Specter of Reason

A little while back I got into a discussion of Wittgenstein at PhilPapers . The issue was mainly about whether or not the instigator of the discussion, Professor Jim Stone, had successfully undermined Wittgenstein's notion of family resemblance in a paper he had published in the '90s. (Professor Stone started the discussion thread because he felt his paper had gone unnoticed in the annals of philosophical research, and that it deserved more attention.) Though the notion of family resemblance is more or less well-established in some circles, Professor Stone (wrongly) claims that it is supported solely by the discussion of games and numbers found in Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations . ( The most immediately relevant sections of the Investigations can be found online, with commentary by Lois Shawver, here .--I have not read Shawver's commentary, however, so do not assume I agree with it.) Stone says that W.'s point about numbers is not commonly respect...

Last September, I defended Gilbert Ryle against Stanley and Williamson's "Knowing How" (2001). After reviewing Ryle, reading a good many papers on the topic, discussing some issues with a few professional philosophers (including an in-depth and spirited email exchange with Jason Stanley about how to interpret Ryle), I've come to the following conclusions, which I divide into two parts. The first addresses S&W's misrepresentation of Ryle. In the second, I develop extensive, original arguments against S&W's formulation of knowing-how as a species of knowing-that. 1.0) Stanley and Williamson (S&W) profoundly misinterpret Ryle. I stand by my original critique of the way they present Ryle's regress argument. Similar critiques are found in Hetherington (2006) and Sheiber (2003). Others (Noe 2005; Wiggins 2009) point out other ways in which S&W get Ryle wrong, though I do not think anyone has yet to identify the full extent to which S&W ...

I don't know how accurate the results of this poll are, but it seems plausible that a somewhat large percentage of self-identifying Republicans harbor irrational and hostile beliefs about Obama, and generally unsettling views about homosexuals, creationism, and other staples of conservative controversy. There's nothing surprising here, as disturbing and sad as it is. It is also unsurprising that prominent Republicans would want to distance themselves from those who, for example, think that Obama should be impeached, or that Obama "wants the terrorists to win." So we should not be surprised to find Bill O'Reilly distancing himself from what he considers a fringe of conservative extremists . But instead of just distancing himself from their wacky beliefs, and defending Obama, homosexuals, and the American education system--instead of talking straight politics--O'Reilly goes on a smear campaign against the poll itself. First, he tries to poison the well, clai...

I would like to distinguish between the form of a valid deduction and the validity of an argument. Formal logic deals with the forms of our inferences, and not the validity of our arguments. For example, appealing to the masses is not a valid form of argument, though it could be expressed as a valid syllogism. A valid argument must have a valid logical form; or, at least, it must be expressible in such a form. But having a valid logical form is not enough. Admittedly, I haven't thought about this distinction before, and I would not be surprised if I suddenly reversed or qualified my position. This might be better discussed by focusing on examples of logical fallacies. Example 1: Begging the Question 1) If X, then ~~X 2) X 3) ~~X This is begging the question by any account. Yet, it is a valid syllogism. Example 2: Appeal to the Masses This is also a logical fallacy, but it can be expressed as a valid syllogism: 1) If everybody knows that X, then X. 2) Everybody knows that X 3...

Context: A woman calling herself "Mom" has made the following claim: Original Sin can only be understood from the heart, not the head. And understood it must be, she says, or else . . . well, I'm not sure how she would have me end that sentence. But apparently it's very important I understand Original Sin with my heart. The problem is, I can't get it past those darn censors in my head. Here's what I wrote: God thinks I deserve to be punished for being born, but God is punishing Himself instead. Since God created me, God is responsible for my birth. It seems only right that God would punish Himself. If God punishes Himself, it is because He wants to. He makes the rules, and he could give Himself a break. He could decide that nobody needs to be punished for sin. But He doesn't. He punishes Himself. That's His choice. God wants to suffer. But let's consider this suffering. God punishes Himself by killing His son. Though that's not quite righ...

[ In July and August, 2010, I made some significant revisions and deleted some questionable portions of this post. ] In " Knowing How " (2001), Jason Stanley and Timothy Williamson (S&W) defend intellectualism against Gilbert Ryle. Their paper was selected by The Philosopher's Annual as one of the ten best papers of 2001. Yet, as I will argue, they profoundly misrepresent Ryle (and so fail to make a sound critique of his project). This suggests that there has been a widespread and severe misunderstanding of Ryle among academic philosophers. Despite the problems with their response to Ryle, S&W's formulation of knowledge-how as a species of knowledge-that is a stand-alone argument and invites criticism of its own. As I aim to show, a clarification of some relevant issues makes it difficult to fully accept their analysis. In section I, I present intellectualism. In section II, I correct S&W's misrepresentation of Ryle's argument against intell...

I want to better explain why I reject the idea that logic refers to something, such as abstractions or Platonic forms. Words and sentences, of themselves, do not refer to anything. Rather, people can use words and sentences to refer to things. (This should be clear when we remember that the same words and sentences can refer to different things, depending on the context of utterance.) Furthermore, the meaning of a sentence is not always its referent; for we can understand sentences even when a referent is unspecified, and also in cases where the referent is non-existant. (E.g., "The King of France is bald.") From these points it follows, first, that the referent of a sentence depends on how it is used in a particular context; and, second, that sentences can be meaningful even if they have no known referent. When we look at the meaning of a syllogism, we may easily find referents. For example, All men are mortal. Socrates is a man. Therefore, Socrates is mortal. Taken by...