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Cool to see a classic quote I've seen in multiple places by now: Adam was watching two men carry a load of bricks in a construction site. He was wondering wheth

by Frummy 3y ago

Cool to see a classic quote I've seen in multiple places by now: Adam was watching two men carry a load of bricks in a construction site. He was wondering whether the men would drop the bricks. This wondering did not involve any symbols, but it was an explicit cognitive process It strikes at the heart of the thinking that makes up 99.9% of my life but seemingly most people never talk about it or are completely unaware of it.

User23 3y ago
You might enjoy digging into the philosophy of C.S. Peirce then, specifically his concept of "abductive reasoning."
galaxyLogic 3y ago
If there were no symbols, what did this "wondering" consist of? Did it really happen? Is it possible to "wonder" without using symbols? The example does not say it out aloud that it assumes you can do "wondering" without symbols. An example like that implies that what it describes as happening actually happened, therefore proves that that is how the world works. I think that is a logical fallacy even though I'm not sure if it has a name or official definition. The fallacy is that because in an imagined situation something is imagined as having happened, it would prove something about the actual world, without us also proving that such an imagined thing can actually happen in the real world.
aradox66 3y ago
aren't the men, and the bricks, and the dropping all symbols? Perhaps the visual stimulus / qualia could be considered non-symbolic, but surely the high level abstractions "men" "bricks" "drop" are, even if the experience of thinking did not include hearing the phonetic expression of these concepts as words
antonvs 3y ago
Men, bricks, a load thereof, and a construction site are all rather complex abstractions. What do you call the mental identifiers that represent these abstractions if not “symbols”? Whatever you may call them, that is in fact what is meant by “symbols” by the people using that term in this context. Essentially, an identifier that represents an abstraction. It’s an incredibly basic feature of all cognitive systems we’re aware of.

by Frummy 3y ago

User23 3y ago

You might enjoy digging into the philosophy of C.S. Peirce then, specifically his concept of "abductive reasoning."

galaxyLogic 3y ago

If there were no symbols, what did this "wondering" consist of? Did it really happen? Is it possible to "wonder" without using symbols? The example does not say it out aloud that it assumes you can do "wondering" without symbols. An example like that implies that what it describes as happening actually happened, therefore proves that that is how the world works. I think that is a logical fallacy even though I'm not sure if it has a name or official definition. The fallacy is that because in an imagined situation something is imagined as having happened, it would prove something about the actual world, without us also proving that such an imagined thing can actually happen in the real world.

aradox66 3y ago

aren't the men, and the bricks, and the dropping all symbols? Perhaps the visual stimulus / qualia could be considered non-symbolic, but surely the high level abstractions "men" "bricks" "drop" are, even if the experience of thinking did not include hearing the phonetic expression of these concepts as words

antonvs 3y ago

Men, bricks, a load thereof, and a construction site are all rather complex abstractions. What do you call the mental identifiers that represent these abstractions if not “symbols”? Whatever you may call them, that is in fact what is meant by “symbols” by the people using that term in this context. Essentially, an identifier that represents an abstraction. It’s an incredibly basic feature of all cognitive systems we’re aware of.