Or we live on and make ... decisions. And we can only decide on open questions that are - by principle - undecidable. If there is an undeniable principle to a question, there is nothing to decide.
That suggestion does not get us off the horns of the dilemma. The question is whether discussion is capable of being coherent and useful, other than for purposes of deception. Obviously we can/must make decisions whatever we believe about the dilemma.
I am with Wittgenstein here. The meaning of a word is its use. Wittgenstein: "Philosophy is a battle against the bewitchment of our intelligence by means of our language."
I think a lot of brainy thinkers have fallen prey to that " bewitchment" and their colossal philosophies have only inflated that bewitchment. Okay, take "freedom". What is it anyway? Getting free of something unwanted, getting rid of it. Well, that is pretty circular. So what?
You have to go back to the roots of language. There you will find exactly this liberating movement and one day an accompanying sound that acoustically sounds like "free" or something. That is its whole meaning: to point to this specific movement through a repeatable word. The sound or other physical representation of the word is repeatable and the movement is repeatable, that is their connection. You make both repetitions coincide. This is the whole art of language.
And so you can talk about it clearly and use it without a definition. You cannot define it in a satisfying (non-circular) way, as Boullion hopes and tries. And you do not need to.
What is an "argument"? A logical deduction? Then it is empty anyway. Beyond the pure tautologies of classical logic or the definitions of words, there is openness, contingency, and the real substance of life. Things to decide for or against, with costs. That is what life is about, making decisions in uncertainty with sacrifices. These are the two things you have to deal with in action: uncertainty and scarcity (conflicting/competing ends). You can no longer make decisions if there is no ambiguity, i.e. different possible paths. Language reflects this. What is freedom? For some it is the holy grail, for others almost nothing.
If so, what is the point of having a Substack and writing about things? If argument is empty so is discussion. Do you see my dilemma? Is there a third option?
J.C. Lester has an unusual approach. https://open.substack.com/pub/jclester/p/rule-of-law-meh?r=8hnjy&utm_medium=ios
If we despair about definitions, we face a dilemma. Either we must have coherent concepts without definitions, or we can’t argue coherently.
Or we live on and make ... decisions. And we can only decide on open questions that are - by principle - undecidable. If there is an undeniable principle to a question, there is nothing to decide.
That suggestion does not get us off the horns of the dilemma. The question is whether discussion is capable of being coherent and useful, other than for purposes of deception. Obviously we can/must make decisions whatever we believe about the dilemma.
I am with Wittgenstein here. The meaning of a word is its use. Wittgenstein: "Philosophy is a battle against the bewitchment of our intelligence by means of our language."
I think a lot of brainy thinkers have fallen prey to that " bewitchment" and their colossal philosophies have only inflated that bewitchment. Okay, take "freedom". What is it anyway? Getting free of something unwanted, getting rid of it. Well, that is pretty circular. So what?
You have to go back to the roots of language. There you will find exactly this liberating movement and one day an accompanying sound that acoustically sounds like "free" or something. That is its whole meaning: to point to this specific movement through a repeatable word. The sound or other physical representation of the word is repeatable and the movement is repeatable, that is their connection. You make both repetitions coincide. This is the whole art of language.
And so you can talk about it clearly and use it without a definition. You cannot define it in a satisfying (non-circular) way, as Boullion hopes and tries. And you do not need to.
I mean, it is like transcending language with the help of language alone. That will not happen. You cannot escape the circle.
I am with him also. But often use is ambiguous.
So we are not coming down on the definition horn of the dilemma. What remains is the horn of ambiguous argument.
What is an "argument"? A logical deduction? Then it is empty anyway. Beyond the pure tautologies of classical logic or the definitions of words, there is openness, contingency, and the real substance of life. Things to decide for or against, with costs. That is what life is about, making decisions in uncertainty with sacrifices. These are the two things you have to deal with in action: uncertainty and scarcity (conflicting/competing ends). You can no longer make decisions if there is no ambiguity, i.e. different possible paths. Language reflects this. What is freedom? For some it is the holy grail, for others almost nothing.
If so, what is the point of having a Substack and writing about things? If argument is empty so is discussion. Do you see my dilemma? Is there a third option?