RoR: Forum

Brendan,

Considering your question: "…how do the primary axioms become present in the mind; and in a way that is consistent with Rand’s epistemology?", I will attempt to answer it on my own and with my own rational thought (instead of from a particular article or particular tenet of objectivism that I am currently consciously aware of).

Thinking of concepts as file folders, we can imagine them as open-ended things (ever-expandable file folders that go off in 2 directions, as if on a continuum). In this respect, a concept like "human being" subsumes all referents (all humans) of past, present, or future. The "Big 3" axiomatic concepts of objectivism (existence, identity, consciousness), however, seem to run in more than 2 directions. They seem to subsume more than the "usual" fare for a "mental concept". It's almost as if they subsume "whole concepts" as referents on THEIR continuum.

A geometry analogy may help here: picture a line running in 2 directions (a standard token of geometry made from a continuum of "points" running along on one, and only one, axis). A standard concept works like this (with "points" serving as referents subsumed by the concept - by the "line"). However, it would seem that whole concepts can be subsumed ("filed") under the Big 3 axioms (not just "points", but "whole lines") so that now we have a "plane" as a file folder (extraordinary mental concept), where we usually have a line (ordinary mental concept). Set the Big 3 axioms up as 3 perpendicular planes and you have got yourself a system for reality.

So Brendan, we only know about the axioms, or "planes" (explicitly), when we have formed enough concepts, or "lines" (but EVERY "line" is, and always was, subsumed by at least one of the "planes").

I do not, at the moment, wish to speculate on the apparent coincidence of having 3 dimensions, which subsume all space, and of having 3 fundamental axioms which apparently subsume all concepts. And if this whole idea of mine is simply a re-hash of some god-awful skepticist- or intrinsicist-philosopher of the past or present, then please excuse my folly (after all, I AM trying hard to increase truth and understanding in this world!)

Ed

Post 41

Monday, August 18, 2003 - 8:31am

Ed wrote: “Thinking of concepts as file folders, we can imagine them as open-ended things (ever-expandable file folders that go off in 2 directions, as if on a continuum). In this respect, a concept like "human being" subsumes all referents (all humans) of past, present, or future.”

I’m not sure that this explains the way in which the axioms become present in the mind, but you have raised an interesting point. One comment springs to mind. First, since a concept is a mental entity, I would have though it more accurate to say that the concept subsumes our knowledge of the really existing referents, and refers to those referents. To say that the concept subsumes all its referents seems to conflate the contents of the mind with the contents of reality, and of course Rand explicitly insists on keeping a sharp distinction between the two.

“The "Big 3" axiomatic concepts … (existence, identity, consciousness) …seem to subsume more than the "usual" fare for a "mental concept". It's almost as if they subsume "whole concepts" as referents on THEIR continuum.”

Here you say the axiomatic concepts subsume all other concepts. This raises an interesting question: what does the term existence mean? If it means, say, “all existing things” it would appear to be a high level abstraction, and the mental file folder marked “Existence” contains all the knowledge we have about these existing things. But in that case the term existence cannot be axiomatic, because among other things this knowledge is not perceptually self-evident.

On the other hand, if the existence axiom means something like “the state of being”, a fundamental metaphysical fact that is common to all existents, the axiomatic character of the term is retained. But it’s retained at the expense of its status as a conceptual file folder that subsumes all concepts, since “the state of being” is not obviously equivalent to “all existing things”.

Brendan

Post 42

Thursday, August 21, 2003 - 7:28pm

Brendan (responses below),

Brendan: "… since a concept is a mental entity, I would have though[t] it more accurate to say that the concept subsumes our knowledge of the really existing referents, and refers to those referents. To say that the concept subsumes all its referents seems to conflate the contents of the mind with the contents of reality, and of course Rand explicitly insists on keeping a sharp distinction between the two."

Ed: Good point of clarification Brendan, and thanks for "keeping me honest"!

Brendan: Here you say the axiomatic concepts subsume all other concepts. This raises an interesting question: what does the term existence mean? If it means, say, “all existing things” it would appear to be a high level abstraction, and the mental file folder marked “Existence” contains all the knowledge we have about these existing things. But in that case the term existence cannot be axiomatic, because among other things this knowledge is not perceptually self-evident.

On the other hand, if the existence axiom means something like “the state of being”, a fundamental metaphysical fact that is common to all existents, the axiomatic character of the term is retained. But it’s retained at the expense of its status as a conceptual file folder that subsumes all concepts, since “the state of being” is not obviously equivalent to “all existing things”.

Ed: I don't quite follow you here Brendan. Allow me to edit myself: the explicit knowledge of the axioms comes after you have used concepts for a little while - all the while implicitly depending on the axioms for the concepts that you have started to use. The explicit knowledge of the axioms is an IDENTIFICATION of the context in which ANY knowledge is gained. In this respect, we may refer to the axioms as if they were "concepts of the context of all knowledge".

The reason for this phenomenon of first using concepts before you have explicit knowledge of the context is the hierarchical nature of knowledge. Said more directly, in order to understand if you've crossed the boundaries, you have to first identify the boundaries (and that often comes after some initial "hands-on" experience where you may approach or cross a boundary).

To paraphrase Nathaniel Branden from his article on the stolen concept, you have to identify a logically necessary idea in order to be able to identify an "arbitrary" or "hypothetical" idea. In this respect, it is only AFTER you have got your necessary ideas that you may judge all the other ideas that you have formed up until then. This is exactly what the self-evident (not necessarily "self-obvious") identification of the axioms does to human knowledge - it validates knowledge. And the axioms themselves are only validated, not rationally "constructed" or formally "proved".

Now use your consciousness to identify that (unless of course you are convinced that your consciousness is not self-evident and not needed to identify existing reality).

Ed

Post 43

Friday, August 22, 2003 - 2:31am

Thanks for your response Ed. It’s possible that we’re talking past each other. As I mentioned previously, I don’t have a problem with the idea that some things exist, or that a thing is what it is, or that some living beings are conscious. But Rand wants to use these ideas as the basis for all knowledge, and as a means for generating further concepts, such as causality, existent etc.

The problem is not so much with the ideas themselves, as with the mileage that Rand tries to extract from them. And that’s where they need to satisfy various philosophical criteria, including such epistemological questions as whether or not they are derived from experience.

I have to sign off now. I’m off for a well-deserved summer break. It’s been good talking to you.

Brendan

Post 44

Monday, May 7, 2007 - 4:59pm