Pat Hayes wrote:
>> Pat Hayes wrote:
>>>> Pat Hayes wrote:
>>>>>> > Pat Hayes <phayes@xxxxxxx> writes:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> I think you are reading more into that word [objective] than
>>>>>>>> I do. Objective does not mean final, absolute, or
>>>>>>>> permanent. It means concerned with facts rather
>>>>>>>> than opinions.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> It sounds as if my saying 'the earth is flat' were an objective
>>>>>> statement, while 'i think that the earth is flat' were a subjective
>>>>>> statement. Is my saying 'she says the earth is flat' an objective
>>>>>> or a
>>>>>> subjective statement?
>>>>>
>>>>> Objective, in that it asserts something about what she said.
>>>>
>>>> good. then if someone has some opinion, and i make a statement
>>>> about that opinion, is it an objective or a subjective statement?
>>>> 'about that opinion' is to say the statement is 'her opinion is that
>>>> the earth is flat', rather than 'according to her opinion the earth
>>>> is flat' or 'she holds the opinion that the earth is flat' -- so
>>>> that the opinion is the subject of the statement?
>>>
>>> Yes.
>>>
>>> I think I see where you are going here. The conclusion will be that
>>> even my statements of my opinions are objective, because they are
>>> objective statements of my opinion. Hence, all assertions of any
>>> point of view are ultimately objective.
>>>
>>> If I have this more or less right, then the response is that the
>>> distinction between a factual assertion and a mere opinion is that
>>> the latter is *about* an opinion or state of the speaker's beliefs,
>>> whereas the former is *about* an actual state of affairs in the real
>>> world.
>>
>> i'll try to summarize this:
>>
>> - an opinion is an assertion that is about an opinion (sic) or the
>> state of the speaker's beliefs (how does such state of beliefs differ
>> from opinion, and if it doesn't, what do we gain from this 'definition'?)
>>
>> - a factual assertion is about an actual state of affairs. but what
>> else can we know for sure other than what we have in our minds, i.e.,
>> our opinions? this 'definition' plus the question turned to an
>> assumption leads me to the conclusion that my statement 'there is a
>> bottle of beer in th fridge' is subjective -- and possibly objective
>> -- in that it is objective only if there happens to be a b.o.b. in the
>> fridge
>
> I would say no. It is objective, as it is about beer and fridges. It may
> be true or false, depending on the actual fridge's contents, but if it
> weren't objective then it couldn't be either true or false: questions of
> its truth simply would not arise. (01)
the problem i see here is that you said that a factual assertion is one
about an actual state of affairs. if i say 'there is a b.o.b. in the
fridge' and there isn't one, then my assertion is *not* about an actual
state, because my assertion is about there being a bottle, and the state
does not include a bottle. (02)
of course, this is sort of a word game. perhaps your point would be
better illustrated with my saying 'the fridge contains a bottle', which
is about a fridge and is a false factual assertion if the fridge does
not contain a bottle (and is not a factual assertion if there is no 'the
fridge'?) (03)
>
>> , hopefully, while my statement 'i believe there is a bottle of beer
>> in the fridge' is objective, in that i know that this is my opinion,
>> and i can't see how this would not be an actual state of affairs in
>> the real world.
>
> Well, yes, of course it is. So my wording was careless. So this
> assertion is indeed objective, if understood to be a statement about
> your beliefs. If however it is understood to be about the beer in the
> fridge, it is not objective. (04)
note: about *the* beer. if there is not beer there, it just can't be
about *the* beer, so it can't be factual (?) (05)
> My point was that the philosophical move -
> which I assumed , perhaps wrongly, that you were going to make - (06)
of course, this was just a play. call it 'philosophizing' if you like. (07)
> to the
> effect that opinions are objective because they are objective claims
> about an opinion or state of belief, can be countered by recasting the
> common-sense distinction as one between objective assertions about a
> state of mind (I believe that...), and objective assertions about
> something else, something external to the speaker. (08)
we take a round and come back to common sense. quoting from an earlier
post by john, "A statement is objective iff there are publicly available
means for determining its truth or falsity." (09)
so suppose i say 'she is ugly' (sorry about it). all of you look at her
and agree (among you) that she is ugly. was my statement objective?
what if all of you disagree with me? what really is the role of (being
able to apply) common sense in establishing whether a statement is
objective or subjective? (010)
you see the point i am making: that common sense allows you to 'verify'
the 'truth' or 'falsity' of a statement seems to be of no value, as
common sense is nothing more than a commonly shared subjective view of
the reality (and certainly not a homogeneous one). (011)
vQ (012)
>
> Pat
>
>>
>> if i may, in my opinion your response is doubly unconvincing, though i
>> won't factually assert that it really is.
>>
>> vQ
>
> (013)
--
Wacek Kusnierczyk (014)
------------------------------------------------------
Department of Information and Computer Science (IDI)
Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU)
Sem Saelandsv. 7-9
7027 Trondheim
Norway (015)
tel. 0047 73591875
fax 0047 73594466
------------------------------------------------------ (016)
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