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> If nature is the source of natural rights, then you would expect their violation in nature to be an exception rather than a rule. If it is instead the rule, t

> If nature is the source of natural rights, then you would expect their violation in nature to be an exception rather than a rule. If it is instead the rule, then what even is the meaning of calling it a "natural right"? Plato, Aristotle, Aquinas, etc, were working in a very different framework from most people today. They believed that universals were really existent entities – either in some transcendent eternal realm (Plato and Platonists), or somehow immanent in their instances. From those realist assumptions, it makes sense to view a universal (nature/essence/subject/species/etc) as an ideal against which something could be measured. The fact that real life very often fell short of the ideal didn't make it any less ideal. And it is "natural" because it is part of the nature of things. Whereas, most people today are nominalists, and given nominalist assumptions, that whole approach doesn't make much sense. But now we've shifted the philosophical problem from natural rights, to who has the correct metaphysics of universals. They also viewed teleology as real in a way in which mainstream contemporary thought does not. Purpose was not an exclusive property of conscious beings (humans and animals), it was inherent in everything. Teleological explanations (final causes) were viewed as causal explanations equal in ontological status to efficient causation, whereas Enlightenment and post-Enlightenment thought has (on the whole) redefined causation to mean efficient causation only. Purpose was inherent in the very nature of things, so it makes sense to judge actions based on whether they further those purposes or fight them. > The problem with all the philosophers you've listed is that they were, essentially, arguing towards a predetermined conclusion, which is that the way they wanted their society to be is also the "natural" way for it to be. Okay, but if you are going to accuse them of that, why not levy the same accusation against philosophers whose positions are closer to your own? If realism about universals is an example of "motivated reasoning", why isn't irrealism about them equally so? If a broader understanding of causation, in which teleology and efficient causation are ontologically equal, is an example of "motivated reasoning", why isn't Bacon/Hume/etc's position that efficient causation has ontological priority over teleology equally so? > The very fact that human morality has varied so extremely over different cultures, and even in the same culture over time (which people often underestimate based on pop and folk history, I should add), is yet another piece of evidence that there's nothing "natural" about all this. That's an old argument: morality can't be objective because people don't agree on what is moral. It also has an old response: if that's true, then fact can't be objective either, because people don't agree on what is factual. > For the purposes of this conversation, "reason" as a term means what people today, in the society that we live in, understand as such. It is a vague squishy term without a clear definition. And when we try to be precise about what it means, we find that even today, people disagree about which precise definition is the correct one. And that's important, because different definitions of "reason" can produce different answers to questions such as "can reason confer rights?" > I'm not interested in sophistry. Implying that the person you are talking with is engaging in "sophistry" is not particularly civil, nor conducive to thoughtful discussion.

int_19h 3y ago
Indeed, so they redefined "nature" to mean what they wanted it to mean, rather than what it observably is. Again, it is always very telling that all those "universals" and "innate purpose" of things somehow conspired to lead to the conclusions that the person in question wanted to achieve. I am really utterly disinterested in pursuing this line of thinking or debating it. And yes, I do see it as sophistry; specifically, as dressing up trivial and/or circular arguments with intent to confuse others about their plain meaning. Much of classical philosophy is exactly that. > Okay, but if you are going to accuse them of that, why not levy the same accusation against philosophers whose positions are closer to your own. If realism about universals is an example of "motivated reasoning", why isn't irrealism about them equally so? Because it's the only sensible null hypothesis. We can postulate existence of all kinds of things at random, why universals specifically? > That's an old argument: morality can't be objective because people don't agree on what is moral. It also has an old response: if that's true, then fact can't be objective either, because people don't agree on what is factual. It doesn't matter if people agree, only if the universe agrees. A 1-ton block falling on you doesn't care if you "agree" whether its movement is factual or not; you'll find out soon enough through direct experience, without having to debate with anyone about it. But can you show me a thing that disagrees with people about its purpose in a way that can be observed and measured? Facts transcend cultures. "Universals" do not.
- skissane 3y ago
  > Indeed, so they redefined "nature" to mean what they wanted it to mean, rather than what it observably is. They never "redefined" the term "nature". They actually originated it. The definition you are used to is actually a descendant, a modification, of theirs. And the problem with claiming "what it observably is" is that (as Popper, Kuhn, Feyerabend, inter alia, argue) observation is theory-laden: a lot of what you think nature "observably" is, is how you interpret your experiences through the lens of your own theoretical committments; hence, people who have different theoretical commitments, don't observe the same things you do. The raw sense data may be the same, but the conversion of that raw sense data into words and concepts proceeds differently. > Again, it is always very telling that all those "universals" and "innate purpose" of things somehow conspired to lead to the conclusions that the person in question wanted to achieve. Again, why can't we levy the same argument against the positions you prefer? If realism about universalism conspires to produce conclusions that the person in question wanted to achieve, why doesn't nominalist irrealism about them likewise conspire to produce conclusions that nominalists want to achieve? > And yes, I do see it as sophistry; specifically, as dressing up trivial and/or circular arguments with intent to confuse others about their plain meaning. Much of classical philosophy is exactly that. I disagree. I think it is a case of being so wedded to a certain interpretive framework that one loses the ability to take any of its competitors seriously, to even realise that there are other options to consider. > Because it's the only sensible null hypothesis. Why should irrealism about universals be the null hypothesis? And, if irrealism about universals is the null hypothesis, why not equally so irrealism about other things, for example physical matter? Why wouldn't the same logic lead to subjective idealism as the null hypothesis? > We can postulate existence of all kinds of things at random, why universals specifically? Because they are part of our everyday experience. We know both individual trees, and whatever it is that all individual trees have in common which makes them trees as opposed to mountains or rivers or dogs or asteroids or whatnot–the first are particulars, the second is a universal. Obviously both exist in some sense, the question is how similar those respective senses of existence are. If you view both as "existing" in fundamentally the same sense, you end up with a strongly realist position about universals, such as Plato's; if you view universals as "existing" in a much weaker sense than particulars do, you end up in the ballpark of nominalist positions such as those of William of Ockham and Thomas Hobbes. If you aim for somewhere in-between these two extremes, you end up with the "moderate realism" of Aristotle and Aquinas. > It doesn't matter if people agree, only if the universe agrees. But we can't know whether the universe agrees. There are many "factual" questions to which (barring some kind of afterlife) none of us now living will ever know the answer. Is there intelligent life in the Ophiuchus Supercluster? What was Julius Caesar's last meal? Somebody once knew, but the last person to ever know that died a very long time ago, and barring some unlikely archaeological discoveries (which probably don't exist to discover), we never again will know. Or, consider modestly (as opposed to outlandishly) improbable conspiracy theories – the vast majority of them are going to be false, but there are enough of them that likely a handful are actually true–but will we ever be able to know which ones? If there are questions to which we'll never be able to know the answer, why should we assume an unknowable answer to them must actually exist? > Facts transcend cultures. "Universals" do not. The concept of a tree, as opposed to any particular individual tree, is an example of a universal, and I'm not aware of any human culture lacking that concept.

int_19h 3y ago

Indeed, so they redefined "nature" to mean what they wanted it to mean, rather than what it observably is. Again, it is always very telling that all those "universals" and "innate purpose" of things somehow conspired to lead to the conclusions that the person in question wanted to achieve. I am really utterly disinterested in pursuing this line of thinking or debating it. And yes, I do see it as sophistry; specifically, as dressing up trivial and/or circular arguments with intent to confuse others about their plain meaning. Much of classical philosophy is exactly that. > Okay, but if you are going to accuse them of that, why not levy the same accusation against philosophers whose positions are closer to your own. If realism about universals is an example of "motivated reasoning", why isn't irrealism about them equally so? Because it's the only sensible null hypothesis. We can postulate existence of all kinds of things at random, why universals specifically? > That's an old argument: morality can't be objective because people don't agree on what is moral. It also has an old response: if that's true, then fact can't be objective either, because people don't agree on what is factual. It doesn't matter if people agree, only if the universe agrees. A 1-ton block falling on you doesn't care if you "agree" whether its movement is factual or not; you'll find out soon enough through direct experience, without having to debate with anyone about it. But can you show me a thing that disagrees with people about its purpose in a way that can be observed and measured? Facts transcend cultures. "Universals" do not.

skissane 3y ago
> Indeed, so they redefined "nature" to mean what they wanted it to mean, rather than what it observably is. They never "redefined" the term "nature". They actually originated it. The definition you are used to is actually a descendant, a modification, of theirs. And the problem with claiming "what it observably is" is that (as Popper, Kuhn, Feyerabend, inter alia, argue) observation is theory-laden: a lot of what you think nature "observably" is, is how you interpret your experiences through the lens of your own theoretical committments; hence, people who have different theoretical commitments, don't observe the same things you do. The raw sense data may be the same, but the conversion of that raw sense data into words and concepts proceeds differently. > Again, it is always very telling that all those "universals" and "innate purpose" of things somehow conspired to lead to the conclusions that the person in question wanted to achieve. Again, why can't we levy the same argument against the positions you prefer? If realism about universalism conspires to produce conclusions that the person in question wanted to achieve, why doesn't nominalist irrealism about them likewise conspire to produce conclusions that nominalists want to achieve? > And yes, I do see it as sophistry; specifically, as dressing up trivial and/or circular arguments with intent to confuse others about their plain meaning. Much of classical philosophy is exactly that. I disagree. I think it is a case of being so wedded to a certain interpretive framework that one loses the ability to take any of its competitors seriously, to even realise that there are other options to consider. > Because it's the only sensible null hypothesis. Why should irrealism about universals be the null hypothesis? And, if irrealism about universals is the null hypothesis, why not equally so irrealism about other things, for example physical matter? Why wouldn't the same logic lead to subjective idealism as the null hypothesis? > We can postulate existence of all kinds of things at random, why universals specifically? Because they are part of our everyday experience. We know both individual trees, and whatever it is that all individual trees have in common which makes them trees as opposed to mountains or rivers or dogs or asteroids or whatnot–the first are particulars, the second is a universal. Obviously both exist in some sense, the question is how similar those respective senses of existence are. If you view both as "existing" in fundamentally the same sense, you end up with a strongly realist position about universals, such as Plato's; if you view universals as "existing" in a much weaker sense than particulars do, you end up in the ballpark of nominalist positions such as those of William of Ockham and Thomas Hobbes. If you aim for somewhere in-between these two extremes, you end up with the "moderate realism" of Aristotle and Aquinas. > It doesn't matter if people agree, only if the universe agrees. But we can't know whether the universe agrees. There are many "factual" questions to which (barring some kind of afterlife) none of us now living will ever know the answer. Is there intelligent life in the Ophiuchus Supercluster? What was Julius Caesar's last meal? Somebody once knew, but the last person to ever know that died a very long time ago, and barring some unlikely archaeological discoveries (which probably don't exist to discover), we never again will know. Or, consider modestly (as opposed to outlandishly) improbable conspiracy theories – the vast majority of them are going to be false, but there are enough of them that likely a handful are actually true–but will we ever be able to know which ones? If there are questions to which we'll never be able to know the answer, why should we assume an unknowable answer to them must actually exist? > Facts transcend cultures. "Universals" do not. The concept of a tree, as opposed to any particular individual tree, is an example of a universal, and I'm not aware of any human culture lacking that concept.