Re: Nominalism

From: David G. McDivitt (dmcdivitt@yahoo.com)
Date: Wed Aug 29 2001 - 21:35:11 MDT


You make some excellent points and I appreciate them. In my opinion we
each have our own reality and can function as autonomously as we so
choose. However, we choose to cooperate. In some ways it is willful
choice and other ways a result of cultural programming. At any time a
person can break loose and go his own way, just as you say.

When people are in a state of cooperation there comes to exist certain
standards or expectations thereby. The volumes we have of human
knowledge represent precisely such standards and expectations. It should
be taken for what it's worth, but it is not realism.

>From: "Lee Corbin" <lcorbin@tsoft.com>
>Date: Wed, 29 Aug 2001 00:24:06 -0700
>
>David McDivitt writes
>
>> Realists don't worry about conflict resolution very much. Right is right
>> is right, right? So if a person has a problem it's a problem with what's
>> right, right?
>
>Actually, we would make that accusation against you! We live
>in the same reality as everyone else (to our way of thinking),
>and so resolving what is true is a common task that we can
>all engage in. It's people who live in their own worlds (or,
>like you, say that they do) who hardly need to rectify discrepancy.
>They can "agree to disagree". What's to prevent one nominalist
>from saying, "well, I don't *like* so-and-so's theory, and there
>is nothing that you can show me or say to change my mind"? But
>this will probably be yet one more question that you totally
>ignore.
>
>> The point is debate, dialectic, and conflict are essential
>> for the emergence of truth. Realism gums up the works.
>
>But isn't truth, according to you, what people create? So
>why should they have to create *one* single thing? Debate,
>seems rather idle, I would think, if each has his own truth.

--
http://www.geocities.com/dmcdivitt

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