John, Stephen, list:
I think it’s bad form to think that metaphysicians should not expect any certainties in their inquiries. This business of understanding the problem of universals can be understood by getting a better sense for how the genitive case operates in context of syllogism, as I think Stephen was referring. Best, Jerry Rhee On Sat, Feb 4, 2017 at 5:26 PM, Stephen C. Rose <stever...@gmail.com> wrote: > If you use the term universal providing a context it seems to me to be a > useful use of it. I use it to refer to values which I believe have > universal applicability. By which I mean that everyone should ideally > espouse them. Without some such way of speaking it is difficult to say > anything important about such things as democracy or idolatry or any other > term which has many contexts and meanings, not to mention evocations. I > understand this is a Peirce list but the sense I got from reading this post > is that the effort is to widen applicability and that terms like universal > are problematic, to say the least. In reading Peirce I have noted more than > once his own evocation of the non-scientific general ordinary person > favorably and I get the impression he was interested in applicability > generally. > > Books http://buff.ly/15GfdqU > > On Sat, Feb 4, 2017 at 6:14 PM, John F Sowa <s...@bestweb.net> wrote: > >> On 2/4/2017 11:10 AM, Jon Awbrey wrote: >> >>> I have been reading up on Peirce's version of scholastic realism and his >>> opposition to various forms of nominalism. He seems to have consistently >>> preferred the term “general” to “universal” (e.g., CP 2.367); has anyone >>> ever tried to figure out why? >>> >> >> The word 'universal' had become overloaded with centuries of baggage >> with conflicting definitions that CSP probably did not want to endorse. >> >> I wrote the following article for the _Applied Ontology Journal_, >> in which I recommended Peirce's semiotic as a replacement for >> a lot of ancient baggage that was more confusing than useful: >> http://www.jfsowa.com/pubs/signs.pdf >> >> To focus the discussion, I started with a book by David Armstrong: >> Armstrong, David M. (1989) Universals: An Opinionated Introduction, >> Boulder: Westview Press. >> >> An excerpt from my article that includes quotations by Armstrong: >> >>> On page 1, Armstrong began with a cautionary note about the “Problem >>> of Universals”: >>> >>> So let me begin by saying what the problem is. It may turn out that >>> it is really a pseudo-problem. That was the opinion of Wittgenstein >>> and his followers, for instance. Quine is not far from thinking the >>> same. But whether it is a real problem or not should not be decided >>> in advance. >>> >>> The index of that book is a warning of the terminology to come: >>> >>> abstract particulars; argument from almost indiscernible cycles; >>> blob theories; bundle theories; identity of indiscernibles; >>> indiscernibility of identicals; particulars (bare, perfect, >>> thick, thin); tropes (a posteriori, bundles, causality, >>> co-extensive, higher-order, independent existence of, natural >>> classes of, nontransferable, sparse); universalia (ante res, >>> in res, inter res). >>> >>> Armstrong’s final chapter summarizes the issues: >>> >>> Metaphysicians should not expect any certainties in their >>> inquiries... Of all the results that have been argued for here, >>> the most secure, I believe, is the real existence of properties >>> and relations. Whether they be universals or particulars is a >>> more delicate matter, and just what properties and relations >>> are required is obscure, and in any case not for the philosopher >>> to determine. >>> >>> To illustrate the issues, Armstrong cited a “distinction that >>> practically all contemporary philosophers accept... It is the >>> distinction between token and type” by Charles Sanders Peirce. >>> As an example, he noted that the phrase the same in the sentence >>> 'Two ladies wore the same dress' means the same type of dress, >>> not the same token. In general, tokens are particulars, and types >>> are universals. But Armstrong cited many more examples that show >>> the complexities and ambiguities in any attempt to define precise >>> identity conditions. >>> >> >> I don't know exactly why Peirce avoided the word 'universal', but I >> suspect that he saw the kinds of confusions that it had caused in >> his day. He did not want to get sucked into that swamp. >> >> John >> >> >> ----------------------------- >> PEIRCE-L subscribers: Click on "Reply List" or "Reply All" to REPLY ON >> PEIRCE-L to this message. PEIRCE-L posts should go to >> peirce-L@list.iupui.edu . To UNSUBSCRIBE, send a message not to PEIRCE-L >> but to l...@list.iupui.edu with the line "UNSubscribe PEIRCE-L" in the >> BODY of the message. More at http://www.cspeirce.com/peirce >> -l/peirce-l.htm . >> >> >> >> >> >> > > > ----------------------------- > PEIRCE-L subscribers: Click on "Reply List" or "Reply All" to REPLY ON > PEIRCE-L to this message. PEIRCE-L posts should go to > peirce-L@list.iupui.edu . To UNSUBSCRIBE, send a message not to PEIRCE-L > but to l...@list.iupui.edu with the line "UNSubscribe PEIRCE-L" in the > BODY of the message. More at http://www.cspeirce.com/peirce-l/peirce-l.htm > . > > > > > >
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