From: "jamie morgan" <jamie-AT-morganj58.fsnet.co.uk>
Subject: Re: BHA: scientific realism,
Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2003 12:49:14 -0000



Hi Phil, not sure when I 'swallowed' this. Language is:

a maker of some aspects of reality
the medium by which we express our ideas on it in various modes or
discourses one of which that is sometimes useful is the use of analytical
methods such as propositions

is this contentious?

jamie


a bearer of some aspects of rality

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Phil Walden" <phil-AT-pwalden.fsnet.co.uk>
To: <bhaskar-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu>
Sent: Sunday, November 30, 2003 9:30 AM
Subject: RE: BHA: scientific realism,


> Hi Ruth,
>
> I think the basic method error that you (and I would say this about some
> other people on the list who I also respect e.g. Jamie Morgan) have made
> is that you have swallowed too much of the analytical philosophy story
> about truth and falsity residing in language (or propositions) rather
> than truth and falsity residing in the whole structure of reality
> (predominantly in the objective parts of it).  As far as I can tell,
> this kind of problem has a long history and goes back to the dawn of
> analytical philosophy (Brentano, Frege, Meinong, Russell - despite the
> contribution they have made) and results from a certain subjectivizing
> and a certain denial of the fundamental contradiction of capitalist
> society which Marx would not have agreed with (I am also not satisfied
> with Bhaskar's version of the anthropic fallacy in DPF, because I think
> it is not consistent with his (stated) commitment to openness in
> philosophical method - compare Adorno).  Strawson's psychologistic
> reading of Kant has imo gutted the real Kant of much of his meaning
> (again compare Adorno).  Bhaskar's Hegel, whilst being analytically
> impeccable (as far as I can see), has gutted Hegel of most of his
> meaning (see Hegel on being, nothing, and on contradiction).  Of course,
> if you reject materialism and dialectics, as I think all of the other
> people on this list do, then it will be difficult for you to get any
> kind of grip of what is going on in the world.  But for you, I have
> hope!
>
> Phil
>
> Hi Phil,
>
> No, I wouldn't say that capitalist social relations are true.  What I
> think is something like: strictly speaking, social structures are not
> truth-bearers and  are therefore neither true nor false; loosely
> speaking, capitalism generates certain false but real appearances;
> metaphorically/Hegelian-ly speaking, capitalism is false.  Nowadays I
> avoid the metaphoric mode more than I used to, mostly because I really
> don't think that the concepts of truth and of being have the same
> extensional content, to put it in persnickity analytic language.
>
> r.
>
>
>
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