Date: Thu, 9 Jul 1998 08:12:57 +0100
Subject: Re: In dubium revocari


>>Steven E. Callihan wrote:
>If we flip a coin, and on the first flip a head turns up and
>on the second flip a tail turns up, we can be as certain as we can possibly
>be, it seems to me, that the coin has a head on one side and a tail on the
>other.
Hi Steven,
you might enjoy reading GE Moore's two articles entitled Defense of
Common Sense and Proof of an External World. In one of these
articles, presented before Cambridge's Moral Club, Moore put up his
right hand and uttered "Here is one hand"; and then put up his other and
uttered "Here is another." From these two premises, together with a
"cousin" to your own premise, he concluded that the external world
exists. The cousin was to the effect that we can be not only as certain of
his premises as we can possibly be of anything, but also more certain of
them than any philosophical argument which tries to undermine them.
> But what convinces us of this?
I would like to ask, however, who is the "us" you are referring to and
"within what context" are you referring to them? Let me explain this
vague question by way of examples (these examples derive from
Thompson Clarke):
(1) Suppose that a few tattered pages of Bertrand Russell's Problems of
Philosophy washes up on the shore of an unknown island, home to only
an indigenous population. After years of study, their very own genius
comes to translate these sentences into their native tongue. They read:
"...we would like to know whether there are physical objects ...";
"...whether there are chairs, tables, pencils, ....buildings, books ..."; "...
can we know such things ...?" "... the problem is whether or not we can
be truly certain that chairs, tables, ... exist ...?" and a few other sundry
remarks and questions. These pages become the island's Rosetta Stone.

Several years later these people launch an expedition to other lands.
Successfully, they land in some European country, wherein they
discover buildings, books, tables, chairs, pencils, and many other such
physical objects. They return to their island and send Russell a letter in a
bottle: "Dear Russell, we have established that there ARE buildings,
books, tables, chairs, pencils, and a very rich array of other physical
objects. We know that there are. We have seen them, touched them,
and received some as gifts. So, we can be certain that there are ...." and
so on.

(2) A psychatrist is lecturing to a professional audience, and he states
that "unlike all of us who know that there is an external world of chairs,
tables, and other such bits of furniture, and like the infant who does not
yet know whether there are physical objects, certain persons suffering
from various syndroms also do not know and maintain that they cannot
be certain that there are physical objects or that there is an external
world. Such syndromes ...." and so forth.

As for the first example, will the letter which they send to Russell
answer Russell's questions? As for the second example, does the
psychiatriac community, unbeknownst to the philosophical community,
know that physical objects exist, that an external world exists, that we
can be certain of these? 

The point is that the 'demonstrations' in everyday life do not inveigh
against the traditional philosophical problems at all. Of course, the
psychiatric community and the island's people use the same word forms
as used in traditional philosophy. And those word forms come to
express for them problems about 'what exist' and 'what they can know
to exist' and 'what they can certain to be the case'. Like your coin-
tossing, Moore's hand-raising, and the island's people's touching and
seeings demonstrat what exist and what they can be certain of being the
case.

But to whom are these demonstrations convincing? To the traditional
philosopher? Or to other members on the island or to someone who,
for some reason, suffers a problem from which Moore's demonstrations
provide relief?

What the island people, Moore, and you did do not answer the
traditional philosophical problem. These are demonstrations in the
contexts of everyday life and, thus, are assessed with respect to the
'implicit heuristics' used therein to establish certainty. Your coin-tossing
might convince someone who, for some reason, doubts that there is a
certainty or probablity of 1 that either the coin will come up heads or
the coin will come up tails.

However, the traditional philosopher would like to know what justifies
you in your 'convictions' about the coin toss. Can you be certain that
you have a coin? Can you be certain that you tossed it? Can you be
certain that what you seem to have caught is identical to what you
seemed to have thrown? Can you be certain that you remember
correctly the results of the first coin tossing, if that is what you did? Can
Moore be certain that he is holding up a hand, that he is standing there
before the Moral Club? How can Moore be certain that he is not just
dreaming that he is before the Moral Club? How do the island's
explorers know that they were not hallucinating or dreaming? And these
questions, in the PHILOSOPHICAL CONTEXTS of these
demonstrations, invoke legitimate counter-possibilities. So, to justify
your claim to certainty you need to rule them out first in order to secure
certainty.

In Wittgenstein's words, "if we grant you that 'here is one hand', then we
grant you all the rest." Similarly, if we grant you that you have a coin,
that you tossed it, that it showed a head or a tail, etc., then we grant you
"all the rest." All the rest is simply the entire jurisdiction of our everyday
epistemic  practices. And if we grant you that, then the coin tossing
demonstration would not be needed, except for somebody who doubts,
as mentioned above, that there is a certainty or probablity of 1 that
either the coin will come up heads or the coin will come up tails.

That is why I ask TO whom is this a demonstration and IN what
context? 

As Kant wrote, the question is not quid facti, about to what our
everyday epistemic practices seem to entitle us. The problem is quid
juris, whether or not we are justified in such entitlement, ie, are really
entitled to what those practices seem to entitle us in everyday life.

>Peirce, in "The Fixation of Belief," dispenses with this problem by simply
>stating that there is an abundance of things which we would hardly conceive
>of doubting.
Like Moore, perhaps? 

>Ultimately, we believe that certain things are indubitably
>true, because to believe otherwise would be to see all the cards fall to the
>ground.
Who does, and in what context? Imagine your words as uttered by a
psychiatrist or someone pursuing Quine's project of Naturalized
Epistemology. These words seem unimpeachable. However, they do
not scathe the traditional philosophical problem. "Why they do not, and
what the tradition is asking" are issues about the very nature of
philosophy itself and the nature of the traditional problems.

I suppose that my point is that in so far as we 'read'/'interpret' your
coin-tossing philosophically, it doesn't scratch the traditional itch; and in
so far as we 'read'/'interpret' it as actually convincing someone, it is not
deomnstrate a philosophical position.

And at this point, something like Heidegger's view (or the later
Wittgenstein?), of questioning the very traditional questions themselves,
seems the only alternative available.
Kindest Regards,
jim


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