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Origenes vs CR on the challenge of criticism

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Sometimes, a blog comment is so cogent that it desrerves headline billing. In the following case, Origenes brilliantly rises to that level in responding to frequent critic, CR. So, from the moral grounding thread:

Laws of logic in action as glorified common-sense first principles of right reason

Origenes, 268:>>CR @

CR: My point was and has continues to be: how does a proposition obtain the status of being “already true” before reason has its say?

No, that is not your point at all. Your “point” is that every proposition is fallible. According to you, it can never be settled whether a proposition is true or false — “no proposition is immune to criticism.” One problem with this is that certain propositions are obviously immune to criticism. Here you apply a little trick: by not making a distinction between successful and failing criticism (‘criticism is criticism’) you claim that there is criticism nonetheless — irrespective of the fact that there is no criticism of e.g. ‘error exists’ which makes any sense whatsoever.

You then go on to claim that:

CR: Criticisms failing and continuing to fail as we develop new ones are all we have.

This is yet another self-defeating statement, as can be easily demonstrated:

1. We only have criticism.
2. Objects of criticism are not criticism.
Therefore, from (1) and (2)
3. We do not have objects of criticism.
4. We do not have criticism.

If we only have criticism then there is nothing to criticize. And if we have nothing to criticize then we do not have criticism.

CR: No one has addressed #207.

A blatant lie — see #217.

CR: It’s particularly humorous that you yourself are a fallibilist about fallibilism, and apparently didn’t recognize it.

I hold that fallibilism is a self-defeating and incoherent idea, which is not quite the same as being a ‘fallibilist about fallibilism.’>>

Let us ponder what has happened to our civilisation that lends plausibility to self-falsifying ideas but stubbornly refuses to acknowledge that self-evident truths exist and are important. In some cases, literally being foundational to reasoning, thinking and communicating. END

Comments
WillSpeaks, our problem is folly is increasingly in control of the civilisation right now, so we have but little alternative. This is not a matter of the village rationalist on a soapbox shouting out his speculations. our interlocutors are echoing very dominant narratives and ideas in circulation and which are demonstrably influencing or even driving the big decisions. KFkairosfocus
January 4, 2018
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I absolutely love this site, but then again, how can I be sure? But I digress. About halfway through the comments I was reminded of Samuel Clemons' admonition to, "Never argue with a fool, because people passing by might not be able to tell the difference"willspeaks
January 4, 2018
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Kairosfocus, CR @
KF: SET’s are understood and acknowledged not proved …
Isn’t it telling that CR never mentions ‘understanding’? In CR’s world, a belief comes from a guess and next it (temporarily) withstands criticism or it does not, but nowhere does he acknowledge that a belief can be understood. It seems that, in CR's view, a belief is formed only by (temporary) lack of good criticism, not by understanding in any way. In an ultimate sense, a belief is nothing but failed criticism — CR: “criticisms failing is all we have.” But this is not what we see:
1. Socrates is a man 2. All men are mortal therefore, from (1) and (2) 3. Socrates is mortal.
One sees that ‘Socrates is mortal’ follows from the premises. If the premises are true, we positively know that Socrates must be mortal, because we see — because we understand — that it follows from those premises. CR, on the other hand, will argue that ‘Socrates is mortal’ is not produced by understanding, but, instead, by a process of guesses alternated by rounds of criticism — similar to random mutations and rounds of selection.
Guess: “Chocolate with cream” -> criticism ->…. -> guess: “Socrates goes Hollywood” -> criticism -> “Socrates is a dwarf” -> criticism -> … criticism -> …. ... (and then on a glorious day) -> guess: “Socrates is mortal” -> (*! For some unknown reason there is currently no good criticism of that!*)
CR needs to do all this to back-up his insane attack on consciousness, which he claims is not part of any explanation of knowledge.Origenes
January 4, 2018
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John @ 7 I think you may find comfort for your position in the comment of Hans Zinnser who said, "the right to criticise should be purchased in terms of knowledge and not lightly assumed."Belfast
January 4, 2018
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Popper’s answer is: We can hope to detect and eliminate error if we set up traditions of criticism—substantive criticism, directed at the content of ideas, not their sources, and directed at whether they solve the problems that they purport to solve.
Who decides what a problem is? Who decides what constitutes an "error"? Who decides what form criticism should take? Who decides what it means for a criticism to be considered valid? Without self-evident truths to draw from, everything CR says is nothing but word salad that could be interpreted and criticized infinitely. Most of the time I don't even bother reading CR's nonsense.
Our systems of checks and balances are steeped in traditions—such as freedom of speech and of the press, elections, and parliamentary procedures, the values behind concepts of contract and of tort—that survive not because they are deferred to but precisely because they are not: They themselves are continually criticized, and either survive criticism (which allows them to be adopted without deference) or are improved (for example, when the franchise is extended, or slavery abolished).
This is just so wrong I don't even know where to start. Criticism of an idea without a self-evident truth to draw from could be applied in any way - for more slavery or less, to abolish it or reinstate it. Where does one's criticism begin? What form does it take? What is it trying to accomplish? Without a necessary direction, it can be used to accomplish and argue anything.
Democracy, in this conception, is not a system for enforcing obedience to the authority of the majority. In the bigger picture, it is a mechanism for promoting the creation of consent, by creating objectively better ideas, by eliminating errors from existing ones.
Look at the assumed direction of the criticism; Popper is relying on the recognition of self-evident truths in order to plead his case, even though it could equally be pled in the opposite direction. "Better" ideas? According to whom? "Errors"? According to what system of evaluation? Why shouldn't Democracy be a mechanism for forcing the will of the majority upon the minority? These people spout this kind of nonsense because they know few people have the critical reasoning skills to recognize that they are relying on that which they dismiss to support their case. If they can get people to dismiss the idea that they have unalienable rights, then they can convince them it's a good idea for them to give them up by "criticizing" the "effects" of "allowing" them to have those rights. Thus free speech and the right to bear arms and own property are eroded, all because of nothing is self-evident, a natural right, or necessarily true. That's exactly what oppressive worldviews want - a populace you can convince of anything with word salad based on rhetoric and emotional pleading - emotional pleading that taps into our internal recognition of truth and the moral good, but twists it for other purposes.William J Murray
January 3, 2018
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I try to avoid getting involved in discussion or debates with interlocutors like CR. If there are no true interpersonal moral standards or obligations how can we trust anything he says or asserts? I don’t think that we can. To have an honest discussion or debate you need some kind of interpersonal, or “transcendent,” standard of truth and honesty. He’s using a rhetorical ploy that we have seen here before, pseudo-humility: “I’m not certain about moral truth, therefore, no one else can be either.” Even if the first part of what he apparently believes is true, how can he consistently believe the second? (That no one else can be certain about moral truth.) If he maintains or makes an argument that that’s true he is making a universal truth claim about truth, which he is claiming with his first premise no one can do. That’s a logical contradiction. But maybe he doesn’t believe the rules of logic are universal either. A “useful” idiot? I don’t think so. Just an idiot.john_a_designer
January 3, 2018
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On marches of folly due to manipulation of the public: http://kairosfocus.blogspot.com/2013/01/acts-27-test-1-on-celebrating-new-year.htmlkairosfocus
January 3, 2018
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William J Murray @1
WJM: CR argues as if one can begin with rational criticism; you cannot. To criticize any idea, one must have a basis and a format by which one holds that process of criticism meaningful or valid. CR might say that we can always rationally criticise the basis and structure of the criticism being applied, but from what basis or structure is that criticism leveled?
Exactly. However, it should be noted that CR did offer a feeble attempt to ground criticism:
CR: Second, a tradition of criticism is itself subject to criticism. Popper’s answer is: We can hope to detect and eliminate error if we set up traditions of criticism—substantive criticism, directed at the content of ideas, not their sources, and directed at whether they solve the problems that they purport to solve.
The obvious follow-up question for Popper and CR is: What are those “traditions of criticism” based on?
Popper: Our systems of checks and balances are steeped in traditions—such as freedom of speech and of the press, elections, and parliamentary procedures, the values behind concepts of contract and of tort—that survive not because they are deferred to but precisely because they are not: They themselves are continually criticized, and either survive criticism (which allows them to be adopted without deference) or are improved (for example, when the franchise is extended, or slavery abolished). Democracy, in this conception, is not a system for enforcing obedience to the authority of the majority. In the bigger picture, it is a mechanism for promoting the creation of consent, by creating objectively better ideas, by eliminating errors from existing ones.
So, criticism comes from some self-criticizing democratic process — not only is it supposedly the source of all criticism but also the end of the line, where all criticism stops. And this democratic process is somehow determined to lead to truth. Looking forward to your comments.Origenes
January 3, 2018
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KF, Origenes, It's either the point or CR is a useful idiot, trained into this nonsense by academia. Ultimately though that is the goal - to destroy proper critical thinking and replace it with rhetorical talking points that can be triggered on command into action.William J Murray
January 3, 2018
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Kairosfocus, Thank you for headlining my comment. Since CR has been flooding this forum with self-defeating statements and theories, it may indeed be necessary to highlight the issue of self-reference. Perhaps CR holds that self-defeating statements are okay, because his hero Karl Popper shows an extraordinary fondness of them. A few examples:
Popper: “all knowledge is hypothetical” [OKN 30]
Does that go for your claim as well Popper? P: Sure. So, what does your claim mean?
Popper: “All knowledge remains… conjectural” [RASC xxxv]
[see above]
Popper: “In so far as scientific statements refer to the world of experience, they must be refutable …” [OSE2 13].
Popper, assuming that your claim is a scientific statement that refers to the world, I take that it must also be refutable. If so, what does it mean?
Popper: “The quest for certainty… is mistaken…. though we may seek for truth… we can never be quite certain that we have found it” [OSE2 375]
But, per your claim, you are not certain about that, so, what, in the blue blazes, is it that you are saying?
Popper: “No particular theory may ever be regarded as absolutely certain” [OKN 360]
Are you certain about that, Popper? Oh sorry, of course you are not certain. But … if you are not sure, what the !@#$ are you saying?
Popper: “Precision and certainty are false ideals. They are impossible to attain and therefore dangerously misleading…” [UNQ 24]
Absolutely “impossible” to attain….? Certain about that? Ah! Not certain! I see. Of course not! … As you say no theory “can be established neither as certainly true nor even as ‘probable'”. So, not only are you not sure about your claims, you cannot even confirm that they are probable. Then what is it that you are saying??
Popper: “We never know what we are talking about” [UNQ 27].
Are you completely … Oh my god are there no limits? - - - - - These self-defeating statements spring insuppressibly from the theory of fallibilism, which is the philosophical claim that no belief can have justification which guarantees the truth of the belief. This theory is self-defeating: 1. No belief can have justification which guarantees the truth of the belief. 2. [*No belief can have justification which guarantees the truth of the belief*] is itself a belief. Therefore, from (1) and (2) 3. [*No belief can have justification which guarantees the truth of the belief*] cannot have a justification which guarantees its truth. Therefore, 4. Fallibilism is self-defeating or meaningless at best.Origenes
January 3, 2018
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WJM, and that is the actual intended point, isn't it. To reduce reason to manipulative rhetoric backed up by intimidatory power. Nihilism, in one word. KF PS: Plato on the mutinous ship of state:
It is not too hard to figure out that our civilisation is in deep trouble and is most likely headed for shipwreck. (And of course, that sort of concern is dismissed as “apocalyptic,” or neurotic pessimism that refuses to pause and smell the roses.) Plato’s Socrates spoke to this sort of situation, long since, in the ship of state parable in The Republic, Bk VI:
>>[Soc.] I perceive, I said, that you are vastly amused at having plunged me into such a hopeless discussion; but now hear the parable, and then you will be still more amused at the meagreness of my imagination: for the manner in which the best men are treated in their own States is so grievous that no single thing on earth is comparable to it; and therefore, if I am to plead their cause, I must have recourse to fiction, and put together a figure made up of many things, like the fabulous unions of goats and stags which are found in pictures. Imagine then a fleet or a ship in which there is a captain [–> often interpreted, ship’s owner] who is taller and stronger than any of the crew, but he is a little deaf and has a similar infirmity in sight, and his knowledge of navigation is not much better. [= The people own the community and in the mass are overwhelmingly strong, but are ill equipped on the whole to guide, guard and lead it] The sailors are quarrelling with one another about the steering – every one is of opinion that he has a right to steer [= selfish ambition to rule and dominate], though he has never learned the art of navigation and cannot tell who taught him or when he learned, and will further assert that it cannot be taught, and they are ready to cut in pieces any one who says the contrary. They throng about the captain, begging and praying him to commit the helm to them [–> kubernetes, steersman, from which both cybernetics and government come in English]; and if at any time they do not prevail, but others are preferred to them, they kill the others or throw them overboard [ = ruthless contest for domination of the community], and having first chained up the noble captain’s senses with drink or some narcotic drug [ = manipulation and befuddlement, cf. the parable of the cave], they mutiny and take possession of the ship and make free with the stores; thus, eating and drinking, they proceed on their voyage in such a manner as might be expected of them [–> Cf here Luke’s subtle case study in Ac 27]. Him who is their partisan and cleverly aids them in their plot for getting the ship out of the captain’s hands into their own whether by force or persuasion [–> Nihilistic will to power on the premise of might and manipulation making ‘right’ ‘truth’ ‘justice’ ‘rights’ etc], they compliment with the name of sailor, pilot, able seaman, and abuse the other sort of man, whom they call a good-for-nothing; but that the true pilot must pay attention to the year and seasons and sky and stars and winds, and whatever else belongs to his art, if he intends to be really qualified for the command of a ship, and that he must and will be the steerer, whether other people like or not-the possibility of this union of authority with the steerer’s art has never seriously entered into their thoughts or been made part of their calling. Now in vessels which are in a state of mutiny and by sailors who are mutineers, how will the true pilot be regarded? Will he not be called by them a prater, a star-gazer, a good-for-nothing? [Ad.] Of course, said Adeimantus. [Soc.] Then you will hardly need, I said, to hear the interpretation of the figure, which describes the true philosopher in his relation to the State[ --> here we see Plato's philosoppher-king emerging]; for you understand already. [Ad.] Certainly. [Soc.] Then suppose you now take this parable to the gentleman who is surprised at finding that philosophers have no honour in their cities; explain it to him and try to convince him that their having honour would be far more extraordinary. [Ad.] I will. [Soc.] Say to him, that, in deeming the best votaries of philosophy to be useless to the rest of the world, he is right; but also tell him to attribute their uselessness to the fault of those who will not use them, and not to themselves. The pilot should not humbly beg the sailors to be commanded by him –that is not the order of nature; neither are ‘the wise to go to the doors of the rich’ –the ingenious author of this saying told a lie –but the truth is, that, when a man is ill, whether he be rich or poor, to the physician he must go, and he who wants to be governed, to him who is able to govern. The ruler who is good for anything ought not to beg his subjects to be ruled by him [ --> down this road lies the modern solution: a sound, well informed people will seek sound leaders, who will not need to manipulate or bribe or worse, and such a ruler will in turn be checked by the soundness of the people, cf. US DoI, 1776]; although the present governors of mankind are of a different stamp; they may be justly compared to the mutinous sailors, and the true helmsmen to those who are called by them good-for-nothings and star-gazers. [Ad.] Precisely so, he said. [Soc] For these reasons, and among men like these, philosophy, the noblest pursuit of all, is not likely to be much esteemed by those of the opposite faction; not that the greatest and most lasting injury is done to her by her opponents, but by her own professing followers, the same of whom you suppose the accuser to say, that the greater number of them are arrant rogues, and the best are useless; in which opinion I agreed [--> even among the students of the sound state (here, political philosophy and likely history etc.), many are of unsound motivation and intent, so mere education is not enough, character transformation is critical]. [Ad.] Yes. [Soc.] And the reason why the good are useless has now been explained? [Ad.] True. [Soc.] Then shall we proceed to show that the corruption of the majority is also unavoidable, and that this is not to be laid to the charge of philosophy any more than the other? [Ad.] By all means. [Soc.] And let us ask and answer in turn, first going back to the description of the gentle and noble nature.[ -- > note the character issue] Truth, as you will remember, was his leader, whom he followed always and in all things [ --> The spirit of truth as a marker]; failing in this, he was an impostor, and had no part or lot in true philosophy [--> the spirit of truth is a marker, for good or ill] . . . >>
(There is more than an echo of this in Acts 27, a real world case study. [Luke, a physician, was an educated Greek with a taste for subtle references.] This blog post, on soundness in policy, will also help)
kairosfocus
January 3, 2018
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CR argues as if one can begin with rational criticism; you cannot. To criticize any idea, one must have a basis and a format by which one holds that process of criticism meaningful or valid. CR might say that we can always rationally criticise the basis and structure of the criticism being applied, but from what basis or structure is that criticism leveled? What CR is apparently advocating is an infinite regress of criticism. That doesn't get anyone anywhere. Unless there are self-evident logical axioms from which one can be confident in to grant validity to their criticism, there is no end to the criticism loop, and all one can be engaging in is, ultimately, rhetoric. In the case of morality, unless there are self-evident and/or necessary truths to begin with, then all one can do is just subjectively pick a basis for their moral views. That might be simple personal preferences, or they might come up with something like "social benefit", which would still just be however they prefer to define "social benefit". With an infinite regress of non-absolute forms of criticism, all one has left are rhetorical arguments supporting their personal preferences - which is, in fact, what we get from these people.William J Murray
January 3, 2018
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