Subject: Re: [lojban] [OT]Argumentum ad elephantum

From: Edward Cherlin <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 19 Feb 2002 00:12:35 -0800

On Monday 18 February 2002 15:52, John Cowan wrote:
> Edward Cherlin scripsit:
> > > But the poem is self-undermining,
> > > because of the existence of an authorial voice who uses "the
> > > Elephant" = lobi'e xanto, and says "all of them are wrong".
> >
> > I don't see how we can insist that he says more than "le xanto".
>
> Because English "the" implies veridicality. "The man was a woman"
> is just not sound English.
>
> > (What does bi'e mean here? I know only of its use for modifying
> > precedence in mekso.)
>
> Thinko for "bi'u".

Oh, OK, now I see what you mean. The elephant in the poem is 
introduced in a theoretical way in the phrase "went to see the 
Elephant", and you interpret this as 
"klama mu'i lenu viska lobi'u xanto"
go with-motivation what-is-described-as event-of see actual specific 
elephant

and further, you say that the lobi'u is from the author's point of 
view, not the wise men, and so the author is doing something spooky 
by invoking a specific veridical elephant. 

However, nothing in the tale is veridical. It's a parable, in which 
no claim is made that such a thing actually happened. In fact, it is 
obvious on its face that it never happened, because it would require 
"wise men" who were utterly, even wilfully ignorant of all 
descriptions of elephants (although that is certainly true of most 
people's attitude to religious teachings). 

To function as a parable, a story must contain some elements of 
fiction together with some elements that are obviously true of human 
behavior, where an analogy can be made with behavior in other 
situations. Further, like a scientific model, the parable must 
describe a simplification of the behavior, in order to make it easier 
to see the key point.

One of the simplifications in this parable is that it is much easier 
to suppose that someone in the world of the story (who happens not to 
be mentioned) positively and even correctly identified a real 
elephant for examination by the wise men than it is to suppose that 
someone in the real world can point you to a real saint or prophet. 
The veridicality of the elephant within the story is not part of the 
analogy, and does not imply veridicality of something not in the 
story. To claim that the author claims special knowledge of 
elephants, therefore he claims special knowledge of religious truth, 
is specious. It is like insisting on expanding a non-logical tanru 
connection. The structure will not bear such transformations. The 
transformation is fallacious, that is, it is known to result in 
nonsense. 

To refrain from such claims, but still claim that a) the author 
claims that this fictional elephant is real and b) he claims that we 
can't identify elephants in the real world and c) he therefore 
arrogantly asserts superiority over us [normally-elidable-terminator] 
is equally specious. It is the purest of non sequiturs. The premises 
are all false.

I could go on, but it makes more sense to me to go to bed. Good night 
(veridically, even if you read this in the daytime) [unless, of 
course, I'm just dreaming {or hallucinating <or whatever>} that it's 
night time but that I haven't gone to bed yet].
-- 
Edward "That would not be logical, doctor" Cherlin