Ierrellus

Gurdur:

I really do appreciate your return to this thread, if we can discuss the subject/object problem without preconceived notions of what each is trying to express here.

The attraction/repulsion model is no more a metaphor than the Bohr use of Copernicus' concept of the solar system to explain the constituencies of an atom. If the model/metaphor yields further understanding of a system, it will persist. If not, it won't.

Phaedrus is right to question subject/object reference as the only one for a human grasp of reality. I have no agenda here of espousing some quintessential truth of origins of anything. I am only hoping that relevant dialogue will provide further understanding.

Have you read Chomsky's essays on language and mind?

Ierrellus

Ierrellus

Ender:

Is the doer the deed?

Ierrellus

phaedrus

Gurdur

If there is no language, does the bifurcation vanish?

No.

So essentially the subject/object thingey is innate?

A major part of human communication - often said to be about 90%, but never strictly quantified - is in fact so-called non-verbal communication, more properly called non-grammatical communication.

Language is grammar is language.
Language is a small sub-set of communication

Umm if you notice my original sentence, it talks about share, discuss and agree in addition to "communication". So how far does non-verbal communication help us there?

And how much of this non-verbal communication is dependent on the subject/object distinction (SOD) or is affected by SOD?

There is a question of whether particular constructions are limited to one particular language, or group of languages, or are shared by all human languages.

So you are saying there is an innate SOD in all of us inspite of our cultural/historical/linguistic grounding? How exactly would you phrase the subject/object distinction?

No; the two go together - they have at the end a common cause, if you like.

Umm, coherent speech and SOD have a common cause at the end? Could you elaborate?

Since in certain ecstatic states the subject/object dichotomy is felt to disappear - though in fact it can be shown not to have.
In such states, attained by whatever routes, people are mostly incapable of either coherent complex action or language.

You are saying people who meditate or are in a state of meditation are incapable of coherent complex action or language? What do you mean by “mostly”? Are there instances where they are capable of performing these actions?

Nope.
But first one must have the subject/object difference before one can envisage different ways, with the exceptions of infancy and certain mental states outlined above

You mean to say until and unless an individual is able to understand that he/she is the subject and the world around presents objects and both are ontologically independent, they cant envisage ways of viewing the world in other ways than through the SOD viewing glasses?

Now going by your examples above..when you talk about an infant…has the child first learnt SOD or has first learnt to deal with the world without SOD and then learnt SOD as it grew up through its parents and peers?

Regarding subject/object thingey….here is what I had offered to another chap on a now extinct great board…. We understand real objects in their own terms as independent and separable substances; yet real objects are also the phenomenal objects that are present in perception, and these have an essential epistemological dependence on the subject. We are free to ask whether this is a peculiarity of our knowledge, that we can't help but conceive of objects except as objects-for-a-subject, since it is impossible for us to have knowledge outside of our subjective viewpoint, or whether it reflects something essential about reality, that consciousness and subjectivity are things that are just as fundamental ontologically as is the external, physical, and objective. Is undecidability merely a limitation on our knowledge? Or does it reflect, as it is reasonable to ask about quantum uncertainty, some basic truth in which there is no indecision and no uncertainty?

JP

Edited for formatting...

[ May 15, 2002: Message edited by: phaedrus ]</p>

Ender

Gurdur
Reasoning? I heard very little reasoning beyond dogmatic declaratives. Since I will not be very active the next couple of weeks and won't probe further, I will ask you this: do you know the difference between linguistic philosophy and the philosophy of language?

After my schedule becomes more forgiving I'll plop in my two cents and grunt my almighty grunts!

~WiGGiN~

[ May 15, 2002: Message edited by: Ender ]</p>

Ender

For Nietzsche there is no such thing as a Cartesian self- he thinks the "I" is a grammatical fiction. In addition, since his theory of knowledge, perspectivism denies objectivity, there is no "objective" world, either. So, what is left is but only the "deed" or a manifestation of the unceasing force or "becoming," the wille zur macht.

Adrian Selby

"there is no "objective" world, either"

You may have to clarify this for me, but would this mean that if the whole of humanity got wiped out, there would be no world? Or is N merely referring to the possibility of us knowing whether there is an objective world?

Adrian

Ierrellus

Looking back to my response to Bill the Cat, I can now see the cause of the ensuing intellectual merriment. You guys are right. The response sounds like ravings of a fundie preacher. It is bloated with issues presented in a declarative manner.

The real issues concern SOD, whether or not it exists, whether or not, if it does exist it reveals anything about how or why we think as we do, etc. Phaedrus stated it much better.

I do believe that SOD has 'moral' implications, but that these may be merely a matter of opinion.

I would not want to live in Nietzche's "worldview".

Ierrellus

Ierrellus

Nietzche's denial of SOD merely places the total human perspective of an event on the verb (activity, identity), which is foreign to human semantics, but could suggest animal perception of phenomena. If one says, "John kills a bear."; the burden of interpretation placed on "kills" tells no one who did what or when.

It can be suggested from observations of animal sounds, specifically those of alarm, that an interpretation of the event symbolized by the sounds must be in the present tense. No animal would waste time screeching, "There is a tiger among us.", but would probably be saying to all who could hear, "tigering", i. e., the threat is present. Consequently animals do not sit around in groups discussing the deeds of their ancestors or making plans for a future hunt.

Ierrellus

Ierrellus

Darwin believed that the subject/object dichotomy was a consequence of the evolutionary development of social animals in that they needed to protect their families or kinds from other predators. I believe the dichotomy is an innate reference for allowing feeding, mating, escape from predators or defensive aggression.

The strong drive of the four F's of animal consciousness appears to find mitigation of intensity only among humans. Is this not the basis of human morality?

Ierrellus

PS How do I respond to criticisms that smack of condescension? Can we not agree on homology?

[ May 18, 2002: Message edited by: Ierrellus ]

[ May 18, 2002: Message edited by: Ierrellus ]</p>

Gurdur

Thanks.
Pardon me if I occasionally sound irate.
It's just me.

The problem is is that it's a poetic metaphor, chosen for semantic rather than empirical grounds.

Yes, I have paid for all my sins - no doubt hideous and numerous - in all my past lives, by having read Chomsky repeatedly.

My brain never really did recover.