POMO: "The Midwife of Platonism Text and Subtext in Plato's Theaetetus" by David N. Sedley

(Original Review, 2004-04-02)

Yes, dinosaurs did exist before the name was created by Richard Owen; they were probably known as dragons before in pretty much all myths around the globe. But the dinosaurs themselves only existed in the imagination of people once they were discovered and named by paleontologists.

So yes, things do exist outside of our consciousness although they only exist to us once we were conscious of it.

Either way, your statement proves that whether truth exists outside of our consciousness, you can only grasp what you (or a trusted authority of paleontologists) are conscious of. The idea of dinosaurs didn't exist before it was discovered, although dragons were quite omnipresent in many mythologies around the globe...they are not quite the same but remember that the first dinosaurs reconstructed were not exactly accurate either as the facts were slightly misinterpreted ( due to their mythologically-loaded background probably as starting point ); because thankfully dinosaurs are not alive so we can only rationally speculate on how they looked like and how they lived from a few fossils.

Even though, we're still unable to tell which color they were; they might have been pink and purple like Barney, we wouldn't know... at best we can imagine they are green/brown like the other reptiles alive these days.

So I agree with you that language and what it is supposed to represent are two different things but we're not able to understand what is outside language therefore for this very simple reason, our conscious representation depends on language.

Dinosaurs certainly did exist before we discovered about them, but this fact was of no importance to anyone, since no-one knew about them. They became part of the consciousness when the word dinosaur was created, even if it relates to a creature that existed independently of language; it needed to be named in order to exist in our representational minds.

I guess there is a subtle distinction between what exists (existed) and what is represented by our consciousness; all sorts of stuff might exist that has not yet be discovered, represented or understood properly but since we have no word for it - it might as well not exist, it would be the same to us so arguably something exists (in our consciousness) once we find a meaningful word to label it. That said, yes things do exist outside language but they are meaningless and unconscious, a bit like how you would argue that Dasein is a sort of meaningless zombie... It's easy to argue that what exists outside our consciousness is therefore pretty much a zombie to... it's totally irrelevant; it does not even make the grade for a myth which at least is a product of language, has a meaning and exist in our consciousness.

But, I, you, other people and animals exist outside language and none of these beings are zombies. So, at best, material objects like stars and mountains are meaningless until they are perceived and described but that seems like a red herring in this debate. Secondly, consciousness does not require language and hence the claim about meaning (no language = no meaning) you are making seems false: pre-linguistic animals and very small children have no language but they are conscious and enjoy representing the world via representations that have non- conceptual contents (Elizabeth Spelke; Michael Tye).

Finally let me emphasize that the debate between me and the pomo crowd is between realism (Plato, modern science, philosophy) and anti-realism/constructivism (Heidegger, Derrida, Latour, Rorty, Kuhn, Putnam). The latter denies that truth is independent of language --in the sense I explained --and that view has been shown to be first of all badly motivated ( arguments for it are bad ) and secondly to be false / incoherent. You seem to have changed your mind now and shifted camps with these latest concessions of yours which is nice.

Turds and Flies: "Theaetetus" by Plato, Robin Waterfield (Trans.)

(Original Review, 2002-06-25)

I've always wondered whether a thesis can only be supported by reason. Is that self-evident or can we find a reason for it?

Plato actually faces and tries to answer similar challenge in “Theaetetus” when he is discussing the nature of knowledge with Protagoras who is a relativist. Plato offers an argument trying to show that Protagoras claim that knowledge is perception must be wrong and he achieves this by making an argument. So we might reply to your question along similar lines: the sceptic about reason is claiming to have knowledge when he says that people never act for reasons but only because they are moved by rhetoric but knowledge to be knowledge and not mere true belief must involve logos or justification and so the sceptic's view is incoherent. He is arguing that knowledge does and does not involve responding to reasons but that is an incoherent view.

This is roughly how Plato tries to deal with the epistemic relativist and his argument is useful in dealing with modern day relativists like Richard Rorty or the social constructivists like Bruno Latour.

Let’s look at it from Plato's point of view. He will say that knowledge is a normative notion in the sense that it involves justification; knowledge is characterized by Plato as justified, true belief. But that says that reason enters into knowledge via justification and is a necessary condition of knowledge in a sense that if you only possess belief that is true (take a guess and think that I’m are writing on a HP laptop and that happens to be the case; do I know that I’m writing this on a HP laptop ? No, you don’t, even though my belief is true) you don’t have knowledge.

So the claim is pretty strong: it is not just that reason can support knowledge on this Platonic view but rather that it logically has to; reason and knowledge are conceptually tied together Plato wants to argue. This is not just an empirical claim but a conceptual one.

What the sceptic and the post modernists like Rorty are challenging is what might be called the classical picture of knowledge which can be traced to Plato:

(i) The world which we seek to understand and know about is what it is largely independently of us and our beliefs about it;

(ii) Facts of the Form -- information E justifies belief B -- are society-independent facts ,and

(iii) Under the appropriate circumstances, our exposure to the evidence alone is capable of explaining why we believe what we believe.

This is Plato's view and is also embraced by Anglo American philosophy and science. The sophists like Protagoras (and in ethical sphere it's Callicles and Thrasymachus) and post modernists like Heidegger, Rorty, Foucault, Latour and so on and of course people in social sciences and humanities influenced by pomo reject this picture by rejecting either one or all components of the classical picture.

Forms are universals and not directly perceived when I see turds and flies although I can intuit these forms. They constitute metaphysical background of ordinary things and are ontologically necessary to explain first of all why ordinary things like turds are in fact turds and secondly how we can come to know ordinary things. So, forms for Plato are ontologically fundamental and prior to what is given in experience and so on this view it is not something we create. Forms are independent of our perceiving them and can be in intuited and so are turds and flies and so, Plato is a realist.

No , the cave works like this : just as in the cave when I look at the dog's shadow on the wall which is a reflection of the dog but dont actually see the real dog so in the waking experience of the world I see things that are contingent, impermanent and transient . When I see a dog I see the reflection of the dog but not the Form of the universal dog. Roughly, Plato wants to say this because he thinks that ordinary scientific and everyday knowledge is too insecure and too revisable to be certain and to the extent to which Plato wants. His model of knowledge is logic and maths and he has doubts about empirical knowledge ; we have two categories ar two classes of knowledge with maths being the better one . This is not that controversial because Plato is distinguishing analytic a priori knowledge from empirical knowledge , the distinction we continue to make . What is unusual is his denigration of the empirical.

The Revelation of the Identical:"Foucault's Pendulum" by Umberto Eco

(My own copy)

"You cannot escape one infinite, I told myself, by fleeing to another; you cannot escape the revelation of the identical by taking refuge in the illusion of the multiple."

In "Foucault's Pendulum" by Umberto Eco

I've always been a keen follower of Prof. Eco's books, both literary and academic. If there's one question I would like to ask him is this:

"What about the question of being, as the Greeks first raised it? Do you think Professor that this question is no longer a question, perhaps entirely dissolved by the sign and/or the 'language game'? Ontology dissolved by epistemology (in the modern era) and which is in turn also dissolved by the signs humans come up (post-modern era). William of Ockham, Nietzsche, Wittgenstein rule supreme -- matter closed. No question of being. Is that it, Professor?"

Anyone who hasn't read Foucault's Pendulum - please buy it today! I think that while the first chapter seems almost deliberately intended to put off the casual reader, once you get through that you find an incredibly absorbing plot, a totally immersive atmosphere, incredible amounts of research dressed in swathes of mystery, and above all some of the most fully realised characters I've ever seen. It also has some quite unbelievably good prose even in translation - the segment of book-within-a-book set in Prague (the bit with the golem, etc.) is astounding. And the ending is superb. Like much of his work (particularly the almost equally good “Baudolino”) it revolves around the conflict between truth and fiction, and the way Foucault addresses this is brilliant. Here's a man that's studied for decades, passing on choice concepts in story form over relatively few pages. It's not like trying to dive into Derrida or Heidegger!

(Bought in 1990)

Bottom-line: If I can give a piece of advice, anyone whjo reads this should concentrate on being introduced to the likes of the Count of Saint-Germain rather than obsessing over what "constopulosiously" might mean... Be grateful of the inclusion of Prester John in “Baudolino”, he didn't exist - but he sort of did... so you can set to inferring why it is we create such figures in our minds and apply that to other beliefs and interests (deities, physics, celebrities, modern art...). This is why I maintained his books are edifying rather than obscure. However, human lies and linguistic lies are of a different kind of complexity. The possibility of telling lies for their own sake with no other motive and the ability to tell lies to ourselves- and believe them- are what makes the difference between language and philosophy and a simple behavioural code. Indeed, perhaps language and philosophy are only possible because we can say things we know are not true and as a result of that imagine things that may or may not be true. Indeed - I have been through it 7 or 8 times. It's simply fascinating, alternately hilarious, erudite, and intensely moving. The 'long stretches' are only 'opaque' for those too dense to understand them, and these diversions throughout, are among the book's many highlights.