a thing, if nothing else. The problem is when we think there is such a thing and someone asks us what it is (or even is like). > However, I agree with the rest of the proposal. > Only some intuitive use > of the rules should be presumed, or axioms > should be settled about > the perception of "reality". I am not sure how this fits in with MK's proposal, which seems to be almost entirely linguistic, making vanishingly small metaphysical commitments (beyond what might be involved in using a certain language, if any are). To unsubscribe from this list, send mail to lojban-list-request@lojban.org with the subject unsubscribe, or go to http://www.lojban.org/lsg2/, or if you're really stuck, send mail to secretary@lojban.org for help.