Rumraket wrote:

Mick wrote:

Shrunk wrote:

Mick wrote:I am aware that modern science does not deploy an understanding of proper being; and that is precisely the problem! Because of that, we have no basis for thinking that there is anything intrinsically wrong with my deafened ears. On the view of modern science, it would be false to say that my ears are working improperly, since there just is no way ears ought to be.

Sure there is. The ability to perceive sounds of given amplitude and frequencies provides an organism with concrete, tangible survival advantages, and within a population of organisms the range of normative function on these parameters can be determined statistically. Deviation from this normative range, then, is considered disorder. I fail to see what is gained by adding metaphysical mumbo jumbo to the mix.

If you are claiming there is one specific "way that ears ought to be", then it suggests to me that all ears are disordered, since no pair of ears that actually exists will match the ideal "form" of a pair of ears. A model of "disorder" in which every single aspect of every single being is "disordered" seems obviously absurd to me.

Right. Statistical norms. Those are not the norms I am speaking of. If everyone here and now becamed deafened, what then?

Then supposing we didn't also suddenly forget we could hear yesterday, it would be a disorder. History matters in this context. Don't tell me this answer wasn't immediately obvious to you.

Indeed. Is our blindness to most of the em spectrum a disorder?

Sent from my GT-I9100 using Tapatalk 4

Rumraket wrote:

Mick wrote:

Shrunk wrote:

Mick wrote:I am aware that modern science does not deploy an understanding of proper being; and that is precisely the problem! Because of that, we have no basis for thinking that there is anything intrinsically wrong with my deafened ears. On the view of modern science, it would be false to say that my ears are working improperly, since there just is no way ears ought to be.

Sure there is. The ability to perceive sounds of given amplitude and frequencies provides an organism with concrete, tangible survival advantages, and within a population of organisms the range of normative function on these parameters can be determined statistically. Deviation from this normative range, then, is considered disorder. I fail to see what is gained by adding metaphysical mumbo jumbo to the mix.

If you are claiming there is one specific "way that ears ought to be", then it suggests to me that all ears are disordered, since no pair of ears that actually exists will match the ideal "form" of a pair of ears. A model of "disorder" in which every single aspect of every single being is "disordered" seems obviously absurd to me.

Right. Statistical norms. Those are not the norms I am speaking of. If everyone here and now becamed deafened, what then?

Then supposing we didn't also suddenly forget we could hear yesterday, it would be a disorder. History matters in this context. Don't tell me this answer wasn't immediately obvious to you.

But here the reference is changed. Upon my criticism, it is no longer relative to the population here and now, but to the population over time. But how much time? Let us hear those arbitrary answers!

Mick wrote:

Rumraket wrote:

Mick wrote:

Shrunk wrote:

Sure there is. The ability to perceive sounds of given amplitude and frequencies provides an organism with concrete, tangible survival advantages, and within a population of organisms the range of normative function on these parameters can be determined statistically. Deviation from this normative range, then, is considered disorder. I fail to see what is gained by adding metaphysical mumbo jumbo to the mix.

If you are claiming there is one specific "way that ears ought to be", then it suggests to me that all ears are disordered, since no pair of ears that actually exists will match the ideal "form" of a pair of ears. A model of "disorder" in which every single aspect of every single being is "disordered" seems obviously absurd to me.

Right. Statistical norms. Those are not the norms I am speaking of. If everyone here and now becamed deafened, what then?

Then supposing we didn't also suddenly forget we could hear yesterday, it would be a disorder. History matters in this context. Don't tell me this answer wasn't immediately obvious to you.

But here the reference is changed. Upon my criticism, it is no longer relative to the population here and now, but to the population over time. But how much time? Let us hear those arbitrary answers!

What exactly are you asking here? What 'criticism' are you trying to level at us? What is the 'gotcha' you are trying to set up here? You're not making any sense.

Mick wrote:

Rumraket wrote:

Mick wrote:

Shrunk wrote:

Sure there is. The ability to perceive sounds of given amplitude and frequencies provides an organism with concrete, tangible survival advantages, and within a population of organisms the range of normative function on these parameters can be determined statistically. Deviation from this normative range, then, is considered disorder. I fail to see what is gained by adding metaphysical mumbo jumbo to the mix.

If you are claiming there is one specific "way that ears ought to be", then it suggests to me that all ears are disordered, since no pair of ears that actually exists will match the ideal "form" of a pair of ears. A model of "disorder" in which every single aspect of every single being is "disordered" seems obviously absurd to me.

Right. Statistical norms. Those are not the norms I am speaking of. If everyone here and now becamed deafened, what then?

Then supposing we didn't also suddenly forget we could hear yesterday, it would be a disorder. History matters in this context. Don't tell me this answer wasn't immediately obvious to you.

But here the reference is changed. Upon my criticism, it is no longer relative to the population here and now, but to the population over time. But how much time? Let us hear those arbitrary answers!

Are you suggesting the is some ideal form for senses? Do 'normal healthy' humans have deficits in hearing, vision taste and smell, or not? How can we tell what the form is?

Why do you think that?

Mick wrote:

Rumraket wrote:

Mick wrote:

Shrunk wrote:

Sure there is. The ability to perceive sounds of given amplitude and frequencies provides an organism with concrete, tangible survival advantages, and within a population of organisms the range of normative function on these parameters can be determined statistically. Deviation from this normative range, then, is considered disorder. I fail to see what is gained by adding metaphysical mumbo jumbo to the mix.

If you are claiming there is one specific "way that ears ought to be", then it suggests to me that all ears are disordered, since no pair of ears that actually exists will match the ideal "form" of a pair of ears. A model of "disorder" in which every single aspect of every single being is "disordered" seems obviously absurd to me.

Right. Statistical norms. Those are not the norms I am speaking of. If everyone here and now becamed deafened, what then?

Then supposing we didn't also suddenly forget we could hear yesterday, it would be a disorder. History matters in this context. Don't tell me this answer wasn't immediately obvious to you.

But here the reference is changed. Upon my criticism, it is no longer relative to the population here and now, but to the population over time. But how much time? Let us hear those arbitrary answers!

They are arbitrary I fully agree, but that criticism is of no concern to me. Why? - It works.

The biological species concept is abitrary and time-dependent. Yet it works. It is useful, we can do stuff with it.

Animavore wrote:

Mick wrote:

Rumraket wrote:

Mick wrote:


Right. Statistical norms. Those are not the norms I am speaking of. If everyone here and now becamed deafened, what then?

Then supposing we didn't also suddenly forget we could hear yesterday, it would be a disorder. History matters in this context. Don't tell me this answer wasn't immediately obvious to you.

But here the reference is changed. Upon my criticism, it is no longer relative to the population here and now, but to the population over time. But how much time? Let us hear those arbitrary answers!

What exactly are you asking here? What 'criticism' are you trying to level at us? What is the 'gotcha' you are trying to set up here? You're not making any sense.

Hasn't it become clear at this point that Mick is about absolute answers? No ambiguities, no grey zones, no arbitrary definitions. It's all or nothing, black and white, about absolute knowledge and all-encompassing definitions. Even if you have to pretend. Even if they're not useful. It's for it's own sake.

Rumraket wrote:

Animavore wrote:

Mick wrote:

Rumraket wrote:
Then supposing we didn't also suddenly forget we could hear yesterday, it would be a disorder. History matters in this context. Don't tell me this answer wasn't immediately obvious to you.

But here the reference is changed. Upon my criticism, it is no longer relative to the population here and now, but to the population over time. But how much time? Let us hear those arbitrary answers!

What exactly are you asking here? What 'criticism' are you trying to level at us? What is the 'gotcha' you are trying to set up here? You're not making any sense.

Hasn't it become clear at this point that Mick is about absolute answers? No ambiguities, no grey zones, no arbitrary definitions. It's all or nothing, black and white, about absolute knowledge and all-encompassing definitions. Even if you have to pretend. Even if they're not useful. It's for it's own sake.

Except when it comes to providing technical details on the processes involved when gods interact with or do anything involving creating or arranging material it seems.

Animavore wrote:

Rumraket wrote:

Animavore wrote:

Mick wrote:


But here the reference is changed. Upon my criticism, it is no longer relative to the population here and now, but to the population over time. But how much time? Let us hear those arbitrary answers!

What exactly are you asking here? What 'criticism' are you trying to level at us? What is the 'gotcha' you are trying to set up here? You're not making any sense.

Hasn't it become clear at this point that Mick is about absolute answers? No ambiguities, no grey zones, no arbitrary definitions. It's all or nothing, black and white, about absolute knowledge and all-encompassing definitions. Even if you have to pretend. Even if they're not useful. It's for it's own sake.

Except when it comes to providing technical details on the processes involved when gods interact with or do anything involving creating or arranging material it seems.

Or you ask "how do you know?".

Rumraket wrote:Hasn't it become clear at this point that Mick is about absolute answers? No ambiguities, no grey zones, no arbitrary definitions. It's all or nothing, black and white, about absolute knowledge and all-encompassing definitions. Even if you have to pretend. Even if they're not useful. It's for it's own sake.

The goal is to provide "accounts": Stories that seem to hang together under some degree of scrutiny and provide satisfying answers to questions one considers important. "It works", but in a completely different sense than the one in which you use the phrase "It works" just above.

Mick wrote:

Rumraket wrote:

Mick wrote:

Shrunk wrote:

Sure there is. The ability to perceive sounds of given amplitude and frequencies provides an organism with concrete, tangible survival advantages, and within a population of organisms the range of normative function on these parameters can be determined statistically. Deviation from this normative range, then, is considered disorder. I fail to see what is gained by adding metaphysical mumbo jumbo to the mix.

If you are claiming there is one specific "way that ears ought to be", then it suggests to me that all ears are disordered, since no pair of ears that actually exists will match the ideal "form" of a pair of ears. A model of "disorder" in which every single aspect of every single being is "disordered" seems obviously absurd to me.

Right. Statistical norms. Those are not the norms I am speaking of. If everyone here and now becamed deafened, what then?

Then supposing we didn't also suddenly forget we could hear yesterday, it would be a disorder. History matters in this context. Don't tell me this answer wasn't immediately obvious to you.

But here the reference is changed. Upon my criticism, it is no longer relative to the population here and now, but to the population over time. But how much time? Let us hear those arbitrary answers!

If everyone suddenly lost their hearing overnight, I think there would be no problem defining this as an epidemic of some sort of mysterious disorder, and there would be no need to resort to metaphysics to do so.

You'll notice you failed to answer my question. How many pairs of ears meet the ideal form of what ears should be? Any? If not, then whose ears are not "disordered"?

We see here a perfect example of the difference between "explanations" and "accounts". The empirical/scientific explanatory definition of hearing impairment is unavoidably fuzzy around the edges and difficult to pin down precisely in terms of metaphysical definitions. Yet its utilitarian value is obvious and no one has difficulty applying it to practical, real world situations. Meanwhile, the metaphysical "account" is airtight in stating how hearing impairment could be defined. Yet that definition is functionally useless. We have no way of knowing what the ideal form of hearing should be, and therefore of measuring how any individual's hearing diverges from that. So even the metaphysicist must fall back on the empirical/scientific model if he wants to operate in the real world.

Shrunk wrote:We see here a perfect example of the difference between "explanations" and "accounts". The empirical/scientific explanatory definition of hearing impairment is unavoidably fuzzy around the edges and difficult to pin down precisely in terms of metaphysical definitions. Yet its utilitarian value is obvious and no one has difficulty applying it to practical, real world situations. Meanwhile, the metaphysical "account" is airtight in stating how hearing impairment could be defined. Yet that definition is functionally useless. We have no way of knowing what the ideal form of hearing should be, and therefore of measuring how any individual's hearing diverges from that. So even the metaphysicist must fall back on the empirical/scientific model if he wants to operate in the real world.

And it basically goes for all Mick's stuff about forms and even extends to stuff like morality and ethics.

I'm not sure how you would make a hearing aid based on metaphysical principles. You would surely have to build it to a very specific standard which is based off of what the most ideal form of hearing is. Science can ignore that and build one which just makes it so you can hear what you need to hear.

Animavore wrote:I'm not sure how you would make a hearing aid based on metaphysical principles. You would surely have to build it to a very specific standard which is based off of what the most ideal form of hearing is. Science can ignore that and build one which just makes it so you can hear what you need to hear.

And I don't think Mick would disagree. One point that remains unclear to me is that when he says this:

I am aware that modern science does not deploy an understanding of proper being; and that is precisely the problem! Because of that, we have no basis for thinking that there is anything intrinsically wrong with my deafened ears. On the view of modern science, it would be false to say that my ears are working improperly, since there just is no way ears ought to be.

exactly what "problem" he is referring to. How would science better be able to treat hearing impairment if it paid more attention to metaphysical principles? We somehow seem to have come up with a working conception of hearing impairment without using metaphysics at all. Unless he is suggesting we are using metaphysics without knowing it. But it seems to me that would only be the case if we were claiming that our definition of hearing impairment achieved some transcendent objective level of "truth", as opposed to just being a pragmatic definition that serves a purpose.

Exactly! Who cares about "intrinsically wrong"? We don't need to erect absolutist metaphysical principles like that to be able to do science or fix people's hearing problems. I don't see any people in their doctor's office complaining about a lack of "proper" metaphysical definitions of hearing disorders.

Shrunk wrote:

Animavore wrote:I'm not sure how you would make a hearing aid based on metaphysical principles. You would surely have to build it to a very specific standard which is based off of what the most ideal form of hearing is. Science can ignore that and build one which just makes it so you can hear what you need to hear.

And I don't think Mick would disagree. One point that remains unclear to me is that when he says this:

I am aware that modern science does not deploy an understanding of proper being; and that is precisely the problem! Because of that, we have no basis for thinking that there is anything intrinsically wrong with my deafened ears. On the view of modern science, it would be false to say that my ears are working improperly, since there just is no way ears ought to be.

exactly what "problem" he is referring to. How would science better be able to treat hearing impairment if it paid more attention to metaphysical principles? We somehow seem to have come up with a working conception of hearing impairment without using metaphysics at all. Unless he is suggesting we are using metaphysics without knowing it. But it seems to me that would only be the case if we were claiming that our definition of hearing impairment achieved some transcendent objective level of "truth", as opposed to just being a pragmatic definition that serves a purpose.

No, I am not saying it is needed for better treatment, I am saying it is needed for intelligibility.

Mick wrote:
No, I am not saying it is needed for better treatment, I am saying it is needed for intelligibility.

Can you say what the ideal form is for senses? How are we to decide what is impairment? Are all humans hearing impaired or not? How can you make that intelligible?

Mick wrote:No, I am not saying it is needed for better treatment, I am saying it is needed for intelligibility.

And yet I can't make sense of it

Animavore wrote:

Mick wrote:No, I am not saying it is needed for better treatment, I am saying it is needed for intelligibility.

And yet I can't make sense of it

What I want to know is what is lacking in intelligibility where A is observed to have property X and B is observed to lack property X, in saying that B is deficient in X? I can hear some sounds that Mick (presumably) cannot. Bats can hear sound that none of us can hear. Could there be some 'ideal form' of hearing by which Mick is deficient and I am not? How does the bat fit into that? Does it exceed the ideal, or are all humans (all life) deficient to some degree or other? It doesn't seem to aid intelligibility at all. It makes seomething simple impossibly complex, or merely arbitrary (define the ideal form to suit the point you want to make).

GrahamH wrote:

Animavore wrote:

Mick wrote:No, I am not saying it is needed for better treatment, I am saying it is needed for intelligibility.

And yet I can't make sense of it

What I want to know is what is lacking in intelligibility where A is observed to have property X and B is observed to lack property X, in saying that B is deficient in X? I can hear some sounds that Mick (presumably) cannot. Bats can hear sound that none of us can hear. Could there be some 'ideal form' of hearing by which Mick is deficient and I am not? How does the bat fit into that? Does it exceed the ideal, or are all humans (all life) deficient to some degree or other? It doesn't seem to aid intelligibility at all. It makes seomething simple impossibly complex, or merely arbitrary (define the ideal form to suit the point you want to make).

Well that makes sense. What Mick is saying is adding unnecessary confusion, not intelligibility.

If we say that, on average, observed A has a hearing range between 20 - 20,000 hertz at age 20, which can be plotted out on a bell chart, then all observed Bs outside this range either have an increased or diminished range relative to the average.

This, to me, is not much different to speaking about height. The average height has increased over the last 50 years and the bell-curve has shifted up. People who were average are slipping toward being below average. People who were tall are slipping toward average. And a new tallness is emerging. It would seem silly to talk about an ideal height without referent (ie. in relation to say suitability for basketball or going up chimneys to clean them), and so too should it be with hearing it would seem to me. But all referents I can think of for height are physical ones, not metaphysical ones. Because, what is a metaphysical referent? Your hearing is either good or bad in relation to someone or something else. Not to an ill-defined ideal.

Evolution changes averages and bell-curves over time so I'm not sure how any creature could ever be considered 'ideal' in any definite sense. Only more suitable, successful and serendipitous.