[lit-ideas] Re: Rationality: Popper vs. Grice
- From: "" <dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> (Redacted sender "Jlsperanza@xxxxxxx" for DMARC)
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Tue, 10 Feb 2015 09:04:38 -0500
In a message dated 2/9/2015 1:47:43 P.M. Eastern Standard Time,
omarkusto@xxxxxxxxx makes the crucial question (and other meta-linguistic ones,
also
crucial):
>"Why be rational?"
Perhaps Grice would consider that question too crucially. So that's why (or
that is because, as Geary prefers) he (Grice) distinguishes between
'rational' from 'reasonable' ('the price of those shoes ain't reasonable'
makes
sense; 'ain't rational' doesn't). It's best to start with the verb,
"to reason"
And surely if we are engaged in the game of reason, we might just as play
it well ("If a thing is worth doing it, it is worth doing it right"). There
is an adjective for good reasoning, 'valid'. But 'reasoning' (like
'cabbage', Grice says) is one of those words that are value-oriented. They
bring
their own value on its face. There is no such thing as 'bad reasoning'. Bad
reasoning is just no reasoning.
So rather than 'why be rational?', the philosopher aims at providing
criteria for 'good' reasoning, where reasoning applies. Surely it doesn't apply
when Rodin is making his sculptures (but it applies when Buonarroti is
making his sculptures -- odd that).
Omar:
"Well, actually I thought that Popper of the Open Society had a point
there. Various parts of the rationalist system can be defended in rational
terms
but the system as a whole cannot be defended in its own terms without
circularity."
In what follows, Omar distinguishes between what Russell called an
object-language (wrongly) and a meta-language (a barbarism: a hybrid of a Greek
and a Latin root).
"We can (perhaps) explain to someone that such and such opinion or action
is rational and its opposite irrational but finally there comes a point when
we are asked asked: "Why be rational ?" At this point, it is difficult to
see how the question be answered except by saying "Because it is rational
to be rational " which is circular"
Grice considers this in his Bootstrap principle: how to pull yourself by
your own bootstraps. It ain't necessarily circular. Rather it involves an
object-language, "x is rational" and a meta-language", "it is rational that x
is rational". Granted, Grice's Bootstrap principle enjoins that no item or
object in the object-language be introduced unless we have ways to describe
it in the meta-language ('to save a problem for the morrow', he adds).
Omar:
"or else by invoking a personal or cultural commitment to rationalism which
is in itself not rational."
Granted, Grice, echoing Kant, called himself 'enough of a rationalist'.
There are degrees of rationalism. One can be rationalist when enjoying a
painting by Mondrian but not by Matisse, say. Similarly, to ask for a rational
price of shoes, when what one needs is that the price is merely reasonable
is to be over-Kantian.
Omar concludes:
"If the later Popper found a solution to this conundrum I would like to
know what it was."
Apparenly, it was Bartley, or Bartley III, as I prefer -- I love this very
aristocratic way that Americans have of keeping things that the French
ended with the French Revolution -- cfr. Louis XIV -- who led Popper out of
the
conundum. Bartley was famous for getting into trouble especially with
followers of Witters, and it's good to learn in this occasion he led someone
OUT of trouble.
Cheers,
Speranza
William Warren Bartley, III, was born in Wilkinsburg, Pennsylvania.
Bartley was brought up in a Protestant home.
His mother said, "I would have brought him up in a Protestant CHURCH, but
his father, W. W. Bartley II, protested. I was told my husband's mother had
also thought of bringing W. W. Bartley II in a Protestant Church, but W. W.
Bartley, I (as he then wasn't) had protested, too. It ran in the family."
W. W. Bartley, III, went to Harvard, graduating with a degree in
philosophy -- which was considered 'classy' (the combo Harvard + philosophy).
While at Harvard, W. W. Bartley, III was the editor at "The Harvard
Crimson", as he should (The "Harvard Crimson" didn't have an editor then, and
W.
W. Bartley, III, thought it reasonable to assume the position).
Later, the 'crossed the pond', as he put it, and met Sir Karl Popper at a
famous pub in London.
As it happened, Sir Karl (as he was known to his friends) was then advising
students, and so W. W. Bartley, III, wrote his PhD essay on "The Limits of
Rationality: A Critical Study of Some Logical Problems of Contemporary
Pragmatism and Related Movements".
He later said, "I know: it's a long title -- but I thought "The Limits of
rationality" was too short, on the other hand". "Popper was unsure that
'related movements' was adequate. ""Movement" best applies to W1, as when I
move my arm, but that's not what you have in mind, in W2, is it, 'the third'?"
(Popper kept referring to W. W. Bartley, III as 'the third' implicating he
knew W. W. Bartley, I, and W. W. Bartley, II).
Bits of "The Limits of Rationality, etc." were subsequently published in
his book, "The Retreat to Commitment".
Bartley would occasionally lecture in logic in London -- or "at London", as
he said in his letters to his family in the USA.
Later, he held positions at the Warburg Institute, which is very posh.
Even later, he was appointed a post at the University of California, where
Grice taught. But while Grice taught at UC/Berkeley, W. W. Bartley, III,
taught at UC/San Diego (Diego was a mediaeval saint, and W. W. Bartley, III,
as a Protestant, was sceptical about a university having a campus on a
saint's shrine).
That was perhaps the reason he moved to University of Pittsburgh, founde by
Pitts, a Protestant (the 'Burgh' is decorative).
W. W. Bartley, III, still later joined the California State University,
Hayward faculty as a Professor of Philosophy, where he received the
distinction of “Outstanding Professor” of the entire California State
University
System.
It should be noted that the California State University is NOT where Grice
taught. Grice taught at the University of California.
The Hayward faculty is named after Hayward.
Even later, W. W. Bartley became a Research Fellow ("that fellow doing
research there," as his mates called him, informally) at the Hoover
Institution, named after Hoover.
Bartley and Popper had a great admiration for each other.
In other words, their admiration was mutual or reciprocal.
This was partly because of their common stand against justificationism.
There were few justificationists living in London then, which perhaps
helped. ("All justificationists seem to have moved to Oxford -- or worse,
Cambridge). (Geary is a justificationist).
However, at the International Colloquium in the Philosophy of Science at
Bedford College, University of London, W. W. Bartley, III and his PhD thesis
advisor -- aka Sir Karlk -- came into conflict with each other.
Bartley had presented a paper, "Theories of Demarcation Between Science and
Metaphysics," in which he accused Popper of displaying a positivist
attitude in his early works and proposed that Popper's demarcation criterion
was
not as important as Popper thought it was.
"I should have written, "as Popper THEN thought it was. It is amusing that
all our fight was because I forgot to qualify Popper's thought."
Popper took this as a personal attack, as it wasn't. "I wasn't referring to
Popper the man, just Popper the philosopher". Popper replied in an open
letter, "By the same token, you might just as well distinguish between Margot
Fonteyn the woman and Margot Fonteyn the ballerina -- Nonsense!".
Bartley took Sir Karl's reply as indicating that Popper was ignoring his
criticism.
"To be precise, I took his reply as indicating that he had read my
criticism but found it _stoopid" (transcript of talk -- W. W. Bartley uses the
American pronunciation of 'stupid', /stupid/, not /stjupid/. Perhaps there is
an implicature there.
Their friendship was not restored until much later, after the publication
of The Philosophy of Karl Popper (edited by Paul Schillpp) in the "Library
of Living Philosophers" (As Schillpp commented, "Surely we don't need a
Library of Dead Philosophers").
W. W. Bartley, III, abruptly changed the tone of his remarks about Popper's
criterion of demarcation, making it less aggressive.
"I added a few 'pleases' and 'thankyous' for good measure. I even included
the occasional Germanism, to please his Austrian pride: 'ach', 'noch'").
However, despite the restored friendship, W. W. Bartley, III's view -- pace
McEvoy -- was never accepted by Popper, who criticised it even after
Bartley's death.
Popper said, "I knew he didn't then have a chance to respond", implicating,
'falsify my view'.
On top of things, W. W. Bartley, III, took the time to publish a very
controversial biography of Witters (Austin: Some like Witters, but Moore's MY
man"). ("I thought a bio of Moore would sell less").
Many perceived W. W. Bartley, III's book as a posthumous "attack" on
Wittgenstein, with the emphasis on 'attack' rather than 'posthumous' (Witters
was indeed dead by then).
In a second edition of the biography (La Salle, Illinois: Open Court, 1985,
pp. 159–97), W. W. Bartley, III, answered the objections of critics.
The biography inspired Jarman, where he makes a point about the connections
between Witters's philosophy and his private life (that W. W. Bartley,
III, denied -- but then 'never saw the film.').
W. W. Bartley, III, also wrote a biography of Werner Erhard, the founder of
est. It tells everything about Werner Erhard, from his birth to his days
of fame, with the bits in between.
W. W. Bartley, III, was graduate of Erhard Seminars Training.
Werner Erhard refers to W. W. Bartley, III, in the book as "My friend
Bill", which is odd, as W. W. Bartley went by the more aristocratic, "W. W.
Bartley, III", and hardly "Bill".
Still, W. W. Bartley, III, served on the advisory board of Est, an
educational company.
W. W. Bartley, III, edited the book by Oxonian C. L. Dodgson (best known
for "Alice in Wonderland"), Symbolic Logic, including the second volume,
which Carroll had never published.
"Alice never liked it," Dodgson says in his Private Journal. ("What's the
good of a book without drawings?"). What pained Dodgson is that the second
volume of Symbolic Logic "does have drawings -- if, if I myself might say
so, rather boring ones").
W. W. Bartley, III, extends Popperian epistemology in his book The Retreat
to Commitment, in which he describes Pancritical rationalism (PCR), a
development of critical rationalism and panrationalism.
PCR attempts to work around the problem of ultimate commitment or infinite
regress by decoupling criticism and justification.
A pancritical rationalist holds all positions open to criticism, including
PCR, and never resorts to authority for justification.
Cfr. Margaret Thatcher.
Parts of Popper's Realism and the Aim of Science, a book that W. W.
Bartley, III, edited, and the Addendum to the fourth edition of The Open
Society
and Its Enemies contain passages that are commonly interpreted as Popper's
acceptance of Bartley's views.
These were in fact written by W. W. Bartley, III, himself, but this is
controversial.
Alan Ebenstein, a biographer of F. A. Hayek, criticized W. W. Bartley, III,
for the extent of the changes he made as the editor of The Fatal Conceit.
("It was as if someone annotating Grice's "Logic and Conversation" were to
retitle the thing, "Conversation and Logic", he said to "The Financial
Times").
Bruce Cadwell suggests that the book in its published form may actually
have been written by W. W. Bartley, III.
Bartley lived in Oakland, that Grice often visited -- the city, because it
has a good Italian restaurant. Grice once found a stray cat in Oakland,
which he called "Oakland" (He already had one called Sausalito and one called
Moraga).
Bartley published "Unfathomed Knowledge, Unmeasured Wealth: On Universities
and the Wealth of Nations", a rather obscure book.
Other works he was preparing included writing a biography, and editing the
collected works, of Friedrich Hayek.
The latter was being completed after W. W. Bartley, III's death.
Also "unfinished" was a biography of Popper.
Both biographies were in an advanced stage at the time of W. W. Bartley,
III's death.
Bibliography: The Retreat to Commitment.
Morality and Religion.
Lewis Carroll's Symbolic Logic.
Wittgenstein.
Ludwig Wittgenstein e Karl Popper: maestri di scuola elementare.
Come demarcare la scienza della metafisica.
Werner Erhard, The Transformation of a Man: The Founding of est.
The Fatal Conceit: The Errors of Socialism, (editor, with F. A. Hayek)
Rehearsing a revolution – Karl Popper: A Life.
Unfathomed Knowledge, Unmeasured Wealth.
Notes: M. Artigas: The Ethical Nature of Karl Popper's Theory of
Knowledge, "About Bartley and the Institute". The Bartley Institute; David
Miller:
Bartley. Critical Rationalism; Gerard Radnitzky: William W. Bartley III
Popper Letters, Karl R. Popper: On the Sources of Knowledge and of Ignorance.
Proceedings of the British Academyreprinted in Conjectures and Refutations;
Kiichi Tachibana: Mails exchanged between Prof. Tachibana and Prof. Agassi
On the Kyoto Prize Workshop. Popper Letters William Warren Bartley III,
Wittgenstein, Philadelphia, Lippincott, Madigan, Timothy J. "The Uses and
Abuses of Philosophical Biographies". Philosophy Now Philosophy Now.
Ankerberg, John and John Weldon Encyclopedia of New Age Beliefs: The New Age
Movement. Eugene OR: Harvest House Publishers. Gardner, Martin The Universe in
a
Handkerchief: Lewis Carroll's Mathematical Recreations, Games, Puzzles, and
Word Plays. New York: Springer. Wettersten, John R. "Karl Popper and
Critical Rationalism". Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy. ^ Rowbottom,
Darrell
P. (Popper's Critical Rationalism: A Philosophical Investigation. New York:
Routledge. .
Alan Ebenstein: Investigation: The Fatal Deceit. Liberty 19:3. Karl
Popper, a Centenary Assessment Vol. 1: Life and Times, and Values in a World
of
Facts. Stephen Kresge: On the Passing of W. W. Bartley III. Popper Letters.
Obituary: “William W. Bartley 3d, Research Fellow, 55”, New York Times.
Caldwell, Bruce J. "Review of "Friedrich Hayek: A Biography"". The Independent
Review. Independent Institute. Why simply as Bartley. Bartley discussing
The Burghers of Calais with Popper, on Stanford campus Categories:
California State University, East Bay faculty, Critical rationalists.
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