Thanks for 👇. It got me to read his last lecture. In it, he makes an astonishing claim:
"[T]he parochial, historically-conditioned character of justification is compatible with the eternal and absolute character of truth."
I find it almost impossible to believe Rorty said
this. Here's the context:
«But pragmatists, at least those of my sect, do not think that anything—either the physical world or the consensus of inquirers—makes beliefs true. We have as little use for the notion of "what makes a true sentence true" as we do for that of "what a
true sentence corresponds to." On our view, all consensus does is help us recognize moral truths. We can cheerfully agree that truths—all kinds of truths—are eternal and absolute. It was true before the foundations of the world were laid both that 2 + 2 = 4 and that I should be
wearing this particular tie today. It was also true that the lash is, in the sense of the Eighth Amendment, a cruel punishment. Eternal and absolute truth is the only kind of truth there is, even though the only way we know what is true is by reaching a consensus that may well
prove transitory. All that can be salvaged from the claim that truth is a product of consensus is that finding out what other people believe is, most of the time, a good way to decide what to believe oneself.
…
Our judgments of progress and of rationality will remain as
parochial as our judgments of everything else. Yet the parochial, historically-conditioned character of justification is compatible with the eternal and absolute character of truth.»
I've never heard Rorty ever describe truth as absolute and eternal. Has anyone?!? It seems to be
the kind of thing he rails against, ie "the project of escaping from time and chance". I'm finding this really hard to square with my understanding of Rorty. Can some Rortians help me out? @Jeffrey_Howard_@Adrian_Rutt@_Thrill_House_
@clarkjosephf@QuillRKukla@carl_b_sachs First, Thank you for sharing your "opinionated introduction"/reading list. I love it!
Second, Thank you for highlighting the @QuillRKukla essay on stances. It's amazing! It brings together several threads I was in the middle of working on: the interpretive stance, coping,
@clarkjosephf@QuillRKukla@carl_b_sachs Davidsonian triangulation, and of course pragmatism. Their generalization of the stance concept to economic stance and interpretive stance was EXACTLY what I was getting at in my tweet.
My favorite line: "There is no neutral stance." In other words, there is no
@clarkjosephf@QuillRKukla@carl_b_sachs neutral/universal way of interpreting patterns. Interestingly, Rorty made a very similar claim regarding his panrelationalism: "Naturalism as the claim that (a) there is no occupant of space-time that is not linked in a single web of causal relations to all other occupants and
@Jeffrey_Howard_@FreihandDenker BTW, Rorty wasn't the first to make this claim about redescription. I'm collecting such claims. I've only found two other so far:
1) "I am convinced, being fully persuaded in the Lord Jesus, that nothing is unclean in itself. But if anyone regards something as unclean, then for
@Jeffrey_Howard_@JonAlanSchmidt@Mookmonster30@FerraraKev@CSPeirceSpeaks Sorry to jump in late, but I think in his "Reply to Ramberg" (mentioned in your excellent recent podcast) Rorty partially recanted the sentiment expressed in "Truth is simply a compliment…": “Ramberg sets me straight here too. He tells me, in effect, that _it was a mistake /1
@Jeffrey_Howard_@JonAlanSchmidt@Mookmonster30@FerraraKev@CSPeirceSpeaks on my part_ to go from criticism of attempts to define truth as accurate representation of the intrinsic nature of reality to _a denial that true statements get things right_. What I should have done, he makes me realize, is to grant Davidson's point that _most of our beliefs /2
In his reply, Rorty clarified what he means by "true of". He does so by more fully embracing and explicating Davidson’s triangulation: ‘Since I now want to agree /3
Prediction: The #SCOTUS ruling in #Bostock will become the central case in law school classes teaching the meaning of "but-for" causation. The entire decision comes down to applying but-for causation analysis! /1
'In the language of law, this means that Title VII’s “because of ” test incorporates the “‘simple’” and “traditional” standard of but-for causation. Nassar, 570 U. S., at 346, 360. That form of causation is established whenever a particular outcome...' /1
'...would not have happened “but for” the purported cause. See Gross, 557 U. S., at 176. In other words, a but-for test directs us to change one thing at a time and see if the outcome changes. If it does, we have found a but-for cause.
Best jargon-free description of #designthinking approach we applied at @ibmdesign … by @mjane_h at @autodesk: To advocate for investment, we don’t start by rationalizing the things we need to do. We start with a vision of what designing and making can feel like to our users. /1
That vision opens with a single, powerful statement that the business can rally around, with a few supporting points to make it visceral and visual. When we’ve done this well, business leaders see their own strategic intent in what we’ve presented. /2
The discussion turns to unpacking possibilities for what strategic intent might be like from this point of view. Only then, when leadership feels it too, do we introduce the areas of investment we request. /3