Heidegger's advice to his students

@Reconstructo,

Reconstructo;129892 wrote:

An expert is given two bills, one of which is counterfeit. (Or so he is told.) His job is to figure out which one. He can't.

Are either of the bills counterfeit, or are they both half-counterfeit? Or are they both counterfeit? Or something else?

The fact that a bill is a perfect counterfiet does not make it any the less a counterfeit. And the fact that we cannot detect that it is a counterfeit still does not mean that it is not a counterfeit. To say that it is counterfeit is to say that it is not an official issue from the US Government, and that can be true even if its counterfeit status is undetectable. Therefore it is a tautology that a perfect counterfiet is a counterfiet.

Remember, X is identical with Y iff X and Y have exactly the same properties. But the counterfeit and the real money do not have the same properties. Therefore they are not the same. QED It is not part of the law of identity that the difference in properties must be detectable.

@kennethamy,

kennethamy;129833 wrote:

I thought you were saying there was no reality. That is just nonsense. It is one of those things that the physicist Von Pauli remarked is "not only not true, it is not even false". Maybe an apt word for it, given this thread, is, "Heideggerian".

Does Heidegger ever deny that there is one world, in which we all live? I've never had that impression (and if I had, I wouldn't be interested in reading him). I have more an impression of a Matrix-like critique of mistaken conceptions of what the world is like. Am I mistaken?

@Twirlip,

Twirlip wrote:

I have more an impression of a Matrix-like critique of mistaken conceptions of what the world is like. Am I mistaken?

But what would be the reasoning behind that? Why would someone think we are mistaken about all our conceptions of the world? I've never read Heidegger, but he believes we are in a simulated world (that is, living in an illusion)? I'd be interested in his arguments.

@Zetherin,

Zetherin;129997 wrote:

But what would be the reasoning behind that? Why would someone think we are mistaken about all our conceptions of the world? I've never read Heidegger, but he believes we are in a simulated world (that is, living in an illusion)? I'd be interested in his arguments.

Heidegger? Arguments???

@kennethamy,

kennethamy;130003 wrote:

Heidegger? Arguments???

It is a great advantage in a "philosopher" to pontificate rather than to provide arguments. That way, no one can point out the fallacious reasoning used to get to one's conclusions, no matter how stupid or crazy or nonsensical one's pronouncements.

@Twirlip,

One could demonstrate, once one bothered to actually read him, that for Heidegger, the world---or at least a great part of it and certainly anything in it with meaning---is "always already" there for us to learn from the moment of birth. This common reality (I avoid using the term "truth" at all) is both derived from human history and society and most certainly from language (remember Wittgenstein's assertion that there can be no private language? or Nietzsche's that "truth begins with two"?). This applies to the reality of everyday existence as well as to more specialised horizons (e.g., physics or genetics) employing special uses of words and viewing the world from limited perspectives.

Heidegger spends a great deal of time discussing tools and hammers; I don't remember in this phenomenological analysis that Heidegger ever argues that these are figments of our imagination, rather just the opposite.
That hammer is mine, I remember purchasing it, I remember how the head got that big dent in it, and I know what a hammer is used for and if pressed, could outline how it was made at the factory and elaborate all the processes that went into making the handle and the head, putting them together and shipping them to a store and what the markup was and so on.

Now it is one thing, and certainly appropriate here, for someone who has not read Heidegger to ask honest questions in an attempt to understand his philosophical positions, but it is entirely another for someone who has not studied him either seriously or sympathetically to provide answers.

@Zetherin,

Zetherin;129997 wrote:

But what would be the reasoning behind that? Why would someone think we are mistaken about all our conceptions of the world? I've never read Heidegger, but he believes we are in a simulated world (that is, living in an illusion)? I'd be interested in his arguments.

Perhaps I shouldn't have mentioned The Matrix, an allusion which does rather seem to suggest that (according to Heidegger or according to me), we are all mistaken about absolutely everything, which is not what I meant to suggest.

---------- Post added 02-19-2010 at 08:03 PM ----------

According to Michael Inwood's article on Heidegger in The Oxford Companion to Philosophy (1995):

Quote:

The problem of the reality of the external world, like that of the existence of other minds, is a pseudo-problem: for Kant, `the scandal of philosophy' is that no proof has yet been given of the `existence of things outside of us', but for Heidegger the scandal is `not that this proof has yet to be given, but that such proofs are expected and attempted again and again'.

@Zetherin,

Zetherin;129910 wrote:

One is counterfeit. In fact, you even said so yourself:

Sorry, I should have specified that his boss has told him that one is counterfeit. Are you implying that you have missed my point?

@Reconstructo,

Reconstructo;130035 wrote:

Sorry, I should have specified that his boss has told him that one is counterfeit. Are you implying that you have missed my point?

I'm implying that the fact you even distinguished in the first place is actually supporting my point.

@Pyrrho,

Pyrrho;130008 wrote:

It is a great advantage in a "philosopher" to pontificate rather than to provide arguments. That way, no one can point out the fallacious reasoning used to get to one's conclusions, no matter how stupid or crazy or nonsensical one's pronouncements.

But this presupposes that philosophers must argue, prove, etc.

Metaphors aren't arguments, and they have been quite important in philosophy. I note that you use rhetoric and irony in this post. Well, so do many philosophers. Of course you are welcome to exclude whoever you want from the term, but others will disagree.

---------- Post added 02-19-2010 at 03:16 PM ----------

Zetherin;130036 wrote:

I'm implying that the fact you even distinguished in the first place is actually supporting my point.

I don't see your point, Z. No offense, but aside from you pointing out my awkward presentation of the hypothetical question, I don't see a point.

---------- Post added 02-19-2010 at 03:18 PM ----------

jgweed;130016 wrote:

One could demonstrate, once one bothered to actually read him, that for Heidegger, the world---or at least a great part of it and certainly anything in it with meaning---is "always already" there for us to learn from the moment of birth.

Yes, and this reminds me just how off topic this thread has become. My apologies for my own part in this.

@Twirlip,

Reconstructo wrote:

I don't see your point, Z. No offense, but aside from you pointing out my awkward presentation of the hypothetical question, I don't see a point.

My point is that if one of the bills was not sanctioned by the U.S government, it is considered, by definition, a counterfeit. It is an imitation. Even if no one could distinguish between the counterfeit bill and the genuine bill, it does not mean that the counterfeit bill is now genuine. The authenticity of the bill is a property that is not dependent on our perception; in other words, no matter how we perceive the counterfeit bill, it does not have the property of being sanctioned by the U.S government, and is therefore not a genuine bill.

@Twirlip,

Personally, my own study and understanding of Nietzsche gained much from reading Schopenhauer. I actually think that there is a page or two (literally) in Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung which Zur Genealogie der Moral is built directly around.

EDIT: I thought this post would be on P. 1....

@Reconstructo,

Reconstructo;130037 wrote:

But this presupposes that philosophers must argue, prove, etc.

Metaphors aren't arguments, and they have been quite important in philosophy. I note that you use rhetoric and irony in this post. Well, so do many philosophers. Of course you are welcome to exclude whoever you want from the term, but others will disagree.

But if we wanted to read meaningless metaphors tacked onto one another, we can read poetry. Philosophy is about argument. I am not saying that philosophers shouldn't use metaphors, but there should be reason behind the metaphors. Reason that the philosophers understand, and reason that supports whatever point the philosopher is trying to make.

@Zetherin,

Zetherin;130047 wrote:

My point is that if one of the bills was not sanctioned by the U.S government, it is considered, by definition, a counterfeit. It is an imitation. Even if no one could distinguish between the counterfeit bill and the genuine bill, it does not mean that the counterfeit bill is now genuine. The authenticity of the bill is a property that is not dependent on our perception; in other words, no matter how we perceive the counterfeit bill, it does not have the property of being sanctioned by the U.S government, and is therefore not a genuine bill.

I see what you mean. But how does this apply to practice? A tricky situation like the one I mentioned? If a "counterfeit" is perfect, what is it that makes it a counterfeit ? Let's imagine that a perfect "counterfeit" is mixed in with 10000 trusted $100 bills. Do you throw them all away? Burn one of them randomly? Or just accept the "counterfeit"?

---------- Post added 02-19-2010 at 04:39 PM ----------

Zetherin;130083 wrote:

But if we wanted to read meaningless metaphors tacked onto one another, we can read poetry. Philosophy is about argument.

Meaningless metaphors? If you strip metaphor from human discourse, you aren't left with much. Formal logic is especially weak because it neglects to understand metaphor.

This is a limited view of philosophy. Nietzsche conceived of truth as an army of metaphors. Heidegger was a great reader of poetry and conceived of language as the "house of being."

Is Plato not sometimes poetry? Does Hegel's system qualify as an argumentative philosophy, if he invents a new kind of logic?

Why is Schopenhauer still read, if almost no one adopts his system wholesale?

I say that philosophy is often at its best when it is metaphorical. I will agree that philosophers are generally concerned with persuasion, and this often includes argument.

---------- Post added 02-19-2010 at 04:40 PM ----------

Zetherin;130083 wrote:

but there should be reason behind the metaphors.

A reason "behind" metaphors? That's a great example of figurative language. I contend that thought is nigh impossible w/o figurative language. That thought is especially figurative.

@Twirlip,

Reconstructo wrote:

If you strip metaphor from human discourse, you aren't left with much

Um, you would be left with literal language.

Quote:

Meaningless metaphors?

What I mean by this is sort of what Orwell speaks about in "Politics and the English language". Metaphors are supposed to be used to assist thought, not make vaguer thought.

I'll answer your other questions a bit later. As for now, I have a hot date (and I'm not using metaphor).

@Zetherin,

Zetherin;130104 wrote:

Um, you would be left with literal language.

"Literal" is a dead metaphor. So is "nature" and "cause." In general, abstract words are dead metaphors that have been literalized by use. Once a metaphor is literalized, it is learned by context and from the dictionary. This has been argued in threads like What are Concepts? and Think in Pictures.

---------- Post added 02-19-2010 at 05:10 PM ----------

Zetherin;130104 wrote:

What I mean by this is sort of what Orwell speaks about in "Politics and the English language". Metaphors are supposed to be used to assist thought, not make vaguer thought.

I suggest that thinking itself is largely metaphorical. I do like Orwell, but I don't interpret him as an attack on metaphor. Newspeak is something else.

---------- Post added 02-19-2010 at 05:11 PM ----------

Zetherin;130104 wrote:

I'll answer your other questions a bit later. As for now, I have a hot date (and I'm not using metaphor).

Enjoy your date, Z. You are a likable "opponent."

@Twirlip,

Reconstructo wrote:

Enjoy your date, Z. You are a likable "opponent."

Oh, no, like I said, I'm not using metaphor. If I used "hot" to mean "attractive", I would be using metaphor. No sir, I literally have a hot date. Wink

@Zetherin,

Zetherin;129978 wrote:

But reality is what is, no matter how we perceive it. So, even if there isn't a distinguishable difference to me between my fake leather coat and my real leather coat, they are still different; they are made of different material. Wouldn't you agree?

I went to extravagant lengths to mention "logical terms" "pragmatic terms" "logical contradiction" so there would be no confusion... but yet you point out the one paragraph that I didn't mention any of those three in... sigh.

@Reconstructo,

Reconstructo;130091 wrote:

I see what you mean. But how does this apply to practice? A tricky situation like the one I mentioned? If a "counterfeit" is perfect, what is it that makes it a counterfeit ? Let's imagine that a perfect "counterfeit" is mixed in with 10000 trusted $100 bills. Do you throw them all away? Burn one of them randomly? Or just accept the "counterfeit"?

---------- Post added 02-19-2010 at 04:39 PM ----------

.

Exactly 90 degrees off point. The point is that even an undetectable difference between X and Y is still a difference, and so, X and Y cannot be identical. (You can do whatever you please with the bills. It is irrelevant to the issue).

@Zetherin,

Zetherin;130117 wrote:

Oh, no, like I said, I'm not using metaphor. If I used "hot" to mean "attractive", I would be using metaphor. No sir, I literally have a hot date.

Sneaky. I can accuse of homonym?

---------- Post added 02-19-2010 at 08:34 PM ----------

The bills don't have to be identical. Their serial numbers vary. (Let's refine this.)

A trusted source, hypothetically perfect, assures a currency expert that one of two bills is counterfeit. It has been manufactured perfectly. It's an ideal counterfeit.

The expert cannot determine which bill is the so-called counterfeit. His boss tells him "screw it. Let's both just take one randomly and spend it."

They use the bills at the mall. They do not write down the serial numbers. A month later, what is the status of the two bills, from a practical point of view? The tiniest dew-drop of inflation?

---------- Post added 02-19-2010 at 08:36 PM ----------

Antoine Roquenti;130051 wrote:

Personally, my own study and understanding of Nietzsche gained much from reading Schopenhauer. I actually think that there is a page or two (literally) in Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung which Zur Genealogie der Moral is built directly around.

Nietzsche sometimes seems like an inversion of Schopenhauer. He modifies the Will to Live a bit, changes the ethic. They both decentralize reason, I think. The both arguably present an irrational world.

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