I don't think biological taxonomy (for example) necessarily includes arbitrary classification but is rather highly influenced by what is actually observed in nature. Yes, we are documenting and classifying, but that is not necessarily to say we are inventing a system to describe what we observe; it's more like we're discovering the underlying natural classification of how things are in the natural world through observation. Our understanding of the differences between a kingdom and a phylum (for example) has less to do with us and our decisions for classifying than it does with what we have observed.

ETA: This reminds me of the debate over whether or not laws are invented or discovered. Something is discovered, and something is invented.

No one, I think, has said that science discovers the "real meaning" of words. I don't think I would understand that view.

But I do think that science can make discoveries about the nature of water. Isn't the discovery that each molecule of water consists of one molecule of hydrogen and two of oxygen, a discovery?

So that, for instance, were we to come across a substance that looked like water, and we called it "water" but it turned out not to have the chemical composition of water, that the substance would not be water?

That is certainly true of "fool's gold" or iron pyrite. See the film, The Treasure of the Sierra Madre for the scene in which some think that iron pyrite is gold.

I'm gonna take a stab at this.

I don't think biological taxonomy (for example) necessarily includes arbitrary classification but is rather highly influenced by what is actually observed in nature. Yes, we are documenting and classifying, but that is not necessarily to say we are inventing a system to describe what we observe; it's more like we're discovering the underlying natural classification of how things are in the natural world through observation. Our understanding of the differences between a kingdom and a phylum (for example) has less to do with us and our decisions for classifying than it does with what we have observed.


<It's a long shot, but for what it's worth.>

ETA: This reminds me of the debate over whether or not laws are invented or discovered. Something is discovered, and something is invented.

The referent of the term, "three" is what it is, and even should it have ever been the case that we never discovered it, it would remain what it is; after all, truth is independent of knowledge.

A number is neither a word nor a concept.

I think I have good handle on the distinction between a concept and what a concept is a concept of. For example, my concept of Earth is one thing, and what my concept is a concept of, namely, Earth--aka the referent of the term, "Earth" is another thing. One is a mental entity, and the other is not. One's existence depends on my existence whereas the other does not.

Yes, about natural kinds. We discovered that there were mammals, we did not invent that classification. And we discovered that whales are mammals and they are not fish. It was an error to believe that whales are fish just because they had the superficial aspects of fish. Similarly in the case of porpoises. I think that is right, don't you?

Yes, about natural kinds. We discovered that there were mammals, we did not invent that classification. And we discovered that whales are mammals and they are not fish. It was an error to believe that whales are fish just because they had the superficial aspects of fish. Similarly in the case of porpoises. I think that is right, don't you?

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I don't see how this distinction between fool's gold and gold threaten's the Wittgensteinian view of the autonomy of language. We are certainly free to classify things and use language to distinguish one thing from another.

Here is a short quote from Hacker's book which I mentioned above:
"It is a leitmotif of Wittgenstein's reflections on meaning that the meaning of an expression is given by what are accepted as correct explanations of meaning, which constitute rules for the use of the expressions explained. Rules for the use of expressions are not true or false, and are not answerable to reality for their correctness (an aspect of what he called the 'the arbitrariness of grammar' or the 'autonomy of language')."

---------- Post added 03-05-2010 at 02:54 PM ----------

The class of all pencils, the class pencil, had no particulars that belonged to the class during a time when there were no people. The class of all classics, the classics class, had no particulars that belonged to the class during a time when there were no people.

I don't see it either, but then, I am not clear about what "autonomy of language" means. I guess we are free (legally anyway) to classify things. But we are not intellectually free to make errors, like classifying a whale as a fish. Whales are no more fish than trees are tigers. So, does the "autonomy of language" allow us to classify trees as tigers, or whales as fish? On a biology exam, if someone said that whales are fish he would be marked wrong. And I don't think that Wittgenstein believed that whales are fish, whatever he believed about the autonomy of language.

Numbers are for quantity. Numbers are signs.
Words are for quality. Words are symbols.
Quantlity is always more ambiguous as well as capable of conveying more textures of meaning. Reality is composed of both quantity and quality. Science only deals with quantities.

Wittgenstein was a competent user of language so I agree that he would not believe that a whale is a fish for that is not what the word "whale" means.

I think I have good handle on the distinction between a concept and what a concept is a concept of. For example, my concept of Earth is one thing, and what my concept is a concept of, namely, Earth--aka the referent of the term, "Earth" is another thing. One is a mental entity, and the other is not. One's existence depends on my existence whereas the other does not.

Just as we can distinguish between 1) a concept and 2) what a concept is a concept of for concrete objects, so too ought we be able to do so for abstract objects.

How would one distinguish between a concept and what it is a concept of?

Certainly a concept of gold is not an actual nugget of gold.

It's obvious that such generalities are human inventions. But we had good reasons to separate the whale from the fish. We wanted a coherent system, as coherence is probably the basic structure of what we perceive as true.

So is the generalization that all water is H20 created by people, but, of course, the general fact it describes is not created by people. And the same is true of all whales are mammals. No one created the fact that water is composed of hydrogent and oxygen, and no one created the fact that all whales are mammals (and not fish).

A whale has some properties that scientists use to classify it as a mammal and not a fish. If there is a fact here it is a linguistic one. If our biological taxonomy was based on superficial appearences then whales would most likely be classified as a fish and that would be considered a fact.

The substances we encounter in the world around us have a vast array of properties. We choose which properties are going to be used for classifying them.

Earth is the third planet from the Sun. That's a fact, but it's not a fact that is dependent on humans. Earth, the number three, and the Sun exist, and they exist independent of humanity. The human observation of the fact is dependent on humans, but neither the actual objects nor the RELATIONSHIPS between the actual objects are dependent on humans. The human observation of the physical relationships are mind-dependent, but the actual physical order of objects to other objects are not.

Yes, but all he's saying is that we do not make something have the property it has. That is, we do not create the fact, we discovr it.

Yes, I agree that it is an empirical finding that whales have certain properties. But we choose whether or not to use those properties depending on the taxonomy we have created. We did not discover the taxonomy itself, we discovered things that we classify according to the already established taxonomy.

Numbers are for quantity. Numbers are signs.
Words are for quality. Words are symbols.
Quantlity is always more ambiguous as well as capable of conveying more textures of meaning. Reality is composed of both quantity and quality. Science only deals with quantities.