Secret Chief
Veteran Member
Is cake real?
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Problem of Universals
- Thread starter Rival
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osgart
Nothing my eye, Something for sure
Abstract qualities exist and they are real; not fictitious. Honesty, redness, will, etc., they all have existence.
Concepts such as math, language, rules of nature have real existence.
Of course there are exceptions where concepts, and language don't obtain actual existence.
Virtues are universals that have existence as well.
Not sure if I fall into a particular philosophical category.
Concepts such as math, language, rules of nature have real existence.
Of course there are exceptions where concepts, and language don't obtain actual existence.
Virtues are universals that have existence as well.
Not sure if I fall into a particular philosophical category.
vulcanlogician
Well-Known Member
I'm a realist all the way, man.
Nobody's voted "nominalist" yet. I'd like to see some debate on the matter transpire in this thread if anyone considers themselves such.
Nobody's voted "nominalist" yet. I'd like to see some debate on the matter transpire in this thread if anyone considers themselves such.
dybmh
ויהי מבדיל בין מים למים
Regarding those lacking actual existence, they're the negations we were discussing in the other thread? The aspects of a concept which are trimmed from the concept as it is being developed in the mind? But they are not actually trimmed, they remain "surrounding" it on all "sides" / "dimensions" / "aspects"?
I'm asking because I cannot decide if these exist or not, and that's where I'm struggling to classifiy myself in the poll.
Or, are you perhaps considering false contradictions? Examples: "non-dairy-milk", the famous "married-bachelor", a "true-lie", "bright-darkness", or my favorite "partial-circumcision"?
osgart
Nothing my eye, Something for sure
Some things only exist in the mind like the idea of a chair, but the universe doesn't recognize it. Contradictions are impossibilities. I would think negations have potential that is not selected for, and are real but not actualized.
I don't think that humans have access to speak the language of the universe. I think we rather are trying to hack it without having intrinsic communication with it.
I have my position as a work in progress. Obviously I don't know what the universe recognizes.
Everyone can only guess beyond what they experience.
Koldo
Outstanding Member
It had to be me... It just had to be me.
Koldo
Outstanding Member
Are you a Realist or a Nominalist?
Problem of Universals: Nominalism vs. Realism | Highbrow
The Problem of Universals posits two theories about the nature of reality: nominalism and realism, that oppose each other and argue the question of whether “universal” things are in fact “real.”gohighbrow.com
I can't help but notice these concepts are flying over most people heads' on the topic.
vulcanlogician
Well-Known Member
I noticed the same thing. The issue is fairly unintuitive (for most folks) Not many ponder if our abstractions (or "ideas") count as real things.
I await your defense of nominalism. Including your definition of it. And maybe if you make your point well, a lot of other folks will realize what the thread is about, and (maybe) realize that THEY are nominalists too.
PoetPhilosopher
Veteran Member
I think I'm a realist in the context of this thread.
However, it becomes confusing for me, because my mind keeps wanting to attribute "realist" to the category of "Optimist, realist, and pessimist".
However, it becomes confusing for me, because my mind keeps wanting to attribute "realist" to the category of "Optimist, realist, and pessimist".
Math is fictional. It could easily have been (1) blue + (2) leaves = Fruit (3).
It's just a way of categorization. Like cladisitics.
dybmh
ויהי מבדיל בין מים למים
Isn't that just semantics? Different languages have different word-labels ( symbols ) but they all end up being the same concept?
Bah, kids these days! What do they teach them whippersnappers in school anyway? Examination of axiomatic assumptions - perhaps the most axiomatic of all being what reality is and means - is foundational to a well-considered life. Think critically, blast ye so-called "rational" animals!
vulcanlogician
Well-Known Member
Nice post.
Hey man, I never said I wasn't an ignorant ape. I just learned a little chimpanzee sign language about metaphysics somewhere along the way. For all I know, chest-beating is the only REAL way to convey ideas.
But it is kinda weird that arguments that Plato talked about at length appear as "contemporary challenges" to realism. Nominalism isn't some new technology. It is a clarification of an argument against something Plato postulated quite some time ago. And, unlike a lot of Plato, some of the stuff Plato said back then still draws things like nominalism into question. That's why I tend toward realism.
Out of curiosity, do you consider yourself a realist, nominalist, or something else, Quintessence?
Nope. Some languages don't even have numbers above 1-3 and they do just fine.
No language gives a good one to one transliteration. That's why the Torah is still in it's original language, the Quran is best read in Arabic, etc.
I believe numbers exist in the same way language does. It's something we made up that is useful, and when it's not useful, we adjust the rules until it is again.
The cake is a lie
vulcanlogician
Well-Known Member
I don't believe you. I've been told by an authoritative entity that I will be rewarded with cake once I complete a series of challenges. Boy oh boy. I can't wait to eat that cake. I hope it's chocolate.
dybmh
ויהי מבדיל בין מים למים
But they do count past three, right? What is four and five in these languages? "1+3" and "2+3"? Or do they operate in base-4?
Quaternary numeral system - Wikipedia
Oh! I didn't mean one-to-one. I meant that the same concept is being described in two different languages. That's all.
I disagree. I think all primitive humans looked at their hands and started expressing numeric comcepts based on that. Communication was needed in order to share and trade resources. It's where the dozen came from. A person can count to 12 on one hand while distributing goods into a basket. 12 became a complete set.
Finger-counting - Wikipedia
Afaik they operate in no base system. Their numbers are 1, a couple (2), a few (3) and many (4-4+).
"Cultures without numbers, or with only one or two precise numbers, include the Munduruku and Pirahã in Amazonia. Researchers have also studied some adults in Nicaragua who were never taught number words. Without numbers, healthy human adults struggle to precisely differentiate and recall quantities as low as four."
"This and many other experiments have converged upon a simple conclusion: When people do not have number words, they struggle to make quantitative distinctions that probably seem natural to someone like you or me. While only a small portion of the world’s languages are anumeric or nearly anumeric, they demonstrate that number words are not a human universal."
www.sapiens.org
But they do count past three, right? What is four and five in these languages? "1+3" and "2+3"? Or do they operate in base-4?
Quaternary numeral system - Wikipedia
en.m.wikipedia.org
Oh! I didn't mean one-to-one. I meant that the same concept is being described in two different languages. That's all.
I disagree. I think all primitive humans looked at their hands and started expressing numeric comcepts based on that. Communication was needed in order to share and trade resources. It's where the dozen came from. A person can count to 12 on one hand while distributing goods into a basket. 12 became a complete set.
Finger-counting - Wikipedia
en.m.wikipedia.org
"Cultures without numbers, or with only one or two precise numbers, include the Munduruku and Pirahã in Amazonia. Researchers have also studied some adults in Nicaragua who were never taught number words. Without numbers, healthy human adults struggle to precisely differentiate and recall quantities as low as four."
"This and many other experiments have converged upon a simple conclusion: When people do not have number words, they struggle to make quantitative distinctions that probably seem natural to someone like you or me. While only a small portion of the world’s languages are anumeric or nearly anumeric, they demonstrate that number words are not a human universal."
How Do You Count Without Numbers?
Some human societies lack words for numbers. What does this tell anthropologists about humanity and human evolution?
www.sapiens.org
Ironically, there is kind of something to that - a weakness of intellectualizing is overlooking the sensuous roots of life experience. Feeling, not thinking. Post-Enlightenment culture and some other cultural influences here in the West tend to put us on the path of being too dismissive of sensuality, feeling, and being. Forgets the difference in the experience of a song in your head versus one sung with every fiber of our animal bodies, breath rushing out of lungs, vibrations of sound meeting the bodies and senses of others both human and not. But I digress.
I'm not sure what word I'd put to things - I haven't honestly given it sufficient consideration. But I am a paradigm shifter - when all ways of seeing have strengths and weaknesses, why not adapt one's framework to what makes sense in the moment for a given purpose? We're all just making this stuff up as we go, and I don't mean that in a derogatory or dismissive way. Long time ago, though, I did decide it was pretty dumb to refer to anything one can experience and know as "not real." It's why when folks ask questions around here like "does X exist" I'm like "well, duh, obviously." Better question - in what way is this named-thing-existence experienced?