Subject: Re: Time & space, still (was: Hermeneutics ...)
From: meron@cars3.uchicago.edu
Date: Mon, 18 Nov 1996 23:48:29 GMT
In article , moggin@mindspring.com (moggin) writes:
>moggin:
... snip ...
>Mati:
>
>>>>That's a topic switch now,
>
>moggin:
>
>>> On the contrary -- it's precisely the topic we're discussing; that
>>>is, the one that you recently decided to ignore, or forgot about, or
>>>whatever the case may be.
>
>Mati:
>
>>>>in the right direction at least, towards
>>>>where this discussion started (Maupertois and Fermat). Of course
>>>>religious mysticism may influence science (that's what I said in my
>>>>initial example).
>
>moggin:
>
>>> That's what you attempted to deny, although you didn't get very
>>>far. You tried to separate the religious motivations of M and F from
>>>their work as physicists in order to show that the one was unrelated
>>>to the other.
>
>Mati:
>
>>Don't even try it. You can go back to my post and you'll find that I
>>stated, explicitly, that their work was inspired by religious
>>motivation (do you really believe that everybody has such short
>>memories that you can play those games?).
>
> It's gotten so damn predictable: the liars should "Liar!," the fascists
>shout "Fascist!," and the topic switchers shout, "You switched the topic!"
>(Or is it some invisible force that deletes the context from your replies?)
Tsk, tsk. Frothing at the mouth again, dear? Shouldn't do it, you
know what it does to your complexion.
> Anyway, I already _went_ back to your post, you fool: I quoted it to you
>to make my point. But apparently you didn't recognize your own words.
>(There was a time I would have found that surprising...)
(Sigh) it was rather a poor editorial job you made on this quote. Can
we have it full?
>
> Enough bickering -- back to the subject. Yes, you said that the physics
>of M and F had religious motivations,
Good, we finally get to admit it...
> but your purpose was to _dismiss_ the role of religion in physics,
But since you've found that the text doesn't support your claims, you
switch to my "purpose". Sorta like "yeah, you said it but you didn't
mean it". Nice
>because their motivations had no relevance to the results of their work.
Right , that's what I said.
>Your position was that their religious beliefs didn't matter (you
>laughed them off as "ramblings"), except possibly as a >biographical
>footnote.
I didn't "laugh them off" as ramblings, I described them as ramblings.
Otherwise correct.
>
>>What I said following this
>>was that the results of this work stand on their own, without any
>>relation to whatever inspired Fermat and Maupertois. I gatehr that
>>part of your difficulty here is that you still can't get used to the
>>idea that the results of somebody's work may be completely separated
>>from whatever the originator had in mind. Can't help you with this,
>>though.
>
> As usual, what you gather has nothing to do with what I've said. But hell,
>what you say has nothing to do with what _you've_ said! First you argue
>with me for saying that "you tried to separate the religious motivations of
>M and F from their work as physicists in order to show that the one was
>unrelated to the other," and now here you are, contending that was exactly
>your point. I've called you confused, but that's not the half of it.
Moggin, please read the above paragraph and see if it makes any sense
to you. To me it doesn't. You really shouldn't be writing in such an
agitated state.
>
>moggin:
>
>>>I disagreed, and offered the example of Newton.
>
>Mati:
>
>>Which was faulty, in the sense that:
>
>>1) He stated explicitly that he offers no explanations.
>
> Good tactic -- keep repeating yourself, and ignore any objections or
>other replies -- that's bound to work, as long as you keep at it for long
>enough. It's not exactly _convincing_, but then it doesn't have to be,
>does it?
Well, did he state it or didn't he? A simple yes or no will suffice.
>
>>2) He couldn't have gotten a different result regardless of what his
>>religious beliefs were.
>
> You still seem to believe that I'm questioning his results. Get over
>it.
No, it is not a matter of questioning results. It is a matter of
relevance. In a situation which could've few different outcomes it
may make sense to talk about the background of the person and how did
this background influenced the choices the person made (whether it is
relevant to judging the outcome is another matter). But, in a
situation which allows no choice of outcomes the background is
relevant. For example, when a person steps out of a 20th floor window
(do I hear groans?) I do not need to know the religious beliefs of
said person in order to either predict or explain the subsequent
developments.
... snip ...
>>>>But, I'll repeat it again, the final
>>>>product stands or falls on its own, with total disregard to the
>>>>ideology of the author (in fact with total disregard to the identity
>>>>of the author).
>
>moggin:
>
>>>Repeat it as often as you like -- it was never at issue.
>
>Mati:
>
>>It was the only issue, as far as I'm concerned.
>
> Maybe so -- by now, I have no idea what you have concerns about.
>But it wasn't the issue that you raised, or the one I responded to.
Could you kindly read my original post again and tell me what other
ssues you see there? It is a question, BTW.
>
> My comments are based entirely on what you say, or rather write.
>What else could I possibly go by?
This question is certainly beyond my ability to answer.
>But as we've seen repeatedly, what you think can vary dramatically
^^^^^
>from one day to another.
We? I didn't realize that I correspond with royalty.
>
>moggin:
>
>>>One small note -- the product never "stands or falls on its own,"
>>>but only in the eyes of other scientists, who are, as we now appear
>>>to agree, liable to be influenced in various ways.
>
>Mati:
>
>>No, you still don't get it quite right. You forget the real business
>>of empirical evidence (you really seem to have an aversion to it).
>
> I haven't said anything to indicate that. You're speaking as if the
>evidence could evaluate itself; I reminded you that scientists still
>have a role to play (apparently you just forgot about them).
Apparently so. I know so few of them, it is easy to forget they
exist. But, yes, they do have a role to play (thank goodness for
that). But, said evaluation eventually (though it may take time) is
reduced to yes/no comparisons. Like with the Fresnel example, is
there a bright spot or isn't there. This type of evaluation
leaveslittle room for subjectivity. It is just like in athletic
competitions. In disciplines where results are established by
measurement it is usually clear who the winner is. Where you've
scoring by judges, on the other hand (gymnastics, ice skating etc.)
controversy is quite common. Now, as a side statement, knowing how
subject my collegues (myself included) can become where there is no
clear data to limit the choices, I can only guess how subjective
people tend to be in disciplines where there is no data whatsoever,
only opinions.
>
>Mati:
>
>>Scientists are human and liable to be influenced by their beliefs,
>>biases, preconceptions etc. But, they don't ignore clear cut
>>evidence. [Fish story deleted.]
Hey, it is Fisherman, not Fish.
>moggin:
>
>>> So you're not pretending it was relevant to our discussion, but
>>>relying on the indulgence of your audience. Is that more or less
>>>the idea?
>
>Mati:
>
>>No. I'm not bringing in things that aren't relevant to the
>>discussion. You may question their relevance but you certainly don't
>>have the power of sole decision on this. The idea is that I'm trying
>>to convince you, win an argument against you, "score points" and other
>>such childish ideas. I'm educating the audience, that's all.
>
> More strawmen.
My vision must not be what it used to. I don't see any. Could you
point them to me.
>As I said, many of your comments have nothing to
>do with the question at hand -- you're inclined to ramble (perhaps
>like Maupertois and Fermat) on various other topics (I'd say it was
>philosophizing if you weren't sure that you have no philosophy).
If you got the impression that my role here is to answer questions,
speak when spoken to and remain quiet otherwise, then no, it ain't so.
>Of course you're entitled to say whatever you damn please -- just
>don't pretend your divagations are anything else.
Pretend? I already told you two month ago that I'm speaking through
you, not to you. It has been a commonly used device of writers
(especially scientific writers) through history to invent imaginary
characters holding views quite opposed to their (the writers') own,
then present their views in form of a dialog with their (imaginary)
opponents. But, it is a hard work. You've to think not only for
yourself but for the other side too and since you can't quite put
yourself in the "others'" imaginary mind, such dialogs often end up
not very convincing. It is so much better if you can find a real
person to play the "opponent's" part. Just, in case you wonder, no,
nobody pays for it so you can expect no royalties.
>moggin:
>
>>> I never argued anything remotely like that, although you clearly
>>>feel a need to argue _against_ it. My point was that Newton's ideas
>>>derived, at least in part, from his religious outlook, and that they
>>>contained some elements which outraged those of his colleagues who
>>>didn't share his mystical leanings. You tried to dispute the notion
>>>that (in your words) "one of the centerpieces of physics is based on
>>>religious mistycism," but what you should have said (given what
>>>you're saying here) is that ideas which are based on mysticism are
>>>acceptable in science so long as they "work."
>
>Mati:
>
>>What I said was plain and simple, namely that given:
>
>>1) Newton's laws of motion.
>>2) Keppler's laws.
>
>>The "law" of gravitation" follows as an inevitable conclusion. Get
>>it? Inevitable. Thus any beliefs Newton might have had aren't
>>relevant since non of them could've influenced the outcome. If you
>>want to dispute this you've to dispute my statement above regarding
>>the inevitability of the outcome. Anything else is an obfuscation.
>
> Speaking of obfuscation, that's not what you said at all. Newton and
>Kepler didn't come into it (I brought in Newton as an example). It's
>not what I said, either -- more strawmen. Here's what you wrote:
>
> * * *
>
>meron@cars3.uchicago.edu (Mati):
>
>> [...] One of the originators
>> of the "least action" approach (an extraemly important part of physics
>> but I won't get into details now), either Maupertois or Fermat (or
>> maybe even both of them), was motivated in his work by theological
>> notions. So, if somebody reads his rambling on the subject and
>> considers them to be part of the his contribution to physics, one may
>> conclude something like "one of the centerpieces of physics is based
>> on religious mistycism". Which ain't true, although that founding
>> father really thought so.
>
>
> * * *
>
The excerpt is from my post on 9/19 (boy, time flies, the thread was
still called "Evolution Speculation" then
*********
As for GR the thing to remember is that (contrary to common beliefs)
there is no such thing as Newtonian Theory of Gravitation. All that's
there is a formula for the gravitational force which follows
automatically from the application of Newtonian Mechanics to Keppler's
Laws. The law of areas tells you that the force is central, the fact
that the orbits are closed eliminates all forces but those
proportional to r or to 1/r^2 and the orbit time to radius ratio law
leaves only 1/r^2. that's all there is to it, it is not theory
(meaning conceptual framework) just an empirical fit. So you can't
ask whether GR reduces to the Newtonian theory of relativity, only
whether within the appropriate limits (weak fields etc.) it yields the
same results. The answer is yes. However, just to add to it, the
roots of GR are in the Hamiltonian formulation (the issue of
trajectory as geodesic).
***********
>moggin:
>
>>> As before, I don't have an interest in disputing the philosophy of
>>>science with you -- especially since you've claimed science doesn't
>>>have any philosophy. If you want to use "explanation" as you just
>>>described, I won't make an issue out of it, even though...well, I'll
>>>just stop there. But "ex nihil nihil fit" isn't necessarily valid --
>>>it's a debated proposition. (A piece of wild optimism, it seems to
>>>me.)
>
>Mati:
>
>>I have no doubt that among philosophers everything is a debated
>>proposition. Frnakly, I couldn't care less.
>
> You already demonstrated that you do care by asserting that "'Ex
>nihilo nihil fit' is still valid, you cannot escape it."
>
Oh, I see. This demonstrates that I care what is a debated
proposition among philosophers. Hmm, I guess I don't see it, after
all. Sorry.
>moggin:
>
>>> That's what you say now -- but what you said was another matter.
>>>You brought up the religious beliefs of M and F merely in order to
>>>dismiss them as irrelevant "rambling."
>
>Mati:
>
>>As indeed they are.
>
> It's possible -- there are plenty of religious ramblings in the world.
>But your say-so isn't good enough, especially since you don't even know
>whether you're talking about M, or, F, or both of them.
I certainly don't ask you to accept anything on my say so. I trust it
is clear to you that I'm expressing my opinions here, not speaking
from authority. And, same as with any other scientist, my opinions
may be mistaken. In fact it is quite probable that some of them are.
But, if you want to dispute them you'll find that all sneering
comments about my intelligence, professional abilities,
trustworthiness, presence of mind etc. fall short of the mark. You've
to actually know something about the subject matter (the way Lev
Mammel does), then we can have a meaningful screaming match.
>And of course it
>doesn't matter if they _are_ ramblings, since you were trying to show
>that there was no meaningful relationship between F and M's religious
>beliefs and their scientific theories -- that requires more than a one-
>word book review.
That's right, it requires some knowledge of the least action principle
and its role in physics.
>
> Same old, same old. You consign religion to the category of motivation
>or inspiration in order to dismiss it as a biographical footnote. But why
>am I surprised? You're the one who thinks that "thoughts and musings"
>are irrelevant to the practice of physics, so I shouldn't expect anything
>more.
You confuse "physics" and "the practice of physics". This is not
quite the same.
>moggin:
>
>>>You're so confused, that
>>>may be true -- but asking, "Does it work or not?" merely tells you
>>>(hold onto your hat) whether or not a given concept "works" -- it
>>>doesn't inform you of the nature of the idea, or of its provenance.
>
>Mati:
>
>>Well, guess what? Physics cares first of all whether a given concept
>>works. It may sound very low brow to you, but that's how physics
>>operates. And, it is not asking for your approval.
>
> More irrelevancies. If you want to discuss "How science judges ideas,"
>"What physics cares about," or "Who physics asks for approval," you go
>right ahead -- I promise to not offer my two cents.
Thank you.
But you didn't raise
>any of those points -- instead, you claimed it was false to say "one of the
>centerpieces of physics is based on religious mistycism."
And I still say it.If you want to show how any other conclusion
could've been reached assuming different religious background, by all
means, do.
Mati Meron | "When you argue with a fool,
meron@cars.uchicago.edu | chances are he is doing just the same"
Subject: Re: Reader's Digest on deconstruction
From: brian artese
Date: Tue, 19 Nov 1996 00:50:34 -0600
wetboy wrote:
>
> Your post showed up in sci.physics. Therefore I ask this question:
> Would you be so kind as to pose the issues you raise in your post
> (copied below) in such a way that they can be demonstrated either
> to be true or not to be true by objective experiments and measurements?
Which issues? There are many. Point out the ones you find problematic.
You have to understand that the point of this post was to show that most
'popular,' second-hand summaries of deconstruction are completely ignorant of
the writers they claim to gloss. I certainly demonstrated *that* plainly
enough, since all I needed to 'measure' these excerpts against are the actual
books by de Man, Derrida, Butler, etc.
In any case, I didn't know I was cross-posting; I inherited this thread and
changed the name...
> brian artese (b-artese@nwu.edu) wrote:
>:Hardy asked me to repost the following. In an exchange about the concept of
>:intent, Silke asked Hardy for a citation to support his claim that
>: deconstruction posits the text as a 'wall' impeding the message-exchange
>: between two bubbles of subjectivity (author and reader).
>
> More interesting to me than this argument are the sources Hardy chooses...
>
> : >> From _Philosophy_ , A.C. Grayling (ed.):
> : >> (Page 608)
> : >> "What may be considered *intentionalism* identifies textual meaning with
> : >> authorial meaning: what the text means is what the author meant.
> : >> *Anti-intentionalism* denies that textual meaning is authorial meaning and
> : >> asserts that textual meaning is autonomous: it resides objectively in the
> : >> work and has nothing to do, conceptually, with what the author may have
> : >> meant".
> : >
> : > This 'anti-intentionalism' is an accurate description of the deconstructive
> : > brand -- until it brings in 'what the author may have meant,' which
> : > completely ignores the identification of textual and authorial meaning it
> : > just brought up. This writer does not understand deconstruction. The
> : > point is that intent exists *only* in an articulation. There is no
> : > 'meaning' that is independent of the articulation. The text says what it
> : > means and it meanswhat it says. If the author 'meant' something other than
> : > what he wrote -- why didn't he write that instead?
> : >
> : >> (Page 610)
> : >> "...deconstructionism or post structuralism - is an extreme form of
> : >> anti-intentionalist pluralism. This position is adopted on wholly general
> : >> philosophical grounds: it is held that the notion of determinate meaning
> : >> should be rejected in all (not just literary) contexts".
> : >
> : > This has nothing to do with intent. It simply refers to the fact that any
> : > given articulation can be paraphrased in the future; there is no 'final
> : > paraphrase' that cannot be paraphrased again.
> : >
> : >> From _A Dictionary of Political Thought_, Roger Scruton
> : >> (See "deconstructionism")
> : >> "The written text stands as an impermeable screen between the reader and
> : >> the author, who disappears forever behind it, and leaves the text as the
> : >> sole guide to its meaning".
> : >
> : > This is exactly wrong. The _only_ thing that creates a metaphysical wall
> : > that 'seals off' an author is the concept of intent. Deconstruction says:
> : > *there is no such wall* that distinguishes 'meaning' from the text.
> : >
> : >> From _The Tain of the Mirror_, Rodolphe Gasche
> : >> (Page 282)
> : >> "The absence of all extra-text, about which one could decide independently
> : >> of the textual system of referral, implies that there is no one final
> : >> meaning to the text."
> : >
> : > This is a horribly written sentence that has nothing to do with intent,
> : > and, as far as I can tell, nothing to do with deconstruction.
> : >
> : >> From _Of Grammatology_, Jaques Derrida
> : >> "There is nothing outside the text".
> : >
> : >> From _Dissemination_, Jaques Derrida
> : >> "There is nothing before the text; there is no pretext that is not already
> : >> a text".
> : >
> : > Where in these assertions do you find the claim that 'the text forms an
> : > impenetrable screen separating author from reader?'
> : >
> : >> From _The Oxford Companion to Philosophy_, Ted Honderich (ed.)
> : >> (See "deconstructionism")
> : >> "This tradition holds speech to be the direct expression of thought or
> : >> logos, contemporaneous with its meaning, while writing enters the scene
> : >> subsequently, a dangerous substitute for speach in which the speaker's
> : >> intentions, no longer 'present', are likely to be betrayed".
> : >
> : > Oh lord... Do you understand what this is describing? This is a paraphrase
> : > of what Derrida calls logocentrism, a metaphysical presumption that he
> : > argues *against*.
> : >
> : > I'm not trying to be insulting when I say this: but this post truly
> : > horrified me. It proves that most second-hand summaries of deconstruction
> : > are written by scholars who have *no idea* what deconstruction is about.
> : > Even more horrifying is the fact that people feel no compunction at all
> : > about substituting these summaries for what writers like Derrida and de Man
> : > *actually say* -- and these people really do believe they're engaging those
> : > writers by doing so. I don't know how many times I've run into people who
> : > say things like, 'I know what deconstruction is about -- I read Terry
> : > Eagleton's essay on it.' It is truly unbelievable.
> : >
> : > -- brian
>
> : I will add as a postscript that the phrase "there is nothing outside the
> : text" is extremely popular among Derrida's detractors; they've inherited it
> : like a note passed around the classroom in 3rd grade. Most of them, however,
> : have never encountered the actual paragraph in which it is situated -- and
> : they feel that there's nothing wrong with this. The subject of the paragraph
> : is *reading*, and Derrida is simply describing the fact that reading incites
> : paraphrase and metonymic association (the search for the 'meaning' of what
> : one has just read), and these paraphrases must necessarily take the form of
> : text, which themselves will incite more paraphrase and metonymic association.
> : This chain of signification will not be 'halted' by any non-linguistic
> : object. Nothing outside the text, in other words, 'grounds' an articulation,
> : proven by the fact that it can always be re-paraphrased. The argument of the
> : paragraph does not claim that people and things don't exist, as the
> : note-passers like to think.
-- brian
Subject: Character of a new Theory
From: singtech@teleport.com (Charles Cagle)
Date: Mon, 18 Nov 1996 11:27:41 -0800
(A copy of this message has also been posted to the following newsgroups:
sci.physics.research, sci.physics)
Due to the censorial policy of the sci.physics.research newsgroup I will
post my reply likewise to another newsgroup in order make this a public
discussion.
In article <565t75$201@lyra.csx.cam.ac.uk>, bje1001@cus.cam.ac.uk (Kitty) wrote:
>In article ,
>Charles Cagle wrote:
>>[unneeded quoted text omitted - jb]
>>Believing that such a major revolution as would be required to unify QM
>>and GR would be 'conservative' is a statement of faith and not of fact.
>>You are presupposing that the 'minor' revolutions that you have referred
>>to are, in fact, representative of truth themselves. You are expressing
>>an unfounded confidence that physics is ever evolving to a more precise
>>vision of reality and that we shouldn't expect any earth shaking
>>revelations which will toss much of what has gone before into the trash
>>can.
>
>If I might offer some observations:
>
>You are referring to "truth" a great deal. The sense in which you mean
>this is not clear.
Of course it isn't clear to you. That is evidenced by the rest of what
you write.
>Physics is about the study of observed phenomena in Nature. If we have a
>statistically significant body of data, with error margin \epsilon from
>processes A which contradicts theory X's predictions by more than \epsilon,
>then theory X is "wrong" from the point of view of describing A at error
>margin \epsilon. That is the only truth contained in physics.
This is rich. You think to define 'truth' by a formula. This only
ascertains that you are clueless as to the nature of truth and stumble
about blindly thinking perhaps you can wrap your intellect around it when,
in fact, your intellect needs to be founded in it. That which you seek to
know, you must become. Until that happens or begins to happen you can
say nothing intelligible whatsoever about it.
>The
>description of *specific* processes at *specified* error tolerances. X
>may be a perfectly usable approximation to processes B at error margin
>\epsilon, or indeed to A at error margin \delta.
>
>Let me give you an example, from Arthur C Clarke.
>From the point of view of absolute truth, the world is not flat.
>From the point of view of absolute truth, the world is not spherical.
Sorry, but Arthur C. Clarke, not being in possession of any better physics
than is proffered by current paradigms is not an authority on that which
he has not.
>So, from the point of view of absolute truth, these two theories are
>equivalent, because they are both wrong.
Only from an esoteric twisting are they equivalent. Only that which is
exactly the same is equivalent. Because neither is true does not
invalidate the usefulness of the one which more closely approximated the
truth. Theories to have any real validity must have utility. The
Ptolemaic system had utility and was quite predictive except for a few
things like retrograde motion of a planet however it was not actually
true.
>The failure of the second theory
>does not affect geophysics, geography, plane and train timetables or
>anything else that I can think of (a very tiny correction to the orbits
>of GPS satellites is the only place I know of where it is taken into
>account). Just beacuse we discover classes of processes which are not
>well described by a theory, does not invalid the theory, because we
>didn't invent it to answer every question in the universe.
You are demonstrating that you do not care for the 'truth' by this
approach and are, in fact, denying either its existence or the ability of
man to obtain it. You somehow seem set on obfuscating the original
purpose of this thread which was to establish the character of an ideal
theory. We are not discussing what has gone before because it is found
inadequate to the purposes of understanding the fundamental issues of
physics. Whether the earth is perfectly spherical or not doesn't have the
slightest bearing on this discussion.
>Theory exists to answer the following:
>"To specified accuracy, what will happen if I do specified experiment?"
With viewpoints like this, no wonder science is in so much difficulty.
Theory is the intellectual proffering of ideas in hopes they coorespond to
reality. The perfect theory would be one which would be the simplist
expression of the things that are and the nature of them. If you are
satisfied with less, then wherever that point may be is your stop, and is
where you get off of the train which is bound for glory. It appears you
missed your station and will have to walk back.
Peter Holland in his book 'The Quantum Theory of Motion' bluntly
>>shines a bright flashlight on the problem in his opening sentence which
>>states: "The quantum world is inexplicable in classical terms."
>
>So? In our culture the Newtonian paradigm is drummed into children from
>an early age. If you taught them QM or SR from babyhood they'd grow up
>thinking that wavefunction collapse, quantised observable spectra and
>Lorentz contraction were "common sense." There is nothing deep or
>fundamental about the classical world.
This comes from someone who drifts around on the surface even denying that
something profound and enlightening lies buried within and is not the
words of a true scientist.
If you think that only that which is passed along by sociological
processes constitutes 'common sense' then perhaps you are bereft of what
you so poorly define.
>the geological processes that have been occuring on Earth for aeons will
>not suddenly sit up and think: "Hang on.... We've been had...".
Unwittingly you make the point that the actual events care nothing about
our description of them. That's is one of the attributes of truth, it is
eternal and unaffected by opinion. The science of geology is not the
geology just as the sciences of chemistry and cosmology are not the
chemistry and the cosmology.
>>Some of the characteristics of the new theory are: (Others are welcome
>>add to the list).
>>
>>1a) The new theory doesn't have to reconcile old theories with each other
>>since it is not the theories which need reconciliation but the data.
>
>True, but the new theory must have limits in which the old theories must
>appear as sensible approximations to the limiting form of the new theory.
>
>>4) The new theory should transform physics into a 'finished' discipline.
>
>What is 'finished' supposed to mean, here? What disciplines do you regard
>as 'finished' or completed?
Finished when it comes to physics means perfected and in possession of the
fundamentals from which all phenomenon can be logically extrapolated.. To
your question as to 'what disciplines' do I regard as finished I would
answer: Perhaps, horseshoeing.
>Not every scientist dreams of a final theory.
Everyone who does not cares not for truth.
--
C. Cagle
SingTech
Subject: Re: Sophistry 103 (was: I know that!)
From: brian artese
Date: Tue, 19 Nov 1996 00:37:21 -0600
Hardy Hulley wrote:
> If you'd like to ascribe to deconstructionism the assertion that
> authorial intent doesn't even exist, I'd like to see some evidence. As
> far as I'm aware, the stance was always that authorial intent is
> inaccessible to the reader.
OK, let's see; *you*, who don't read decon writers, are asking *me* to
'prove' that these writers don't assert something. Your injunction,
furthermore, is in the service of an argument *about* decon writers -- the
ones you don't read. Thirdly, the only knowledge you have about the
subject at all -- besides the word 'deconstruction' -- comes entirely from
a handful of second-hand summaries (and a couple of Derridian sound bites)
that are each no more than a paragraph long.
Under such conditions, one would think you would be obliged to assume that
I know what I'm talking about: Intent is ascribed only to a particular
articulation or discourse -- never to a silent human body. (unless this
body is somehow 'gesturing').
I don't see how I could obey your command for proof except by transcribing
all the works of de Man, Derrida, Butler, et al., and then adding a line at
the end: "See? They never ascribe intent to anything but a particular
articulation."
> > The point is: If there really exists something called 'intent' that is
> > *distinct* from the actual text -- and if that intent is communicable
> > and therefore articulatable -- *why didn't the author simply write down
> > _that_ articulation instead?*
>
> Your argument is guilty of begging the question, and is, consequently,
> fallacious. To wit, you are not permitted to assume (as you have done)
> that the author *didn't* simply write down the articulation of his
> intentions.
In your objection you've arbitrarily posited the very thing in contention
-- the author's 'inent,' which is supposedly distinct from any and all
articulations. Besides, I don't think read correctly the sentence you're
responding to. Read it again.
> > In other words: it's not deconstruction that claims that there is a
> > 'problem' with communicating *what* one has to say; it's not
> > deconstruction that has posited the text as an 'interference' to
> > communication; what causes the 'problem' is this goblin called 'intent'
> > that humanists feel so compelled to protect.
>
> And that you haven't successfully overthrown yet.
By definition, your 'intent' is something that is not identical with any
actual, sensible articulation -- therefore, it is a transcendent entity.
The burden of proof is not on *my* shoulders to overthrow such an entity --
the burden lies on *your* shoulder to prove it. *Why* should I accept your
transcendental 'intent' when my understanding of communication operates
perfectly well -- and accounts for all effects of 'meaning' and 'intent' --
with sensible signifiers alone? Why should I believe in your non-empirical
entity?
> Consider the following. I say to you: "Pick up the red ball". My
> intention is a particlar sequence of actions which I want you to
> perform. When you pick up the ball, I have verified that my intentions
> have successfully been communicated. By the fact that I don't object to
> your actions, you have verified that you did, in fact, understand my
> intentions. What's the problem?
No problem; but this can be explained perfectly well without your
transcendental 'intent'. What makes you posit some force that exists
*prior* to your articulatable but unspoken thought? ("Pick up the red
ball.") You and I have learned to respond in certain ways around certain
signifiers. You don't need intent, you don't need anything independent of
the signifiers.
-- brian
Subject: Re: New sci-fi movie called PULSAR, BEAM ME HOME
From: jpeschie@cs.ruu.nl (Jarno Peschier)
Date: Tue, 19 Nov 1996 10:00:21 GMT
Archimedes.Plutonium@dartmouth.edu (Archimedes Plutonium) wrote the
following:
>> >Time : For advanced aliens on Bu it was one light year after they
>> >discovered controlled fusion energy.
>>
>> Sorry if I start laghing after this first sentence, but a light years
>> is a unit of distance, not of time.
>>
>
> Please, go ahead and laugh loud. This is a sci-fi movie and you are
>permitted that art of laughter.
Fine. I'll just laugh at this and move on...
>> >There civilization sent a space ship in the shape
>> ^^^^^ their
>>
> Yes I do make mistakes and I type in a rush often my mind interposes
>their and there. There are other words that my mind interposes when I
>am in a rush.
I sometimes have the same problem (and besides, I need another
keyboard, because on this one some often used keys keep repeating).
But in this case it really made post even more ludicrous to me...
>> >through their distillation tank. The Bu-s immediately set out to net
>> >all of the Permain large sized animals and run them through their
>> >distillation tank. In one end is fed all of these captured animals and
>> >at the other end is seen a fractionalized form of lithium.
>>
>> So, all large Permian animals were composed completely and 100% of
>> lithium? I didn't know that!
>>
> The lithium part was not a trap. I did not say 100%.
Implicitly you did! Read your own post again:
"Permian large sized animals" are "run through" "their distillation
tank".
The image I get from your writing is this"
"these captured animals" ("one end")
|
V
"distillation tank"
|
V
"fractionalized form of lithium" ("other end")
You see that I only use quotes. But of course this was only another
one of your traps, right? For you explicitly forgot to mention the
third opening (second outlet) where the waste comes out, right...?
>Put your
>thinking cap on or was your initial laugh unceasing. Think for a
>moment. If each animal had so much lithium then you would not have to
>round up all of them to get the desired amount of lithium. The point is
>that lithium is too diffuse in nature but concentrated, and a known
>concentration in animal bodies. Thus , if faced with a time constraint
>of one month to get a known volume of lithium and you know that animal
>hearts have a given volume of lithium, you can calculate how many
>animals you need, how long to round them up and be out of there in a
>month's time. Take the known quantities rather than the risk of looking
>for a lithium mine and not finding one.
I must confess this sound less silly after all. But you must agree
with my analysis of your writing above as well, mustn't you?
>> I really have much difficulty of taking this post for real. Movie
>> makers are often stupid, but not this stupid, are they....?
>>
> You are the stupid one, for not only have you not made a movie to
>show, but you have never made a movie outline such as PULSAR, BEAM ME
>HOME. And I would guess that you are not creative enough to do so, and
>if you did and posted it, you would be so embarrassed by it that people
>there in the Holland would say, there is Jarno, he is a computer person
>because he is dull and bland otherwise.
Hey! There is no need to start getting downright insulting you know...
> Jarno, have you read anything about Chaos theory and attractors in
>chaos ?
Sure. Butterfly effect, nonlinear equations, Lorenz (and other)
attractors, bifurcation diagrams, fractals, stock markets, weather
forcasts, etc. I even have two or three books on the subject myself
(and yes, I've read them as well).
>Well, if you have that is a fair likening of my posts on the Internet.
>I set traps and many of my posts are 'nonlinear' and have attractors
>and chaos in it. But to the simple minded folk that read the Net , like
>you, well, they expect everything linear to them and are puzzled by my
>posts.
I'm not at all puzzled by you post. Why should I be? I just stated my
opinion that I thought I had my doubts if your post was for real and
if there ever would be such a movie.
Then again, if you look at the ridiculous scientifical errors in most
SF movies and TV series, that are (probably) only meant to attract the
real "simple minded folk" and "the average man" and supply better
entertainment or are even downright errors because the makers of the
movies didn't know any better (or hired advisors that knew better) I
should not have been so surprised at your post at all. When will we be
seeing Pulsar in the cinema's then?
>So, here's to you Jarno Peschier chump, I am laughing at you.
Please, have a nice laugh on my behalf, but don't start callin me
"chump"...
Jarno Peschier, jpeschie@cs.ruu.nl, 2:2802/247.5@Fido, 162:100/100.2@Agora,
74:3108/101.5@QuaZie, 27:2331/201.5@SigNet, 606:3130/200.2@F1-net
___________________________________________________________________________
'avwI' nejDI' narghta'bogh qama' reH 'avwI' Sambej
Subject: Re: Sophistry 103 (was: I know that!)
From: patrick@gryphon.psych.ox.ac.uk (Patrick Juola)
Date: 19 Nov 1996 10:31:32 GMT
In article <56q5g4$35n@netnews.upenn.edu> weinecks@mail2.sas.upenn.edu (Silke-Maria Weineck) writes:
>Patrick Juola (patrick@gryphon.psych.ox.ac.uk) wrote:
>: In article <329061D0.1E36@rmb.co.za> hoh@rmb.co.za writes:
>: >> Such a statement does not merely claim to have read the actual words of
>: >> the author, to which we all have access. The statement does not simply
>: >> point to *what* the text says; it claims to have apprehended something
>: >> else: the 'intent' of the author. Somewhere along the line something
>: >> went wrong -- why did 'intent' get divorced from the text itself?
>: >> Didn't we establish that the author successfully wrote down what he had
>: >> to say?
>: >>
>: >> The point is: If there really exists something called 'intent' that is
>: >> *distinct* from the actual text -- and if that intent is communicable
>: >> and therefore articulatable -- *why didn't the author simply write down
>: >> _that_ articulation instead?*
>: >
>: >Your argument is guilty of begging the question, and is, consequently,
>: >fallacious. To wit, you are not permitted to assume (as you have done)
>: >that the author *didn't* simply write down the articulation of his
>: >intentions.
>
>: Well, I have to step in here. There's no such thing as "THE" articulation
>: of an author's intent. There are *several* articulations, depending
>: upon the situation. The choice of articulation can be crucial
>: to its understanding. And, in fact, mischosen articulations are
>: (in my opinion) a primary source of confusion.
>
>Let's take another approach. Let's say, for the sake of argument. that
>there are lots of people who cannot articulate themselves very well; that
>is, the presumption is that "they know what they want to say" but cannot
>say it the way they want to. I hope that's a fair paraphrase of
>"mischosen articulation" as you use it above. My question to you, then, is
>_in what medium_ do they "know what they want to say"? It cannot be in the
>medium of discursive language, since then the problem wouldn't arise.
They know approximately what they want. Call it the medium of
interaction-with-the-world.
[snip]
>There is an experiment teachers like to do in about tenth grade. Two
>students are sent out of the room; they are given a sheet of paper with
>an abstract design arrangement made out of squares. The students are then
>led back to the classroom and asked to describe the arrangement without
>taking recourse to gesture or drawing. ("It's an arrangement of six
>squares; the arrangement is mostly vertical; the first square
>blablabla..."). The only difference between the two students is that the
>second one is allowed to take and answer questions, the first one
>isn't. Not surprisingly, the first student has a lower success rate than
>the second one.
[snip]
>I don't think I've said anything even slightly controversial above. It's
>basic, and it's written in primer English, as requested. Would one of you
>now point me back to the question of how authorial intent can be
>established in reading? I'm not even beginning to ask you whether you admit
>of an unconscious.
Well, you've got the bones of a perfect micro-experiment there. Let me
flesh it out a little bit? Give the student ten similar pictures, ask
him to describe one (his choice), and ask the rest of the class to
match his description to the one. I further assume that we make the task
hard enough that it's not being performed at ceiling level -- there is
a difference of opinion about which picture was described.
Suppose further that we then allow students to discuss and debate among
themselves to determine which picture was described, and assume that
a consensus is reached. We then ask the original student which picture
he described -- and by assumption, there is a difference. What would
the "reasonable person" assume from the evidence, that the student was
wrong or the group consensus was wrong? The evidentiary privilege assigned
to the original student is a recognition of "authorial" intent. (I further
presume that this experiment can be done and would establish this privilege;
it's a reasonable and testable conjecture.)
And, of course, to more firmly establish this in reading, one simply
makes the original student write a descriptive essay and ask the
rest of the class to read the essay and proceed as above.
If you can find another explanation for this evidentiary privilege,
I'd be interested to hear it.
Patrick
