Monday, April 23, 2012
On the subtle delights of teaching.
One of my favorite moments is always the moment when I can shrug and say, "Well, one man's modus ponens is another man's modus tollens and have my students get it.
Wednesday, April 18, 2012
On the similarity of the mind-body problem and the fact-value gap.
Let c stand for the thesis that human beings should live according to human nature -- that facts about human nature are not idle, but have normative (action-guiding) force.
Many twentieth-century philosophers scoffed at premises along the line of c, and more than enough still do in the twenty-first century: What? How can an "ought" ever follow from an "is?" haven't you heard of the fact/value distinction, and the unbridgeable gap between them? For Pete's sake, haven't you people ever read Hume?
I have little to say to this; it strikes me as superstitiously and gratuitously mystery-making. Many of these same people, if you had asked them:
"How could Descartes have thought both that:
(1) minds and bodies are completely separate entities, of completely different kinds, with completely different natures, incapable of overlapping at any point -- and that
(2) the mind and the body are utterly intermingled, such that mind pervades body?
How could those both be true?"
-- would have replied with a laugh that even smart people used to believe unaccountably foolish things. Obviously, if (1) is true, then mind and body simply can't have anything to do with each other. You couldn't attach a mind to a body any more than you could attach a triangle (not a triangle-shaped piece of paper, but a triangle, the abstract object) to a blackboard eraser. Why can't you do that? Because the blackboard eraser doesn't have a mind to hold the triangle, and the triangle doesn't have a body to touch the eraser. And by the same token, you can't attach a mind to a body, because the body would already have to have a mind to be able to interact with a mind, or the mind would already have to have a body to be able to interact with a body. To believe both (1) and (2) simultaneously is frankly bizarre.
Some of these people have been willing to assert nevertheless both that
(1') facts and values are completely separate entities, of completely separate kinds, with completely different natures, incapable of overlapping at any point; and that
(2') facts and values are utterly intermingled, such that values pervade facts.
Some have accepted (1') and therefore rejected (2'), and more than (2'): rejected the very idea that value could be in anything. All there are are facts; facts are incompatible with values; hence there are no values.
Most people don't want to do that. For obvious reasons: we routinely take facts to have normative implications and values to have factual implications. Here's a reasonable argument from fact to value-judgment:
There is no Santa Claus. Therefore, to represent Santa Claus to a child as the source of his Christmas bounty is to lie. All other things being equal, it's bad to lie. Therefore, all other things being equal, you shouldn't tell children that their presents come from Santa Claus.
Here's a reasonable argument from value-judgment to fact:
This marriage is illegitimate. (For instance, the bride and bridegroom have concealed prior marriages or blood relations.) Therefore, no marriage has taken place.
To give up (2') on the grounds of (1') means rejecting these arguments as monstrously ill-formed. That's quite a sacrifice, and requires large changes to the ways we are used to thinking through problems. Sacrifices just about as large as would be required if we were to give up (2) because of (1). To say that there exist only facts but no values is not less strange than to say that there exist only minds but no bodies, or bodies but no minds.
The obvious solution is to reject (1) and (1'): minds and bodies aren't made out of different stuffs so fundamentally as all that, facts and values aren't made out of different stuffs so fundamentally as all that. Not everyone wants to take that route. But people who take it in regard to (1) and (2) really shouldn't have to take out the smelling salts in the presence of someone who takes it in regard to (1') and (2').
Many twentieth-century philosophers scoffed at premises along the line of c, and more than enough still do in the twenty-first century: What? How can an "ought" ever follow from an "is?" haven't you heard of the fact/value distinction, and the unbridgeable gap between them? For Pete's sake, haven't you people ever read Hume?
I have little to say to this; it strikes me as superstitiously and gratuitously mystery-making. Many of these same people, if you had asked them:
"How could Descartes have thought both that:
(1) minds and bodies are completely separate entities, of completely different kinds, with completely different natures, incapable of overlapping at any point -- and that
(2) the mind and the body are utterly intermingled, such that mind pervades body?
How could those both be true?"
-- would have replied with a laugh that even smart people used to believe unaccountably foolish things. Obviously, if (1) is true, then mind and body simply can't have anything to do with each other. You couldn't attach a mind to a body any more than you could attach a triangle (not a triangle-shaped piece of paper, but a triangle, the abstract object) to a blackboard eraser. Why can't you do that? Because the blackboard eraser doesn't have a mind to hold the triangle, and the triangle doesn't have a body to touch the eraser. And by the same token, you can't attach a mind to a body, because the body would already have to have a mind to be able to interact with a mind, or the mind would already have to have a body to be able to interact with a body. To believe both (1) and (2) simultaneously is frankly bizarre.
Some of these people have been willing to assert nevertheless both that
(1') facts and values are completely separate entities, of completely separate kinds, with completely different natures, incapable of overlapping at any point; and that
(2') facts and values are utterly intermingled, such that values pervade facts.
Some have accepted (1') and therefore rejected (2'), and more than (2'): rejected the very idea that value could be in anything. All there are are facts; facts are incompatible with values; hence there are no values.
Most people don't want to do that. For obvious reasons: we routinely take facts to have normative implications and values to have factual implications. Here's a reasonable argument from fact to value-judgment:
There is no Santa Claus. Therefore, to represent Santa Claus to a child as the source of his Christmas bounty is to lie. All other things being equal, it's bad to lie. Therefore, all other things being equal, you shouldn't tell children that their presents come from Santa Claus.
Here's a reasonable argument from value-judgment to fact:
This marriage is illegitimate. (For instance, the bride and bridegroom have concealed prior marriages or blood relations.) Therefore, no marriage has taken place.
To give up (2') on the grounds of (1') means rejecting these arguments as monstrously ill-formed. That's quite a sacrifice, and requires large changes to the ways we are used to thinking through problems. Sacrifices just about as large as would be required if we were to give up (2) because of (1). To say that there exist only facts but no values is not less strange than to say that there exist only minds but no bodies, or bodies but no minds.
The obvious solution is to reject (1) and (1'): minds and bodies aren't made out of different stuffs so fundamentally as all that, facts and values aren't made out of different stuffs so fundamentally as all that. Not everyone wants to take that route. But people who take it in regard to (1) and (2) really shouldn't have to take out the smelling salts in the presence of someone who takes it in regard to (1') and (2').
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