Pursuing praxis

"  "

Homework, discussion, and thought-provocation. I won’t tell you how long it took me to achieve a diagramatic level of clarity on this.

Numbers in the diagram explicated below. 

1 & 2. Existence is identity. That which exists has identity; that which has identity, exists. This one fact can be viewed from two perspectives:
     1. Existence. "It is." This concept differentiates a thing from nothing. This is the primary identification of consciousness.
     2. Identity. "It is." This concept differentiates one thing from another. A second step in cognition.

The context and purpose of the two concepts differ, but they name the same fact.

3 & 4: To talk of things (which exist), requires awareness of them.
     3. This is the fact of concsiousness. Consciousness exists.
     4. Consciousness is awareness of something which exists. Consciousness is awareness of existence. As a part of existence (#3), and dependent on it (#7), consciousness is and can only be conscious of that which exists. Consciousness exists (#3), and it is an awareness of something that exists (#4).

5. Because consciousness exists, and because existence is identity, consciousness has identity. Its identity is: awareness of existence.

6. Because consciousness has an identity, it exists.

7. Consciousness implies existence, but existence as a fact does not imply consciousness. Thus, existence is prior to and independent of consciousness. Conversely, consciousness is existentially (and functionally) dependent on existence. See #1.

You can also visualize #7 by collapsing all the double-sided arrows, which function as equals-signs, leaving the one up-ward vector going from existence to consciousness.

Alternatively, I could have drawn a circle-diagram, with a little bubble labelled "consciousness" nested with a big bubble labelled "existence," showing that the existence of consciousness is a sub-set of all that exists, and it participating in the fundamental properties of existence - namely identity. If existence = identity, then we can swap labels, from "Existence of all that exists" to "Identity of all that exists". And from "Existence of consciousness" to "Identity of consciousness." Both the existence and identity of consciousness are seen to flow from, and be dependent on, existence as such.

No surprises here, though I am tired of typing the word ‘existence.’ 

My infuriated mind can barely grasp the retardedness of c. 20th century logicians and philosophers of math. I’m this-close to endorsing professional stranglers for hire. A time travel box for them would be even better. Sigh.

Philosophical detection is a lot easier than I thought it was. It’s all just sitting there, right in front of you (or on wikipedia) - you just have to know what the words mean. I mean, mean. Where they come from, what they entail. And you can even do this with a rough understanding of concepts. Take a working hypothesis, generate a prediction, then go look for it. "Godel’s incompleteness theorems smack of utter BS - the kind of BS that usually comes from very bad starting points. Of Kant and Plato and the like. I wonder if Kant had a strong influence on him." Yep. Counter-prediction? "Godel was strongly influenced by clear-headed thinkers of the past, give or take, like Aristotle and Bacon and maybe Locke, and maybe even had a childhood hero of Newton or the like." Negatory.

More rants later. I have real work to do.  

I was thinking about Aristotle’s "intuitive reasoning" and induction - which I unsubtly equate - and protothetical logic. And, having only a vague conception about the point and validity of the latter, much less its methodologies (so my evaluation remains on hold, though distinctly leaning towards "bunk"), my conclusions can only aspire to that level of clarity.

Nevertheless, in asking questions about (correct me if I’m wrong on protothetical logic) the origin of reason, the identification/definition of the unit or "one" (and the attendant historical setting, and therefore the purpose and range of applicability of the definition), and therefore the question of whether we are innately or arbitrarily rational, it seems faintly obvious to me that, as HWB Joseph has said, men can’t create logic, study it or talk of it, if men weren’t already rational (by capacity and choice, if not by necessity). And, given that our mode of reasoning - and therefore logic - are derived from both the observed nature of reality and the particular ways the human mind functions, it seems even more obvious that the human mind has more than adequately evolved in the context of said reality, and is in a sense programmed for knowing it tolerably well. That programming - or capacity or tendency or whatever - may even be a primary causal basis of our evolution, but that’s beyond our current knowledge and in need of demonstration. It’s also not essential to this argument.

And, if we are considering the origin of reason and our natural modes of cognitive operation, the most obvious line of inquiry and investigation is the domain of biology. For example: how does induction work at the neurological level? [current black blox]. Do other animals possess rudimentary or even highly complex and competent forms of induction? [Anyone can train a dog.] What happens if you artificially screw with an animal’s experience of perceived reality - if you change things arbitrarily such that no patterns emerge, nothing is reliable or repeatable? What happens to the animal behaviorally, psychologically, physiologically? In what environmental, social and cognitive context(s) did the human lineage evolve? Even, test the tenets of logic - psychologically and experimentally. Can a thing both be and not be something simultaneously? (That’d be a hideously boring experiment, but I won’t speculate on the desires and motivations of some; many important things are intolerable to some subset of the human population.)

In short, I think Aristotle’s "intuitive reasoning", and the mechanism of induction, are biologically based and therefore explainable, and not philosophically problematic. Quasi-automatic knowledge by induction is in many ways a given, and a valid starting point (a good working hypothesis) for more explicit investigations and knowledge-building. But it’s the job of scientists to explain how induction happens. And describing it won’t change the phenomenon of induction, though it can add tremendous amounts of context and understanding. This may in turn flesh out our understanding of human cognition, psychology, epistemology, etc - but I don’t think it will fundamentally change philosophy.

And, while it’s possible that the definition of the unit was arbitrary at its time of creation, by subsequent use (and therefore by thousands of years of implicit experimentation) it has lost any veneer or odor of the arbitrary, and is a fully legitimate and vetted philosophic concept underlying pretty much all human thought and action. I would even argue underlying the action of conscious animals (another testable hypothesis).

Thus, I have secured the rug that was once nearly pulled out from under me, and explains why I am not apologetic for my strong affinity to logic, reason, rationality, and analysis. By my experience and analysis I think that it works, when used carefully and properly, which leads me to accept its foundations.

Close! Very close to what I’m after. However, I was told by my recommender that it’s written from a Modern Synthesis pan-adaptationist perspective, which kinda sucks, but hey, it’s a start. At least someone is thinking similarly.

William S. Cooper. 2003. The Evolution of Reason: Logic as a Branch of Biology. Cambridge Studies in Philosophy and Biology. Michael Ruse, series editor. Cambridge University Press.

Description:

The formal systems of logic have ordinarily been regarded as independent of biology, but recent developments in evolutionary theory suggest that biology and logic may be intimately interrelated. In this book, William Cooper outlines a theory of rationality in which logical law emerges as an intrinsic aspect of evolutionary biology. This biological perspective on logic, though at present unorthodox, could change traditional ideas about the reasoning process. Cooper examines the connections between logic and evolutionary biology and illustrates how logical rules are derived directly from evolutionary principles, and therefore have no independent status of their own. Laws of decision theory, utility theory, induction, and deduction are reinterpreted as natural consequences of evolutionary processes. Cooper’s connection of logical law to evolutionary theory ultimately results in a unified foundation for an evolutionary science of reason. It will be of interest to professionals and students of philosophy of science, logic, evolutionary theory, and cognitive science.

The review on Amazon is also helpful.  

Previous related posts:

People are Logical
Reflecting Myself (see comments) 

A follow-up to a previous post on the apparent biological basis of logicality. Specifically, I said:

> As in, whatever the contents of your mind, your feelings and actions
> flow logically and consistently from them.

Let me clarify a little:

It’s all in how you look at the word logical, and contrast it with the word rational. See, all the irrational actions of people the world over are highly logical:

1) It’s exceedingly hard to do things contrary to one’s most deeply held principles (feelings get in the way; feelings are kind of a speedy comparison of a situation to one’s principles; the rough description: good feelings = go, bad feelings = don’t go), and it’s really really easy to do things that are in alignment with one’s most deeply held principles.

2) Many people have never stopped to ask what their most deeply held principles are, although they have absorbed them (whatever mongrel principles they may be) over the course of their life, from all the ready sources: family, friends, culture, media, etc etc.

3) Becase we can, with work, identify our base principles, and because people have the power to change many aspects of themselves, it follows that with (considerable) work, people can identify and change their base principles. A change in principle thus results in a change in feelings regarding a given situation, and a change of easiest-behavior.

Now, it is true that people can do things that are hard, and exercise their "will" in apparent contrast to their apparent values, i.e. people don’t always take the easiest route. (Here I would actually argue that this is far rarer than it would seem; you’re usually swapping values, so that your new action is contrary to an old value, but consistent with a new value; I’m not even sure if complete arbitrariness is even possible, but that’s another discussion). But you’ll never convince me that the millions and billions of people doing stupid, irrational, hostile, violent things with considerable moral, emotional, and physical consequences are ALL working AGAINST deep principles that are diametrically opposed to those stupid actions. I would actually argue that most people act consistently with their values, such as they are (and the are usually not good - they are often contradictory and prevent having a healthy, active mind). In this consistency, people can be said to be behaving logically, i.e. given a set of principles, what actions flow logically from them? Answer: the muck that you typically see from people. People, by and large, behave logically.

But that doesn’t make them rational. I think rational is a broader term with higher standards. Logic is just a computer - you get out what you put into it. Many people are irrational because the starting points of their logical actions (i.e. their principles) are flawed, contradictory, and inconsistent. If you start with principles that are incompatible with happiness, you can never be fully happy, although you may achieve a modicum of happiness cobbled together from unrelated consequences. If you start with principles that are not logically compatible with each other (i.e. are contradictory with one another, partially or completely, on one or more levels) you will never be able to lead a fully rational, integrated life; some aspects of your life will always clash.

Hence the widespread compartmentalization of people’s minds. Rather than address the root issue, it’s often easier to just try to prevent communication between different parts of your life, thereby reducing the frequency of shitty conflicts, conundrums, and dilemmas you experience (religion and science as separate epistemological compartments are exceedingly common, including for many professors, like my advisor).

But it does nothing to address the root problem, and if the shit hits the fan, you have no recourse to action except to complain that life is full of shitty conflicts, that life isn’t fair, that people aren’t meant to be happy, that death and taxes are the only sure thing, that life isn’t logical, and that rationality is overrated at best, false at worst. Of course, life is logical, it’s just that what we give it is crap to start with, oftentimes.

The alternative is, of course, to explicitly identify and evaluate your most basic values and principles - the axioms of your life, the things you won’t (can’t) ever betray or refute or contradict or hide from. This is really hard, but for motivated long-term thinkers, the payoff is so obvious and so extraordinary that the initial energy expenditure is dwarfed by comparison. Hence the on-going revision of my life. The revision pays dividends en route, of course, which makes things easier, and I expect it to be, more or less, a life-long journey for me. Even if someone told me I’d never achieve complete consistency at the end of my very long life, I’d still say it was worth it. Seeing how emotionally tortured, twisted, and mangled many people are - and they only barely realize it, and yet it governs their life like the most totalitarian of dictators - makes the decision virtually automatic for me. The alternative is so awful, that NOT climbing Mt. Everest is simply not an option.

Is the logicality of the human mind more obvious, now? The mind being a suped-up computer, of sorts, I think it makes sense. GIGO - garbage in, garbage out; or, gold in, gold out. Rationality is not assured, even in logically-operating minds - it must be chosen, and it is (logically) the option with the highest rewards. And it is the best way to operate, on all levels, given a certain set of goals that I think most people would consider desireable (happiness, health, security, success, achievement, preparedness, etc.)

In writing my paper today, I wrote out some useful, apparent parallels in modes of thinking. They are brash, rampant dichotomies that beg for de-dichotomization, but I wrote them nonetheless. Because this is my blog, and it appears that most people here are either spammers, google touch-n-go’ers, or lurkers, I will thus dichotomize and speculate with impugnity.

Here are the opposing pairs I came up with: (Note: analytic and synthetic are general descriptors; I’m not referring to particular schools of thought. Rather, these pairings came up in the context of advocates of non-rational theology; that is, irrationalism and other icky variants; I tried to give them a fair airing, a charitable viewing.)

Analytic  -  Synthetic
Rational  -  Irrational / a-rational
Divisible  -  Indivisible
Reductionistic -  Wholistic
Particulate - Unitary/Unifying
Logic  -   ???????

The first is the main polarizing pair. The middle pairs are simply descriptive. The last pair is method. I couldn’t think of what method one can use to skip right to the wholeness of things other than passive experience, which is not knowledge and which is, at any rate, possible also to the Analytic column. I considered a deduction/induction dichotomy, but logic and analysis are not contradictory with induction, although deduction seems more contradictory to the synthetic viewpoint. I set a high bar for the title of Objective Knowledge. I reject mere assertion, no matter how persuasive, bombastic, detailed, or outlandishly possible. I also reject arbitrariness, whim, feeling, and other forms of subjectivism. Still, I can’t think of a Synthetic method - valid or proposed - that sets out rules for knowledge.

Aha. Rules. Do we need rules? What is their value? Why are we so fixated on them? Do they do us any good? Do they do us any harm?

Given the garbage our minds are so adept at collecting, I am convinced of the value of rules. Of course, good rules and bad rules produce wildly different results. The question boils down to, I think, how much garbage are you willing to store, in the hopes of finding a diamond? Moreover, is it that kind of sliding probability? Or is there a shortcut, a truly beautiful solution, where we can virtually eliminate all garbage, while amassing diamonds like mad? And not just lots, but all possible diamonds? That is the holy grail of epistemology, I think.

The question is, where are we at now? And how do you know ahead of time what that best possible solution is? Do you just have to stumble upon it? My mind rebels against that answer. If such a solution exists and we are capable of knowing it, there must be clues, or observable trends that we have access to. From these trends, we either follow the method and acquire new content, or amplify the rate of the method (i.e. do things faster) for more of the same kind of content, so that we come across more diamonds. I’m a fan of the former, though I’m not sure what exactly it means, what it entails practically, so that I can go out and try it.

From HWB "Talking nonsense is not thinking" Joseph. pgs 41-46

"There is a certain difficulty in the notion of a negative term, and in the account merely the absence of a quality. The Irishman’s receipt [recipe?] for making a gun, to take a hole and pour iron round it, is not more difficult to execute, than it would be to frame a term whose meaning consisted simply in the fact that a particular quality was not meant. A term must have some positive meaning, in order to be a term at all.

"It is indeed sometimes said that a negative term includes in its meaning whatever is not meant by the corresponding positive term. According to this view, there is no positive term to which we may not frame a corresponding negative; to man there corresponds not-man, to book not-book, to square not-square, to colour not-colour; not-man is everything which is not man, and includes therefore not only the other animal species, but plants and minerals, books and institutions, birth and immortality; not-book includes all these but books, and man besides; and so forth. The two ‘contradictory’ terms, (as they are called) comprise between them all that is; nothing can be conceived, of which one or the other is not predicable; and they divide the universe between them. What the positive term is, does not matter; for whatever it be, the negative term covers everything else; and therefore it may be expressed by a symbol; let A represent any term, and non-A its contradictory; we may then say that A and not-A between them make up all that is, or that there is nothing of which one or the other may not be predicated. ‘Everything is either A or not-A.’

"Such negative terms as these do not really figure in our thought; they are ‘mere figments of logic’; …

"The invention of such terms however is explained when we remember the relation of a term to judgment. The latter, as we have seen, is the primitive and remains the complete act of thought, and terms are got by abstraction from it. Now the affirmative judgment ‘All flesh is grass’ may be resolved into the terms flesh (the subject) and grass (the predicate affirmed of it); and the negative judgment ‘Man is not a fly’ into the terms man (the subject) and fly (the predicate denied of it). But since we do therein affirm that man is not a fly, it seems possible to say that the predicate, not a fly, is affirmed of man, as well as that the predicate fly is denied of him. This attempt to reduce negative and affirmative judgments to a common affirmative type, by throwing the negative into the predicate, is not really defensible, for the negative term not a fly does not signify the nature of anything, and so is not really a term; it should, if it were a general term covering everything except the corresponding positive, be predicable of all subjects except flies in the same sense; but there is no common character in all these which it is intended to signify. Hence, as we should not take the trouble to affirm of man nothing in particular, the only point of the judgment must lie in denying of him something in particular; so that the meaning of the ‘infinite’ judgment (as it is called) ‘Man is not a fly’ lies in the negative judgement ‘Man is-not a fly’, and it is clear that we have not resolved the negative into the affirmative form, when such affirmative can only be understood by restoration to the negative. But it is out of such attempts that so-called purely negative terms like ‘not-fly’ have arisen; and it is only by understanding that the term A has been the predicate of a negative judgment, that we can understand how the term not-A should ever have been formed.

"There are however certain negative terms which are not such mere figments of logic as the ‘infinite terms’ considered above. Where the positive is not a general concrete term but is attributive, there the corresponding negative may be quite legitimate; indeed the distinctions of positive, negative, and privative most properly apply not to all, but only to attributive terms, or to abstract terms founded upon these. For all attributive terms imply a subject of which they may be predicated, and to which they refer that attribute which constitutes their meaning. Therefore even if the term be negative, it still suggests a subject which, lacking the attribute which the negative term excludes, is conceived as having some character instead. And here we have a basis of positive meaning to the negative term; for let A be a positive term; then not-A will signify what a subject, which might be A, will be if it is not A. Thus intemperate signifies what a man, who might be temperate, will be if he is not that; uneven suggests what a line or surface, such as the surface of a road, will be if it is not even; not-blue suggests what a thing which might be blue (that is, an object having some colour) will be if it has not that colour. The definiteness of the positive meaning which a negative term thus conveys will vary greatly, according to the range of alternative attributes which we conceive possible to a subject that might conceivably have possessed the attribute denied of it; thus intemperate has a more definite meaning than not-blue, because when temperance is excluded, though there are many degrees of intemperance, yet they have more affinity with one another as opposed to temperance than have the remaining colours as opposed to blue; unruffled has a more definite meaning still, for a surface which is not in any way ruffled can only be smooth.

"It has been alleged that ‘not-blue’ does not necessarily imply ‘coloured in some other way than blue’, nor ‘not-even’ a surface of another kind than even; that it is as true to say of banter that it is not blue as of a buttercup, and that larceny is as much not-even as Lombard Street. But such a contention misinterprets our thought. Just as privative terms imply the absence of an attribute from a subject that possessed or should have possessed it, and therefore must convey a notion of what the subject consequently is without that attribute, so negative terms (at any rate when they are not mere figments of logic) imply the absence of an attribute from a subject that might conceivably have possessed it, and therefore convey a notion of what the subject is instead. The attribute which a negative term excludes belongs to a genus of attributes (as blue belongs to the genus colour, or prudence to the genus feature of human character, or square to the genus figure); and if a subject is unsusceptible of any attribute within that genus, we should not be a pains to deny of it some particular attribute therein; since the soul for example has no figure, we should not say that it is not-square; since furniture has no feature of human character, we should not call a towel-horse imprudent. The negative term is only used of what must have some attribute within its genus; and this genus furnishes a substratum of positive meaning to the negative term; not-blue does mean ‘coloured not with blue’ and not-even ‘having a surface which is uneven’.

"Many negative terms indeed are not themselves attributives, but are abstracts which presuppose an attributive; and what has been said of negative attributives is confirmed by the fact that these abstracts - such as injustice, inequality, non-intervention - are very positive in their meaning. ‘Injustice’ does not mean whatever is not justice (such as ‘accidence and adjectives and names of Jewish kings’), but the quality of being unjust; ‘inequality’ means the relation of being unequal; non-intervention the conduct of the non-intervening. Abstract negative terms like not-equality or not-colour are as unreal as concrete negative terms like not-Socrates or not-book.

"It may be asked, if all negative terms (and the same is true of privative) have a positive meaning, what is the use of the distinction between them? The answer is as follows. First, with regard to the distinction of positive and privative terms; there are some states which can only be understood as the privation of a positive state: deafness would have no meaning, but for our knowing what it is to hear; we cannot think of a body dessicated, except we think of it as having first contained moisture.

"Secondly, with regard to the distinction between positive and negative terms: there is a real difference between a term which signifies one definite attribute, and a term which signifies any attribute within a genus except one; the latter is in most cases comparatively indeterminate and uninstructive; e.g. vertebrate signifies a definite anatomical structure; invertebrate signifies an animal structure which is not vertebrate, but fails to characterize it further. Positive terms are positive directly and precisely, negative terms indirectly and for the most part vaguely. This distinction is important, and we are therefore justified in calling attention to it; it will be seen for example presently to be one of the rules of definition to state what a thing is, not what it is not; this is best expressed by the injunction to avoid, as far as possible, negative terms; and there is no way in which the point of this instruction could be so well conveyed as by the help of the distinction of negative and positive terms."

Chapter 2: Of Terms and Their Principal Distinctions

pg 14: "The true unit of thought, the simplest complete act of thought, or piece of thinking, is the Judgement or Proposition: between which where a distinction is intended, it is that the proposition is the expression in words of judgement."

pg 15: "In judging then I always distinguish a particular element, the predicate, in the being of a subject which I could not think of unless I recognized in it some other than the predicated character." see footnote. "I must think, severally yet together, of both; and if I want to call attention to them separately, I must indicate then by different signs; but in order to make the judgement, though I need a sign, I do not need to indicate them by different signs."

- Aha. Fantastic. The black billiard ball peels back a layer. What is inside? A superficial conflagration, spurring a hasty secular mysticism, that but seconds later reveals itself to be a simple identification of the process of cognition. A calling to attention, with language, parcels of integrated thought. To discover how we think, we must divide up thought with language, like a surgeon with a scalpel, though thought only exists and functions as an inseparable whole. This is no more circular than the surgeon repairing by cutting, the discovery of internal nature by investigation of that external to us. It’s all dependent upon the soundness of Induction. From this vantage point, I cannot see how any knowledge is, at root, possible without Induction. The obvious, as usual, with me. It seems the most straightforward and liberating and exhilerating of activities. Why the mess of the 20th century?

pgs 17-18: Subject and predicate, but not the act of predication, are the terms in a judgement… A proposition is a sentence, but not merely a sentence: it is a sentence expressing or menaing and judgement. Otherwise, we could not speak of resolving it into its terms; for the subject and predicate words, at which we thus arrive, need not have been in the unresolved proposition; and a mere sentence could not be resolved into words that were not in it… "It is easy then to see that a term is not the same as a word. in a judgement there are always two terms, but a single word may express both; … also, many words may make one term; this is the commonest case. … Some words cannot normally be the terms of a proposition at all. They do not indicate by themselves any object of thought, but are either used, like:"

• an article, in cojunction with some descriptive word, to designate an object
• an adverb, to qualify what another or word expresses
• a preposition or conjunction - to makr some reltaion between different parts of a complex object of thought, or to express an operation of thought. 

    - Syncategorematic: the above types of words - they can only be used with others in predication
    - Categorematic: words that can be used alone as subject or predicate.
              She left lonely for ever the kings of the sea.
              Italicized = syncategorematic
    - Mixed terms: contain categorematic and syncategorematic words.
    - Suppositio materialis: words with no referent used grammatically in a sentence as a subjects. "Of is a preposition."

pg 20: The answer to, "What is it called?" may be:
      1. Proper names
      2a. General names (man, river), and
      2b. Kinds, attributes and relations. Descriptions used as subjects are not names.

pg 21: It is sometimes necessary to indicate whether by the terms of a proposition we mean what is thought of [regardless of what combination of words are used to designate or describe it], or the words signifying that. Call the former terms of thought, latter, the terms verbal.

-         Again distinguishing between the entire thought represented by a sentence, and the nuts and bolts of the sentence itself. Nuts and bolts are terms verbal.
-         Term of thought: whatever can be thought of as the subject or predicate of a proposition.
-         Term verbal: a word or combination of words capable of standing as the subject or predicate of a proposition.

pg 22: Terms as words versus terms as what they stand for:

-         concept: always the latter; never just the words or names, but the entire thought represented by them.
-         Concept: that which is conceived
-         Conception: the act of conceiving

A concept is not the same as a term of thought, because concrete individuals may be terms of thought, but they are not concepts, for we may perceive or think of, but not conceive them. Nevertheless, many terms of thought are concepts. – The problem of universals – the one and the many.

1. “Barkis is willin’.” The predicate is one of several possible to the subject. The subject is inidicated only by a name, which doesn’t at its face tell you the identity of the other predicates.

2. “The emperor is captured.” Predicate is also one of many possible to the subject; the subject is a general name, which entails some other predicates at face value.

1 and 2: Both have predicate subject, and subject is a concrete individual. But, in 2, the subject term (a concrete) is a subject-concept (which is but a detail in the being of the concrete subject, the person who is the emperor.)

3. “A bacillus is a vegetable.” Subject is a subject-concept and predicate is a predicate-concept. Both are not merely a detail of their respective concrete, but instead its essential or constitutive being. The predicate is the general being of the subject. The subject is the essential detail of the subject-concept. Being a bacillis is being a vegetable.

4. “To obey is better than sacrifice.” The subject is not a concrete thing, but a concept. The predicate also, but it’s not the general being of the subject-concept, and does not mean than obeying is superiority (noun) to sacrifice.

5. “To doubt is to think.” The subject is a subject-concept. The predicate is a predicate-concept and is the general being of the subject. The proposition does mean that doubting is thinking. (Complete conceptual containment of S in P, though P is not entirely contained within S).

Key points:
i.                    Concepts are characters (not necessarily sensible – i.e. sense-able, with sensation) which we find displayed in individuals.
ii.                   These characters may be characters which, as it were, cover the whole being of these individuals, or only details in their being.
iii.                 One character may cover the whole being, or be the general being, of another
iv.                Where the predicate-character covers the whole being of the subject, or subject-character, the latter is the former essentially, and not only may the things be denominated from the subject character be denominated from the predicate character, but the subject-character itself is the predicate-character.
v.                  Where the predicate character is only a detail in the being of the subject (whether subject-individual or subject-character) the subject is not thus essentially the former (i.e. P is a detail, a part): the predicate character is incidental to the subject, or co-incidental with the subject-character in the same individual subject. The S or S-character is not its P, in this case, i.e. not essential or wholly containing.

Pg 24. “Thus judgment involves concepts among its terms of thought, but individuals may be terms of thought also (one and many may be terms); but these terms of thought (individual or concept) are not in every judgment judged to be related in the same way, though the forms of language do not always bring out these differences in the relation between subject and predicate.

-         Insufficiency of language mechanics (grammar) to capture all meanings always. 
-         * go over again

Pg 24: On the problem of universals: “But it would be wrong because [concepts] are not sensible, to suppose that they are not real independently of the conceiving mind: that they are products of the activity of conceiving.” See ftnt 4 “… I am concerned here to urge that what is apprehended in things by thinking, but is not sensible, is not less really in them nor more dependent on the mind [for existing as a trait] than what is apprehended [directly and wholly] by sense-perception.”

-         a word-use distinction made by both me and HWBJ: “existing” is confined to sense-able things, and non-sense-ables are said to be.

Pg 27. “The universal is not one of its own instances, and cannot be found like them. Nevertheless to deny that there are universals is to deny all identity between different individuals, and to do this is to say that we can never, by what we learn of the connection of characters in one individual, infer one from the presence of another in a second individual.”

-         So the problem of induction is a variant, or out-growth, of the problem of universals, yes?

Pg 28 ftnt 1: “Yet biologists do not seem always to have asked themselves which they mean when they write about evolution. Do individual men evolve, or is it the human nature which is displayed in them all? And if the latter, and men are descended from animals whose nature was not human nature, but has evolved into human nature, what is the relation of the two, or are human nature and pithecanthropous nature the same common nature? And if so, are there many species or only one?”

-         The man has nailed the species problem. To a T. Fantastic. This is what I want to work on.

Pg 28. “The ordinary classifications of terms are classifications of them as words which signify objects of thought; but the distinctions are based on differences in what we think of, or what in general we think things to be.”

Pg 29: “Our  notion of a thing … iinvolves two elements, which furnish the basis for a further division of both concrete and abstract terms into those which are singular and those which are common or general. A thing is, first, an individual, having an existence distinct from that of other individuals; the page, for example, on which these lines are printed is a different page from every other in this book. But secondly, a thing has a character, which may be the same in other things; just as other pages in this book, though individually different, are equally pages. This character, which belongs alike to many individuals, is sometimes called, as we saw, an universal; and they, as so many different cases or examples of it, are called particulars: particulars, as we often say also, of a kind.”

Pg 29: “A general term is thus one that is predicable of any number of individuals in the same sense: a singular term one that is predicable of one individual only in the same sense: and a singular term is a proper name if it does not indicate what individual it stands for by reference to any special element in its being.”

-         did Linnaeus perpetuate thinking problems by the scheme he devised for naming? A name often comes to suggest more than it means. What did Linnaeus mean by the names? What do they mean now? What does the evidence suggest now?

Pg 30. Proper names as non-descriptive, non-essential, and pragmatically coined. [Pragmatic decisions may be objectively given when in relation to the full nature and context – including cognitive – of a situation. Pragmatic decisions may be a subset of objective decisions; but not all. If a pragmatic decision is dissociated from an objective methodology, regardless of the concurrence of outcomes, the decision is not objective, but arbitrary. Hence Pragmatism.]

Pg 32. “Now, it has not been stated in the last sentence, what general terms are the names of. Are they also the names of individuals, or are they names of the character common to many individuals? The former view seems incomplete, for it does not take account of their difference from singular terms. The latter view is plainly wrong, for man is clearly predicated from individual men, not of the nature common to them; and when I say that  man is mortal, I mean that men die, not that human nature dies; that is displayed in a succession of individuals who are born and perish, but is not born and does not perish itself. We must then accept the former view. General concrete names are names of individuals, but names of them in respect of their common nature. Hence they imply the existence of universals, though they are not the names of these.”

-         YES. The problem of using general names and individuals. Huge. Classes in general. How did Ghiselin formulate the concept of class-individuals in the 1970s?

Pg 33: “…[T]he substantial nature of a thing cannot properly be regarded as a mere attribute of it.”

Pg 33: “But men are interested chiefly in the individual instances of what is concrete, and in the general nature of their attributes or relations; and so not only are there no proper names for these, but the general name, besides being used of them, is used also of their general nature, or universal. Death, when I speak of Caesar’s death or Alexander’s, is a general abstract term, comparable with the general concrete term man; when I say that death comes in many forms, it is the name of an universal, comparable not with man but with humanity. So colour is a general abstract term, if I speak of the colours of yesterday’s sunset, but the name of an universal – viz. colouredness – when I say that colour has divers species. The fact that many words are used both as general abstract terms and as names of the universals of attributes or relations helps to make us regard the names of universals of substances as abstract. ‘Colour’, as predicable not of a coloured thing but of its attribute, is an abstract term; meaning colourdness it is a word of the same sort as ‘goldness’; hence we think ‘goldness’ an abstract term also.

Pg 36: “Abstract terms then are the names of attributes or relations; but we must understand this definition rather widely. It is not only sensible qualities, like favours or odours, whose names are abstract terms; each element in the being of the individual concrete thing.. is abstract, and its name (where it has any) an abstract term. Moreover, the thing in question need not be a single thing (or person)…; it may be an assemblage of what we regard as distinct things (or persons)…; but if there are features belonging to this assemblage, though they are not qualities of any one thing in it… these features considered in themselves are abstract, and their names … abstract also. Hence discipline, civilization, paternity, are all abstract terms… And we have seen that commonly, though confusedly, terms like ‘animality’ and ‘triangularity’ are also called abstract, names, that is, not of the distinguishable individual elements in the being of the individual concrete thing, but of the universals whereof either individual concrete things, or the various distinguishable individual elements in their being, are instances.”

-         This is how we get hierarchy theory biologically. Pay close attention.

Pg 36: Terms verbal. 1. Abstract. 2. Concrete. 3. Attributive terms (adjectives and adjectival terms; red, beaten, insolvent).

Foreword: I’ll be transcribing here the quotes and notes I wish to retain from my reading of HWB Joseph’s An Introduction to Logic, (1916). This is not meant to be a summary of the chapters, but the references and jumping off points for future thoughts and research. My quotations should be accurate, but in many places I will paraphrase, and will not use quotations then.

—

Chapter 1: Of the general character of the enquiry

pg 2: "[I]n the same ways that we study the laws of motion as they are exemplified in the movement of all bodies, without studying all the bodies that ever move, so we may study the laws of thought, as they are exemplified in thinking about all subjects, without studying all the subjects that are ever thought of."

pg 3: "[B]ut it is not the business of Logic to make men rational, but rather to teach them in what their being rational consists." [Lovely]. "And this they could never learn, if they were not rational first."

pg 3: "Logic, then, is the science which studies the general principles in accordance with which we think about things, whatever things they may be." … Our thought about things is expressed partly "and most systematically in the various sciences. Those sciences are the best examples of human thinking about things, the  most careful, clear and coherent, that exist. In them, therefore, the logician can best study the laws of men’s thinking, and it is in this sense that we may accept the old definition of Logic, scientia scientiarum."

pg 4: "… what is meant by saying that Logic is concerned with forms of thinking. … By form we mean what is the same in many individuals called materially different. … And all science is formal, in the sense that it deals with waht is common to differences." YES.

pg 5 footnote: "What is different in particular thoughts is not related to their common form as … to their common[ality], but rather as the specialty of their structures to the generic identity, or as particular instances to the common nature of which they are instances."
- All of page 5 is good - He reminds us not to abstract logic too far, to the commonest of all common denominators. You miss a lot when you do this, and bastardize the point of the whole thing anyway.

cont’d: "But the truth is, that we think in different ways about subjects of different kinds, and therefore we must, if we wish to study the principles that pervade our thinking, consider to some extent the differences in our thinking arising from differences in that about which we think."
- This is a key to arguing against reductionism - the bane of biologists who rail against it yet participate in it themselves. Natures are different, though materials may be connected…

pg 5 cont’d: "The distinction between form and matter may as it were be taken at different levels." Discussion of Cuvier’s embranchements. "The higher the level therefore at which in Zoology the distinction between form and matter is taken, the less can we study the form in isolation from variety of matter; no example taken from one order of animals, say the starfish, will enable us to realize what animality is."
- So the same for logic - we need wide material familiarity (with thoughts) for wide concepts.

pg 7: "Form cannot be studied apart from matter." "What is important to realize is the need for following the common form out into the differences which it displays in different matter."

pg 7 ftnt: "In strictness, the generic nature of a subject should not be called an attribute of it."

pg 10: "Logic ascertains the methods and nature of knowledge, but does not prescribe it.
- This is a total inversion of what I had assumed, and - perhaps? - been taught. It totally changes the ethics of epistemology - who prescribes what, and why. Existence and experience are primary. It is only from these that we can figure out how we exist, but existing is the given. Same for experience. It need not be proved, as some might imply or attempt to do; only explored, explained, explicated.

pg 12: "[It is] just because it studies our thought about things, [that it] is concerned with questions about the general nature of things."
- Logic’s role, relation to metaphysics.

pg 11 (The value and purpose of Logic): "It would be a mistake to suppose that it can have no practical value unless it can furnish rules for ‘the conduct of the understanding.’ The direct help that it can give in this way is not very great. Its practical value in general education is firstly this: that it demands very careful and exact thinking about its own subject matter, and thus tends to produce a habit of similar carefulness in the study of any other subject. In this it only does for the mind what a thorough training in any exact science might do. Secondly, it makes us realize better what the general forms of speech that we habitually use really mean, and familiarizes us with the task of examining our reasonings and looking to see whether they are conclusive. In this it has an effect which the study of some special science like botany is not equally calculated to produce. Thirdly, it brings more clearly into consciousness… what knowledge is, and so far furnishes us with a sort of standard by which to judge what we commonly call our knowledge of things; it makes us more alive to shortcomings in our ordinary opinions. But it does not need for its justification that we should point to effects which it produces upon our thoughts about other subjects; the nature of thought and knowledge is itself a subject worthy of investigation. And, if we are to look also beyond this, its chief value lies in its bearing upon these ultimate problems, concerning the nature of reality, and man’s place and destiny in the world, from which at first sight it might seem far remote." Fantastic.
- I particularly appreciate his attention to the consequences of the study of Logic, but insistance that the primary justification of a subject or study be the very nature of that study itself. Use does not justify means. Means must justify themselves. The entire enterprise may be motivated by the uses, but it cannot move ethically beyond its means.

pg 12: "Thus recent Symbolic Logic is full of discussions about classes and the relations between classes, because it holds thinking to be fundamentally thinking about the relations of classes. It seems to me that classing and class-relations are a very secondary subject of though, and that for this reason Symbolic Logic gives a very distorted theory of thinking."
- Something to re-visit upon reading Ghiselin’s formulation of species as individuals rather than as (only) classes.

pg 13 ftnt: An exploration of the relation between thinking (downstream: epistemology) and being (downstream: metaphysics) - wholly beautiful. Discusses the Law of Identity, the Law of Contradiction, and the Law of Excluded Middle, and some aspects of determinism, and the ability of the mind to know reality, and of thought to capture reality. Joseph dismisses any doubt or concern on those matters. We are fully capable.

From HWB Joseph’s Introduction to Logic, 1916.

"It is not the business of Logic to make men rational, but rather to teach them in what their being rational consists. And this they could never learn, if they were not rational first." (pg 2)

"Logic, then, is the science which studies the general principles in accordance with which we think about things, whatever things they may be. … [O]ur thought [about things] is expressed partly … and most systematically in the various sciences. Those sciences are the best examples of human thinking about things, the most careful, clear and coherent, that exist. In them, therefore, the logician can best study the laws of men’s thinking, and it is in this sense that we may accept the old definition of Logic, scientia scientiarum." [The science of science, I think] (pg 3).