J said, when somebody does the right thing, it won't matter if she was an eliminative materialist.
I would agree!
But I have strong memories of my time when I have to pass that course on metaphysics!
I had to write and write and write -- on stuff! I got an A+, but still!
So, I would qualify J's view above: it wouldn't matter, unless you ARE doing 'metaphysics'. In which case, if you are an eliminative materialist does matter.
Most scientists don't care, as J is well aware. As he notes, there are a lot of nurses, and other people who do the technical work, etc. --. The scientist who has to answer the question, Quine's -- on what there is, is possibly confused when you start quoting from Duns Scotus's haecceitas.
In this regard, the $tanford Encyclopedia entry on the existence of theoretical entities (that I referred to earlier) is a good one. There are quantum-mechanical assumptions that do not fit the canons of 'individuation', etc. Thus far, no big problem. But then the things become so metaphysical DENSE that you wish the scientist were able to discuss metaphysics rather than denegate it! I may quote Grice on that!
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OK, yet...when philo-person claims, this scientist/techie/reductionist doesn't know anything about, say, Kant's synthetic a priori, so he shouldn't say anything, the scientist has every right to respond: something like, there are no good arguments for the synthetic a priori (say, show it to me, or provide a necessary argument), it was torn apart by positivists, Heisenberg thought it was bullsh*t, etc. And that's ...usually the case with metaphysics. It's inherently speculative (as even say Russell, or Carnap said). I don't say it's...bull-sh*t but...conceptual--models. And it's rather amusing that philosophers, supposedly interested in logic, generally can't offer logically necessary proofs for their own belief systems (or metaphysical systems), and the classic metaphysical disputes (say realism vs nominalism, freedom/determinism, mind/body) generally can't be completely resolved. They are conceptual puzzles, not ...like chess combinations with only one correct answer (tho some answers are better than others). We might agree to a few logical givens--the law of non-contradiction, excluded middle, argument forms--but that's hardly accepting Kant's first critique as a whole (or any idealist metaphysics).
ReplyDeleteGood points. Yes, the philosopher faces a bit of a dilemma: even when conversing with other philosophers, let alone PEOPLE!
ReplyDeleteFor example, a philosopher who claims: "It IS a conceptual truth -- i.e. analytic -- that ... blah blah blah" I usually get VERY BORED. For: if I share his view, so what? If I don't -- so what? On the other hand, had he the cheek that what he says is NOT 'analytic' then, who cares? Why would I accept it? Philosophical truths are SAID (and proved) to be non-synthetic.
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The proof of the Grice pudding IS in the eating.