Metaphysics is the speculative and integrative metaempirical inquiry into the nature and structure of reality. It is a rational, intellectual enterprise that doesn't ignore experience but transcends its bounds, venturing forth into what is undetermined, undeterminable, or underdetermined by the perceptually (observationally or experimentally) given.
Metaphysicians hunger for insight into the fundamental reality in and behind appearance.

SpeedOfSound wrote:If you want to understand my definition of metaphysics read the Carnap paper. The external questions is what I mean and I do not think so much of these questions.

If, as Carnap thinks, external existence questions are meaningless or truth-valueless, then existence becomes discourse- or framework-relative. But:

"The concept of existence, however, cannot be relativized without destroying its meaning completely."

(Gödel, Kurt. "A Remark about the Relationship Between Relativity and Idealistic Philosophy." In Albert Einstein: Philosopher-Scientist, edited by Paul Schilpp, 557-562. La Salle, IL: Open Court, 1949. p. 558, fn. 5)

We need an absolute, ontologically serious meaning of "exist".

"Existence: we know all about it, there is nothing concealed. The concept of existence helps us to form a good picture of reality. It is important for supporting a strong philosophical view and for being open-minded in reaching it."

(Gödel, Kurt. Quoted in: Wang, Hao. A Logical Journey: From Gödel to Philosophy. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1996. p. 150 [4.4.13])

Teuton wrote:Metaphysics is the speculative and integrative metaempirical inquiry into the nature and structure of reality. It is a rational, intellectual enterprise that doesn't ignore experience but transcends its bounds, venturing forth into what is undetermined, undeterminable, or underdetermined by the perceptually (observationally or experimentally) given.
Metaphysicians hunger for insight into the fundamental reality in and behind appearance.

In other words, bollocks. Metaphysics has no epistomological rigour. Pure speculation dressed up as something "intellectual".

Teuton wrote:

SpeedOfSound wrote:If you want to understand my definition of metaphysics read the Carnap paper. The external questions is what I mean and I do not think so much of these questions.

If, as Carnap thinks, external existence questions are meaningless or truth-valueless, then existence becomes discourse- or framework-relative. But:

"The concept of existence, however, cannot be relativized without destroying its meaning completely."

(Gödel, Kurt. "A Remark about the Relationship Between Relativity and Idealistic Philosophy." In Albert Einstein: Philosopher-Scientist, edited by Paul Schilpp, 557-562. La Salle, IL: Open Court, 1949. p. 558, fn. 5)

We need an absolute, ontologically serious meaning of "exist".

"Existence: we know all about it, there is nothing concealed. The concept of existence helps us to form a good picture of reality. It is important for supporting a strong philosophical view and for being open-minded in reaching it."

(Gödel, Kurt. Quoted in: Wang, Hao. A Logical Journey: From Gödel to Philosophy. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1996. p. 150 [4.4.13])

I do not understand why Carnap is followed by two sound-bites from Gödel. Why would you consider that persuasive?

Darwinsbulldog wrote:

Teuton wrote:Metaphysics is the speculative and integrative metaempirical inquiry into the nature and structure of reality. It is a rational, intellectual enterprise that doesn't ignore experience but transcends its bounds, venturing forth into what is undetermined, undeterminable, or underdetermined by the perceptually (observationally or experimentally) given.
Metaphysicians hunger for insight into the fundamental reality in and behind appearance.

In other words, bollocks. Metaphysics has no epistomological rigour. Pure speculation dressed up as something "intellectual".

Can anyone please explain it to me what "fundamental reality" is supposed to mean? And while we're at it, the "nature and structure of reality"? "Appearance"? Appearance at what level?
What I've learned so far is that it's impossible to grasp the nature of a cup of coffee in its entirety. If that's the case, the whole enterprise smells of playing with oneself, to put it delicately. There's nothing inherently wrong with that, but it's hardly earth-shattering.
As far as I'm concerned, it's physicists who have a lot to say about the structure of reality, only they needn't transcend anything, as far as I can see.

Regina wrote:

Darwinsbulldog wrote:

Teuton wrote:Metaphysics is the speculative and integrative metaempirical inquiry into the nature and structure of reality. It is a rational, intellectual enterprise that doesn't ignore experience but transcends its bounds, venturing forth into what is undetermined, undeterminable, or underdetermined by the perceptually (observationally or experimentally) given.
Metaphysicians hunger for insight into the fundamental reality in and behind appearance.

In other words, bollocks. Metaphysics has no epistomological rigour. Pure speculation dressed up as something "intellectual".

Can anyone please explain it to me what "fundamental reality" is supposed to mean? And while we're at it, the "nature and structure of reality"? "Appearance"? Appearance at what level?
What I've learned so far is that it's impossible to grasp the nature of a cup of coffee in its entirety. If that's the case, the whole enterprise smells of playing with oneself, to put it delicately. There's nothing inherently wrong with that, but it's hardly earth-shattering.
As far as I'm concerned, it's physicists who have a lot to say about the structure of reality, only they needn't transcend anything, as far as I can see.

The only way I can see it making sense to talk about fundamental reality is to call it a myth, admitting that it is a story we are telling ourselves while roasting marshmallows around the campfire. Ideas about structure and creation and sweeping generalities are not necessarily about something that is the case outside of our own heads.

I find it handy to call these fundamental stories implementors. LittleIdiot for instance thinks that there is a WorldMind that implements reality. I think that this is just bad storytelling and am agnostic about there even being any implementors at all. It could just be a happy accident in a locality that has very fuzzy boundaries.

SpeedOfSound wrote:
The only way I can see it making sense to talk about fundamental reality is to call it a myth, admitting that it is a story we are telling ourselves while roasting marshmallows around the campfire. Ideas about structure and creation and sweeping generalities are not necessarily about something that is the case outside of our own heads.

I find it handy to call these fundamental stories implementors. LittleIdiot for instance thinks that there is a WorldMind that implements reality. I think that this is just bad storytelling and am agnostic about there even being any implementors at all. It could just be a happy accident in a locality that has very fuzzy boundaries.

This just continues to beg the question of why people who are not children (intellectually, that is) are still telling themselves bedtime stories explicitly not subject to suspension of disbelief. People dabble in metaphysics to avoid suspending ontologic disbelief, and theism is only one of the most egregious examples of this. So is a belief in 'human progress', and so on. The silly thing I see here in these threads is that people seem to give themselves permission to talk about all sorts of pie in the sky, as long as they don't drape it in conventional sky-daddy theism. I call these systems 'religion-substitutes', and you can compare them to the pacifiers you stick in a baby's mouth when getting the teat is no longer a slam dunk, or else pretension to knowledge that is not at all hard-won. People labour furiously, and bring forth a mouse, or a spoon that doesn't bend.

Teuton wrote:

We need an absolute, ontologically serious meaning of "exist".

Speak for yourself. What I need is the erotic and fecund mass of many meanings in many contexts.

lobawad wrote:

Teuton wrote:

We need an absolute, ontologically serious meaning of "exist".

Speak for yourself. What I need is the erotic and fecund mass of many meanings in many contexts.

But let's call a spade a spade:

Regina wrote:the whole enterprise smells of playing with oneself, to put it delicately.

It's a lovable sport, this generation of narratives without the constraints of fiction: Character, scene, and so on.

lobawad wrote:

Teuton wrote:

We need an absolute, ontologically serious meaning of "exist".

Speak for yourself. What I need is the erotic and fecund mass of many meanings in many contexts.

And this is what language is. Which is bloody great in a lot of instances, and a horror in some others.
Additionally, it keeps philosophers busy and thus in pay cheques.

Cito di Pense wrote:

lobawad wrote:

Teuton wrote:

We need an absolute, ontologically serious meaning of "exist".

Speak for yourself. What I need is the erotic and fecund mass of many meanings in many contexts.

But let's call a spade a spade:

Regina wrote:the whole enterprise smells of playing with oneself, to put it delicately.

It's a lovable sport, this generation of narratives without the constraints of fiction: Character, scene, and so on.

Oh Cito, sad fail. Surely you know what "fecund" means.

Teuton wrote:"The concept of existence, however, cannot be relativized without destroying its meaning completely."

(Gödel, Kurt. "A Remark about the Relationship Between Relativity and Idealistic Philosophy." In Albert Einstein: Philosopher-Scientist, edited by Paul Schilpp, 557-562. La Salle, IL: Open Court, 1949. p. 558, fn. 5)

That's not much of a case against relativism, is it? Relativism is bad for metaphysics and ontological wibbling. Oh noes!

It's a bit feeble and strange, though: you post a quoted assertion from Gödel, in isolation, implying that everyone ought to be won over, merely because Gödel made the assertion. He could be Göd, for all I care. (Implied) arguments from authority are simply unimpressive.

lobawad wrote:
Oh Cito, sad fail. Surely you know what "fecund" means.

One could say that metaphysics seeks to situate itself in one wing of a distribution in which 'deepity' is a treated as a normal variable. 'Fundamental' does not just have rhetorical semantics. It's where the name of the f-orbital comes from.

I don't need to tell you that fundamentals and overtones have to do with periodically-oscillating 'pressure waves' in a model medium which people think of as 'material'. What's more fundamental, of course, is the role of periodic functions in complex analysis, illustrated in Euler's relation. Deepity, then, is about the the melancholy resonance of the minor fourth, which is cultural. When I say 'two cultures', I mean that you don't find quantum mechanics, as below, all that relevant.

Fecundity is in the eye of the beholder.

Whether or not you recognise it as relevant has everything to do with how 'fecund' you find it. Welcome to the Department of Tautology Department, and the explanation of 'hard' things in 'easy' terms. It's not hard to write an essay on the 'context' of some artifact. You just keep slogging away at it until you have an essay. Metaphysics thinks it's hot because it has no artifacts.

Darwinsbulldog wrote:Metaphysics has no epistomological rigour.

It is true that metaphysical questions aren't decidable by means of logical proofs or empirical tests; but this doesn't mean that all metaphysical theses and theories are equally good or equally bad, because there are some intersubjective theoretical criteria (key term: theoretical virtues).
The crucial epistemological question is whether pure reason (intuition, intellectual insight) is a source of justification and knowledge, i.e. whether the a priori belief in nonanalytic propositions is justifiable.

Teuton wrote:

Darwinsbulldog wrote:Metaphysics has no epistomological rigour.

It is true that metaphysical questions aren't decidable by means of logical proofs or empirical tests; but this doesn't mean that all metaphysical theses and theories are equally good or equally bad, because there are some intersubjective theoretical criteria (key term: theoretical virtues).
The crucial epistemological question is whether pure reason (intuition, intellectual insight) is a source of justification and knowledge, i.e. whether the a priori belief in nonanalytic propositions is justifiable.

And, is it?
How about coming up with a few answers for a change?
It must be quite frustrating to engage in deep thinking for aeons and never produce any results.
Or is that it: leave it to others to come up with answers and let them take the risk of being wrong?

Regina wrote:
It must be quite frustrating to engage in deep thinking for aeons and never produce any results.

There are many results.

Teuton wrote:

Regina wrote:
It must be quite frustrating to engage in deep thinking for aeons and never produce any results.

There are many results.

Do give us a thumb sketch.

Teuton wrote:Metaphysics is the speculative and integrative metaempirical inquiry into the nature and structure of reality.

To say that metaphysics is meta- or transempirical is not to say that it is antiempirical. Naturalistic metaphysics, at least, is informed by science and sees to it that its theses and theories are consistent with the scientific knowledge available. Its feedstock or raw material are the metatheoretical and conceptual presuppositions of the sciences and the interpretational problems of their results, including the question as to how these are best integrated into a larger picture of reality.

"The methods I have mentioned so far – attending to internal consistency, compatibility with our original conceptual scheme, and epistemological consequences – are wholly or largely a priori, making no direct appeal to experience or experiment. And this is often how metaphysics is popularly conceived, as a wholly a priori enterprise, this being precisely what differentiates it from science. But in sharp contrast to this is a naturalistic metaphysics, which is informed by physical science. The naturalistic metaphysician may be less concerned with a priori structures than with the metaphysical picture of the world suggested by, for example, the special and general theories of relativity, quantum mechanics, or string theory. As we might put it, metaphysics tells us what is possible; science what is actual (…). This does not make metaphysics redundant, because the philosophical implications of scientific theories, concerning a principle like the identity of indiscernibles, for instance, may need to be made explicit, since the scientist's concern in putting forward these theories is not likely to be primarily philosophical. But a note of caution is in order. In drawing out the supposed consequences of these theories, how much are we revealing what is already there, deep within the scientist’s picture of reality, and how much are we bringing independent lnetaphysical models or principles to the interpretation of that picture? And how much are scientists themselves making metaphysical assumptions that need to be scrutinised before being incorporated into scientific theory?"

(Le Poidevin, Robin. "General Introduction: What is Metaphysics?" In The Routledge Companion to Metaphysics, edited by Robin Le Poidevin, Peter Simons, Andrew McGonigal, and Ross P. Cameron, xviii-xxii. Abingdon: Routledge, 2009.)

SpeedOfSound wrote:

Teuton wrote:

Regina wrote:
It must be quite frustrating to engage in deep thinking for aeons and never produce any results.

There are many results.

Do give us a thumb sketch.

Regina didn't write "results known to be true".

Teuton wrote:

SpeedOfSound wrote:

Teuton wrote:

Regina wrote:
It must be quite frustrating to engage in deep thinking for aeons and never produce any results.

There are many results.

Do give us a thumb sketch.

Regina didn't write "results known to be true".

Just give me the true results then. That should pare it down quite a bit.