tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8954608646904080796.post7463311253868429549..comments2024-03-27T23:49:45.668-07:00Comments on Edward Feser: Generally speakingEdward Feserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13643921537838616224noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8954608646904080796.post-85693396258923575952013-11-22T00:11:09.896-08:002013-11-22T00:11:09.896-08:00And thus nominalism strikes again!And thus nominalism strikes again!Timotheoshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09848027239405239382noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8954608646904080796.post-51011512574637185012010-05-23T23:06:05.482-07:002010-05-23T23:06:05.482-07:00Of course the biggest and most pervasive generaliz...Of course the biggest and most pervasive generalization is summed up in the phrase "the Christian understanding"--or Buddhist, or Hindu<br /><br />There is of course no such thing.<br /><br />Only individual Christians, one at a time are capable of understanding anything.<br /><br />Plus if one thoroughly interviewed, and thus challenged 100 different Christians about any number of topics, the answers and response thus given would be wide and varied. And most often contradictory between individuals.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8954608646904080796.post-30375398407919507582010-05-23T02:23:02.094-07:002010-05-23T02:23:02.094-07:00Hi, Jonathan Speke Laudly here,
The "norma...Hi, Jonathan Speke Laudly here,<br /> The "normal case'? <br /> Why not just say all dogs have four legs unless they are born without them or lose them, and dogs with less than four legs are rare.<br /> Generalizations are necessary.<br /> How can you have a name for each separate thing? You'd have to have a world's worth of proper names but no one would know what you refer to anyway. No, generalization is the foundation of our language--is our language really.: What is more fundamental than --x is a y--?<br /> But general categories are vague<br /> and necessarily so---if we need them to be useful. "All pink houses in Gary, Indiana" is a general category. "The two pink houses in Gary Indiana", is really a form of proper name, and so of limited use. <br /> But vagueness is annoying too.<br /> How much do you lop off a dog before it's no longer a dog?<br /> The ears? The tail? The bark?<br /> The snout? How many hairs must you lose before you are bald?<br />Unless you are there to be the arbiter of dogness or baldness each time a question of dogness or baldness arises, any description could still make someone unfamiliar with earth animals take a pig for a dog or a hairy man for bald. <br /> We learn dog by seeing dogs and baldness by seeing a thing<br /> being told--"it's a dog" or "it's a bald dog" or some such.<br /> Generalization of dogness is cat--egorization. And in the absence of<br /> new categories new things get put into the old categories. Never seen a dog before?-so you say it's "kinda like a pig". <br /> Malaria, flu, cholera, yellow fever and other illnesses all used to be placed in the "fever" category---until biology sorted it out. Schizophrenia is a catch-all like fever was.<br /> Don't be so quick to generalize?<br /> We have no choice.<br /> How many exceptions invalidate the generalization? Up to you.<br /> A pig does resemble a fat dog that squeals.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8954608646904080796.post-36554977592710487172010-05-21T15:40:48.253-07:002010-05-21T15:40:48.253-07:00This is a literally perfect application of what I,...This is a literally perfect application of what I, for one, call "Scholastic method." May I please state without shame that, for me, this is the only method and I openly defy all men everywhere to produce a better one.<br /><br />But the article exposes a much larger problem with liberal generalizers, namely, their profound cultural and intellectual deficiency extending to a complete breakdown in rational or logical thinking.<br /><br />For, the sad robots manufactured in today's sovietized government re-education system are deprived of ordinary modes of right thinking, if not thought itself, implied in that formal engagement of the human mind with the Western intellectual heritage anciently referred to as "education."Joseph McKenzienoreply@blogger.com