[lit-ideas] Re: Practical Logic
- From: "John McCreery" <john.mccreery@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Thu, 27 Dec 2007 15:48:58 +0900
Robert writes,
>
> To say that the conditional 'if p then q' is 'problematic' because the
> determination of p requires (?) that one make one observation and the
> determination of q requires that one make another tells us nothing about
> the conditional. The conditional—usually the first step in
> modus-ponens—is completely general and is moreover indifferent to the
> actual truth or falsity of whatever propositions are substituted for 'p'
> and 'q' respectively.
Who here would disagree? The conditional, as defined in logic, works
precisely in the way described. One might as well sneer at Euclidean
geometry for being what it is; though, however, the view that non-Euclidean
geometries may better describe the real universe might give one pause about
that "completely general." The problem is not with logic per se, but with
people who assume that "if p then q" is an accurate description of what ever
they are talking about, when the relation between the "p's" and "q's" may
not be so straightforward. Bourdieu touches on this problem when he writes,
"To slip from _regularity_, i.e., from what recurs with a certain
statistically measurable frequency and from the formula which describes it,
to a consciously laid down and consciously respected _ruling_..., or to
unconscious _regulating_ by a mysterious cerebral or social mechanism, are
the two commonest ways of sliding from the model of reality to the reality
of the model In the first case, one moves from a rule which, to take up
Quine's distinction (1972) between _to fit_ and _to guide_, fits the
observed regularity in a purely descriptive way, to a rule that governs,
directs or orients behaviour -- which presupposes that it is known and
recognized and can therefore be stated -- thereby succumbing to the most
elementary form of legalism, that form of finalism which is perhaps the most
widespread of the spontaneous theories of practice and which consists in
proceeding as if practices had as their principle conscious obedience to
consciously devised and sanctioned rules....
"In the second case, one acquires the means of proceeding as if the
principle (if not the end) of the action were the theoretical model one has
to construct in order to account for it, without however falling into the
most flagrant naiveties of legalism, by setting up as the principle of
practices or institutions objectively governed by rules unknown to the
agents....
Robert also writes,
>
>
> I'll admit that my eyebrows were singed by the reference to ivory
> towers, and I was blown clean over by the implication that those safe in
> them are concerned with transmitting a useless formalism to students who
> will in their turn repeat this inbred process &c.
This is, I suggest, a misreading. No general systems theorist I have read
would assert that the formalisms of standard logic or statistics are
useless. The claim is that the domains in which they apply to real-world
decision making are restricted in a way that excludes a large (some would
say the largest) chunk of reality.
On a personal note, I found the year of logic I took as a freshman at
Michigan State one of the most important components in my education. If I
sound a bit harsh when I write about the ivory tower, that is, to be sure,
the odor of sour grapes creeping through; the academic career I imagined was
not the way my life turned out.
That said, my non-academic career has made me acutely aware of how rarely
human judgments are made with the leisure and access to information that
non-academics unfamiliar with office hours, faculty meetings, and the other
impedimenta of academic life assume that professors enjoy. So I smile
knowingly when I read Deirdre McCloskey writing, in _the Rhetoric of
Economics_, that she and her fellow economists do a good job of teaching
facts and logic, but a lousy job of communicating the importance of story
and metaphor, leaving students unable to distinguish between good stories
and bad ones. I nod my head, "Yes, yes," as I read Bourdieu comparing
practical decision making to playing football (by which he means soccer),
where stopping to think through all possible moves will leave the player
flatfooted. I read Gary Klein talking about a fireman standing on a roof,
which is suddenly hotter than it ought to be, who is dead if he can't
respond instantly without stopping to think through his options. I think of
all the people who inhabit my world and are forced to make time-pressured
decisions based on insufficient information. That is the life from which I
offer my interjections, hoping to learn something from the way our
philosophers respond to them.
John
--
John McCreery
The Word Works, Ltd., Yokohama, JAPAN
Tel. +81-45-314-9324
http://www.wordworks.jp/
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