leonardomenderes wrote:
sam26


I have no idea what you are saying, and I have no idea how it relates to what I said at the beginning of this thread.


Understandable, considering I was not replying to you. Misdirected...sorry.

It was Lem that I was talking too.

hmmm...wonder if the software slipped a cog

Sam26 wrote:
Your point above, is the point I would make (if I understand you correctly) when it comes to addressing knowledge as 'justified true belief.' Gettier comes up with paradoxes, and all of a sudden people think "Oh my, we have to come up with a better definition, this definition of knowledge cannot account for this situation" - this is just nonsense (and yes I am being dogmatic about this). I would venture to say that there is no definition of knowledge that can account for every situation, because there are too many different kinds of situations that can arise, ie, too many too describe. This is where Wittgenstein's family resemblances come into play.

Yeah. I mean, it seems obvious that the word 'knowledge' has a somewhat diverse family of uses, like every other word. So I really have no idea why everyone expects to find one set of rules that encompasses every accepted use of the word. Or if they're not looking to apply the rules to every sense of 'knowledge,' then... what are they looking to apply them to? The 'justified true belief' sense? That's totally circular, so, yeah, I'm boggled.

I don't see a problem with having lots of language-games either. I guess my concern is, for instance, that we do not always understand the language-game of religion versus the language-game of philosophy. We use one set of rules in one language-game to diminish the language-game of another, which is rather weird because they are using a different set of rules for knowledge and truth (for the most part). This can be seen in our disputes about what is true in religion, versus what is true in the language-game of an atheist or an agnostic, or even a different religious language-game. I am not saying that it is all relative, because I do not believe it is. I just think that one of the ways of resolving such disputes is understanding Wittgenstein's method. I do not think it is the only way, but I believe it is an important way of resolving these kinds of arguments.

Agreed. And also just elucidating what's going on in them: language-games that are at least partially incommensurable talking past one another.

Sam26 wrote:
leonardomenderes wrote:
sam26


I have no idea what you are saying, and I have no idea how it relates to what I said at the beginning of this thread.


Understandable, considering I was not replying to you. Misdirected...sorry.

It was Lem that I was talking too.I was talking replying to leonardmenderes, saying that he had misunderstood something I had said.

To this day philosophers are making these same mistakes, they look for precise definitions for the words knowledge, truth, reality, etc, etc; and for the most part there are none, so round-and-round we go. The problem, it seems to me, is that we do not have a good grasp of the nature of meaning.

Excellent thread...but words be they English or Russia will still be questioner by philosophers. Words do not express the thoughts of the writer because that's all he knows.You can expand thoughts and words but the other reader might think the writer is wrong. Words like knowledge truth and reality are individually created and or not general believed. pljames

To this day philosophers are making these same mistakes, they look for precise definitions for the words knowledge, truth, reality, etc, etc; and for the most part there are none, so round-and-round we go. The problem, it seems to me, is that we do not have a good grasp of the nature of meaning.

Excellent thread...but words be they English or Russia will still be questioner by philosophers. Words do not express the thoughts of the writer because that's all he knows.You can expand thoughts and words but the other reader might think the writer is wrong. Words like knowledge truth and reality are individually created and or not general believed. pljames