[lit-ideas] Re: A Connoisseur's Guide to the Noumenon

  • From: Adriano Palma <Palma@xxxxxxxxxx>
  • To: "lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • Date: Wed, 10 Sep 2014 07:17:41 +0000

Nu?


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Subject: [lit-ideas] Re: A Connoisseur's Guide to the Noumenon



In a message dated 9/9/2014 12:46:28  P.M. Eastern Daylight Time, 
palmaadriano@xxxxxxxxx writes:
so what?  

Well, the entry in Liddell/Scott for Greek for 'think' ends:

IV. of words, bear a certain sense, mean, “πυθοίμεθ᾽ ἂν τὸν χρησμὸν ὅ  τι νοεῖ” 
Ar.Pl.55, cf. Nu.1186, Pl.Cra.407e; [εἰ] τοῦτο . . νοεῖ αὐτῷ if this means  for 
him that . . , Id.R.335e; also “ἐπιδεῖξαι ἐθέλω τὸ νυνί  μοι συμβεβηκὸς τί  
ποτε νοεῖ” Id.Ap.40a; τὸ νοούμενον the sense, meaning, Phld.Po.Herc.991.4,  
al.—Not in Th. or Oratt.
 
-- i.e. the idea is that the noumenon is the _sense_ that Frege worshipped and 
Grice avoided ("do not multiply senses beyond necessity").
 
Perhaps the clearest statement is by Yost:
 
"To speak of something without reference to empiricism ... is to claim direct 
knowledge of a noumen[on], which is type of faith or imaginative leap."
 
----
 
One may disagree.
 
If 'noumenon' ultimately derives from THINK, we need a thinker. It's true  
that only empiricists claim that there's nothing in the intellect (in the  
thought) that was not before in the senses -- but most philosophers must  
postulate some connection between thinking processes and, shall we say,  
_sensing_ stuff.
 
I'm not sure I buy the Greek idea that 'noumenon' is the _meaning_. For  
one, it's _utterers_ who mean, never or hardly ever words. A word only 
acquires  meaning by its use within a population of speakers that share a form 
of 
life (as  someone said).
 
Oddly, Rodin's statue, The Thinker, is the great producer of noumena. 
 
Cheers,
 
Speranza
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