Comments on Philosophy, et cetera: Constructivism and Intuitions

I'm not too familiar with any of that -- possibly ...

2007-01-19T21:35:00.000-05:00

I'm not too familiar with any of that -- possibly 'constructivism' and what I called 'conceptualism' are the same thing? I don't see any obvious link here to moral contractualism. What did you have in mind?

Are you therefore embracing a form of "costructivi...

2007-01-18T10:01:00.000-05:00

Are you therefore embracing a form of "costructivism" as a meta-philosophical theory? Scanlon is such a constructivist. Do you think there is a necessary connection between being a constructivist in your sense and being a contractualist in Scanlon's or Rawls sense? Or one could be either without being the other?

Yes, very helpful!

2007-01-18T01:44:00.000-05:00

Yes, very helpful!

"we'll need to take something as primitive""philos...

2007-01-16T05:53:00.000-05:00

"we'll need to take something as primitive"

"philosophical truth "just is the ideal limit of a priori inquiry"

I think we have to take the methods of a priori inquiry as primitive. I don't think that talk of the ideally rational agent plays any explanatory role at all - if we should mention it at all, we should do so only as an aid in describing this "conceptualist" position.

If you do this, then metaphysical worries about "where" philosophical truths are, or how they relate to the physical world, reduce to epistemological concerns about what a priori truths there are, and how we reason using these truths.

Does this sound correct?

Sorry for the belated response...Clayton - I'm com...

2007-01-15T01:34:00.000-05:00

Sorry for the belated response...

Clayton - I'm committed to saying that the ideally rational agent would believe in Conceptualism rather than Platonism, if that's what you mean?

Alex - yeah, there are obvious risks of circularity here (compare my old post on bootstrapping modality). So we'll need to take something as primitive. I'm inclined to favour the normative facts (e.g. about what ideally rational agents would believe; or, to avoid Euthyphro, whatever reasons lie behind these beliefs). What do you think is the best option here?

Richard,Would an ideally rational agent think that...

2007-01-08T22:49:00.000-05:00

Richard,
Would an ideally rational agent think that their intuition motivated beliefs aimed at an independent reality?

intuition is just what we call decisions made wher...

2007-01-07T12:52:00.000-05:00

intuition is just what we call decisions made where we can't remember what the justification was.
Actually almost everything is intuition.
GNZ

Hi Richard,I generally agree with your position, t...

2007-01-06T06:03:00.000-05:00

Hi Richard,
I generally agree with your position, though I tend to frame the issue little differently...
1)To intuit a truth =def. to comprehend something.
2)When something is comprehended, there is no need for additional justification.

So the way I see it the question:"how is this faculty supposed to work, exactly?" , has two different answers:

a) The simple one: It works by comprehension of something (e.g. relations between notions)

b) How comprehension works?
There can be different attempts of grounding the comprehension in something else, one is for example the Kantian attempt to explain its possibility (though he frames it little differently, i.e. "How are synthetic a priori judgments possible?"), but to my thinking in ideal case the answer can be nothing but comprehension of relation of thought and notion (or subject and world).

Good post, I'd been meaining to write a near ident...

2007-01-06T05:27:00.000-05:00

Good post, I'd been meaining to write a near identical one myself! It's worth noting, as I intend to post on now instead, that my argument about moral intuitions can be made consistently with this approach.

One minor issue:
"philosophical facts are made true simply by the fact that they are what ideally rational agents would believe."

I hope (and believe!) you mean this merely as an expository device, and not as analysis. If it's analysis, it's open to a euthyphro dilemma (in a manner that I assume is obvious, but tell me if its not!).