Genealogy of Specious Dualisms

[Curtiss Leung]

Hello Carroll:

You wrote:

> This is called Platonism, and it is with that term 
> that Bertrand Russell labelled himself as a 
> mathematician. But of course laws, equations, 
> theorems, etc. exist only in human brains.
> There is no e = mc(2) "out there" in the world, 
> though matter moves in ways that can be described 
> (for human understanding) by that equation. Ted is 
> simply reintroducing the ancient quarrel over 
> universals first theorized by Plato and Aristotle.

This is part of what I wanted to suggest with my
questions (as well as that ugly sentence), but I
wouldn't to go as far as saying they exist only in
brains.  To explain and expand on that statement: as a
materialist, I think (ha!) everything that's ascribed
to "mind" can be reduced to brain processes, but it's
clear we don't have those descriptions yet, so mind is
still a convenient term for the ensemble of brain
processes we don't have good accounts of.  However, 
because there are brain processes that are only
provoked by interactions with others (nervous system
development is impeded if a child isn't touched,
successful language acquisition requires stimulation
before a certain age, et cetera), it's likely that
that many of the processes that fall into the category
of mind must also require social stimulus -- and if
this is so, this is the cause of much of the confusion
about the "ideal" and "eternal" nature of universals.

I was recently going through Kripke's _Wittgenstein on
Rules and Private Language_, which amounts to a long
gloss on Wittenstein's statement "Hence it is not
possible to obey a rule 'privately': otherwise
thinking one was obeying a rule would be the same
thing as obeying it," which is also a pertinent
criticism of "ideal, eternal" universals.

What made me throw the book across the room, though,
was Kripke's claim that Wittgenstein's posing the
problem and his resolution thereof was completely
original:

<quote mongering>
"As long as we regard him as following a rule
'privately', so that we pay attention to _his_
justification conditions alone, all we can say is that
he is licensed to follow the rule as it strikes him. 
This is why Wittgenstein says, "To think one is
obeying a rule is not to obey a rule.  Hence it is not
possible to obey a rule 'privately'; otherwise
thinking one was obeying a rule would be the same
thing as obeying it." (sec. 202, _Philosophical
Investigations_)

"The situation is very different if we widen our gaze
from consideration of the rule follower alone and
allow ourselves to consider him as interacting with a
wider community.  Others will then have justification
conditions for attributing correct or incorrect rule
following to the subject, and these will _not_ be
simply that that the subject's own authority is
unconditionally to be accepted.  Consider the example
of a small child learning addition.  It is obvious
that his teacher will not accept just any response the
from the child.  On the contrary, the child must
fulfill various conditions if the teacher is to
ascribe to him mastery of the concept of addition."
[p.89]
</quote mongering>

If we skip back to p.87 in Kripke, he notes, again
with justification from Wittgenstein, that an
individual solving an addition problem doesn't do so
by referring to the rules of addition but where one
acts "unhestitatingly but _blindly_."  So it takes
Krikpe almost a hundred pages of stultifying prose
that constantly appeal to Wittgenstein's cryptic
utterances to make the same points made in less than
four quite lucid and readable pages in Nietzsche's
_Gay Science_, section 354, "On the 'genius of the
species'".  So at that point I gave up on Mr. Kripke
and decided to take my arguments against Platonism
from more congenial folks who won't waste my time or
try my patience.
--
Curtiss

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