Conger is right,civilized argument is not the same as knowing you could get shot. Kate Sullivan -----Original Message----- From: William Conger <[email protected]> To: aesthetics-l <[email protected]> Sent: Wed, Jan 16, 2013 6:22 pm Subject: Re: Art is money
As a longtime academic and administrator in a tier 1 research university, where real reputations are at stake for the merest of reasons, I know what lecture hall or conference room arguments are like and they cannot be equated with actual foxhole or battlefield life and death terror, usually random, which makes it all the more fearful. It's hyperbole to compare any academic dispute with any real-world shooting battlefield. Period. wc ________________________________ From: "[email protected]" <[email protected]> To: [email protected] Sent: Wed, January 16, 2013 4:32:30 PM Subject: Re: Art is money William writes: "That event [the debate/argument/verbal-conflict between Popper and Wittgenstein in a meetng room in Cambridge in 1946] does not qualify as an analogy for a real battlefield where, we may assume, the speakers are subject to incoming fire, not fire between themselves." I don't think William has this right. I've seen similar meeting room disputes between philosophers. The disputants, the battlers, are the opposing philosophers. They are verbally firing on each other. They are not jointly subject to "incoming fire" from some external-to-the-hall source. Hell, it doesn't have to be philosophy; how many of us have seen husband-and-wife disputes, parent-child disputes, that have turned living rooms into veritable battlefields, metaphorically speaking. See the play and movie CARNAGE. Incidentally, if you do read WITTGENSTEIN'S POKER, you'll find that several other of your assumptions about that encounter are denied by numerous commentators who were there. In a message dated 1/15/13 5:14:18 PM, [email protected] writes:
This book, as I understand it, is an examination after the fact of the famous heated (battlefield-like) encounter between Wittgenstein and Popper.
That
event does not qualify as an analogy for a real battlefield where, we may assume, the speakers are subject to incoming fire, not fire between themselves. Besides, it seems as if Wittgenstein lost it at the famous encounter and was
menacing
Popper with the poker iron -- more or less. Popper won the debate by being witty. I don't see why you are mentioning that book in relation to your
battlefield
conversation, unless it's a lecture hall battlefield. wc ________________________________ From: "[email protected]" <[email protected]> To: [email protected] Sent: Tue, January 15, 2013 4:01:04 PM Subject: Re: Art is money Look up the short, interesting book, WITTGENSTEIN'S POKER, some time. In a message dated 1/15/13 4:20:39 PM, [email protected] writes: > I'm having trouble believing a battlefield conversation on polite > linguistic > problems. > > My expectation would be that a battlefield conversation would be
limited
> to very > short practical sentences or to outbursts of rage, fear, etc. Or
wheezy
> silence. But I've never been on a battlefield shooting or being
shot
at. > > wc > > > > > > ________________________________ > From: "[email protected]" <[email protected]> > To: [email protected] > Sent: Tue, January 15, 2013 2:30:57 PM > Subject: Re: Art is money > > Talk-sounds is stunningly ugly. > Kate Sullivan > > -----Original Message----- > From: Cheerskep <[email protected]> > To: aesthetics-l <[email protected]> > Sent: Tue, Jan 15, 2013 1:29 pm > Subject: Re: Art is money > > I wrote: > > > > > The use of the word 'art' has metastisized so wildly, so > uncontrolledly, > > > because though the human mind was clever enough to devise
language,
> it > > has > > not > > > been nearly clever enough to make its use foolproof. > > > language is still in a primitive stage comparable to riflery
soon
> after > > its > > > invention, when the projectiles were spherical metal balls > > > Michael responded: > > > > Please, Tom, that's a ludicrous bit of hyperbole. Language is one
of
> the > > oldest human accomplishments, perhaps the very oldest communal > > accomplishment--how could societies have arisen without
communication.
> > Language isn't *primitive*, either chronologically or notionally:
it's
> > geometrically more complex than almost every other human
production.
> > Everything humans have made or invented have, typically, has only
a
> few > > capabilities. Language is infinitely malleable, as the first
sentence
> of > > this > > excerpt acknowledges. > > > I stand by my allegation of "primitive". About two-thirds of the
way
> through the nineteenth century, "philosophy of language" had not
been
> invented > yet. Writers then (rightfully) gloried in what language could do. > Notice that > I said, "For some purposes". If you'd gone to the philosophers in
the
> late > 19th and told them that, for the next 125 years, philosophy would be > bent > over language trying to straighten it out, you might have been told, > "that's a > ludicrous bit of hyperbole." Then came Frege, Russell, Whitehead, > Tarski, > Strawson, Wittgenstein, Austin, Searle, Quine, Grice, Davidson, > Donnellan, > Putnam, Kripke... > > In something I'm working on, I found myself writing: > > BREN > Oh, our talk-sounds often work well enough -- in the kitchen, on a
ball
> field or a battlefield. Because we all link simple sounds like Milk! > Run! > Shoot! with similar raw sensations -- > KIT > -- But we're not in a kitchen right now -- > BREN > -- No, we're on a battlefield -- > KIT > -- I'm saying listen to us! We're understanding each other! > BREN > We are? ...With philosophy, politics, religion -- when we hear their > psychedelic sounds -- 'freedom', 'art', 'salvation', 'understand', > 'meaning' > -- we > all conjure notions, but they're abstract, fuzzy, and, most
important,
> various. > > > If anything, language -- as a philosophical tool in the mire of Saul > Kripke's modal logic -- is perhaps more bogged down now than it was > fifty > years > ago. I'd love to see where it will be (for philosophy) a hundred > years from > now.
