[lit-ideas] Re: What is a transcendental claim?
- From: Donal McEvoy <donalmcevoyuk@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 22:47:32 +0000 (GMT)
Perhaps I should be boning up the TLP and not putting my nose in here, but just
some comment on the very last part:-
--- On Sat, 20/12/08, Eric Dean <ecdean99@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> It seems to me that all general claims can be restated as
> conditions for the possibility of experiences,
But not necessarily is the re-statement valid, and in re-stating we have to
bear in mind different kinds of possibility: see below.
>so for the
> term 'transcendental' to distinguish some general
> claims from others it must be distinguishing them either in
> terms of the types of condition, types of experience, the
> scope of 'conditions' or the scope of
> 'experiences, or in some other way.
> To illustrate the assertion that all general claims can be
> restated as conditions for the possibility of experiences
> consider:
>
> a. This stove never works right.
> b. It is a condition of the possibility of using this stove
> that the attempt will be frustrated.
Let us say that 'a.' = There is no occasion on which this particular stove will
ever work right.
And say that 'b.' = It is _not possible_ that this particular stove will work
ever right.
We might agree that for anything to be actual it must be possible (i.e.
'possibly actual'):- this means that from (the truth of) 'a.' we can deduce,
trivially, that _it is possible_ that there is no occasion on which this
particular stove will ever work right. After all if it is not possible, it
cannot be actually the case that 'a.'.
But this deduction would not necessarily validate 'b.': for the _possibility_
that 'a.' is compatible with the _possibility_ that 'non-a.'; this is so even
if it is impossible that 'a.' and 'non-a' are both 'actual' or 'the case'. That
is, while my dog cannot at the same time have four legs and not have four legs,
it may still be the case that it is possible that he has four legs and possible
that he does not - in other words, it may still be the case that neither
condition is an 'impossibility'.
This is so whether we take possible/impossible to refer to what is _logically_
possible/impossible or whether we take it refer to what is _empirically_
possible/impossible.
Yet 'b.' goes beyond all this and asserts that 'non-a.' is _not possible_
(rather than merely assert that 'non-a.' is not actual or actually the case,
which may be deduced from 'a.'). In this way 'b.' cannot be deduced from 'a.'
since the truth of 'a.' may be a contingent truth, and so its truth does not
preclude _the possibility of its negation having been true in another logically
conceivable world_.
In saying 'a.' may be a contingent truth, it may be either logically contingent
or empirically contingent.
It is possible to have a universal generalisation ['UG'] that is empirically
contingent (in which case it will be logically contingent). Take the UG "All
dodo birds die before they reach a height greater than four feet". We may show
that no dodo ever did reach a height greater than four feet, and may show that
since it is now extinct there will never be a dodo greater than four feet high:
so the UG is valid. But the UG, though valid, does not therefore necessarily
point to either an empirical or a logical necessity: it might well be logically
conceivable, and there might be no empirical laws that would prohibit this
occurring, that at least one dodo _might_ have reached a height greater than
four feet - though as it happens the species was wiped out before this
evolutionary possibility ever happened.
So among UGs that are valid will be UGs that
(a) are empirically contingent (and also therefore logically contingent).
(b) are logically contingent (but not therefore necessarily empirically
contingent e.g. "E=mc2" might point to a universal law or structural property
of the universe and thus to an empirical necessity, though it is not a
statement of any sort of logical necessity).
(c) reflect an empirical necessity (though not necessarily a logical necessity
e.g. "E=mc2").
(d) reflect a logical necessity.
So to avoid confusion we need to distinguish (at least) between contingent UGs
and non-contingent UGs, and between logical and empirical forms of
contingency/necessity.
And these distinctions should be borne in mind when we debate whether some kind
of UG should be viewed as a T-claim.
Donal
Only trying to help
Though maybe spreading confusion
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