On philosophy some time ago I was involved in a debate about something which escapes my memory for now, but it was probably about Descartes meditations.
I ended up blaming the structure of language, because (as I said) 'All language has properties that allow it to pose the question "which came first, the chicken or the egg?" whether meaningful or not'. And it seems to me that even the more formal the language (formal logic, algebra etc) the fault still exists. After all Russell's set paradox exists in the most formal of our philosophically abstract languages.
To a great extent this has left me a brute empiricist. If one contends, like Ludwig did at one point, that most 'real' questions are not reducible to a priori reasoning, all we are left with is best possible evidence.
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timeasmymeasure
Re: A bit of logic and philosophy of science.
Date: 2010-09-17 03:44 pm (UTC)On
I ended up blaming the structure of language, because (as I said) 'All language has properties that allow it to pose the question "which came first, the chicken or the egg?" whether meaningful or not'. And it seems to me that even the more formal the language (formal logic, algebra etc) the fault still exists. After all Russell's set paradox exists in the most formal of our philosophically abstract languages.
To a great extent this has left me a brute empiricist.
If one contends, like Ludwig did at one point, that most 'real' questions are not reducible to a priori reasoning, all we are left with is best possible evidence.
I'm prepared to be shown the error of my ways.