________________________________ From: Eric Yost <mr.eric.yost@xxxxxxxxx> To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx Sent: Tuesday, 15 November 2011, 21:00 Subject: [lit-ideas] Re: "Promissory Materialism" Correction >"A. Here there is snow. B. Here there is no snow. Assuming "Here" refers to same point in space-time, these A and B contradict." >Who in their right mind would assume “here” refers to the same point in space >time? That’s why there’s an “A” and a “B” – to indicate that the “here” is >different from speaker to speaker.> That is not btw why there's an 'A' and a 'B' - they are there simply so they can they be deployed as shorthand signs for the propositions they are stated to denote, propositions that do not differ "from speaker to speaker" but remain constant or invariant in their content. But, really, who in their right mind would ask "Who in their right mind would assume x?" when x has explicitly been assumed [and indeed implicitly might be assumed otherwise] in order that the contradiction between 'A' and 'B' does not give rise to vacuous quibbling along the lines that we can remove the contradiction by taking 'A' and 'B' to mean something other than the meaning assumed (for example by taking "Here" to denote different points in space and time)? Next on the "Eric & Adriano Show": a dazzling demonstration that there is no contradiction between the view that A. the banks bear a large measure of the blame for our current fiscal woes, and the view B. it is not the case that the banks bear a large measure of the blame for our current fiscal woes - as we may assume "banks" and "blame" etc. mean something logically quite different in each case, and who in their right mind will bother to stop us? And for their next (pointless) trick? Donal Jogging On London