Being Without Numbers

Linguistic anthropologist Daniel Everett has been researching and living with (off and on) an Amazonian tribe called the Pirahã for a few decades now. In Don't Sleep, There Are Snakes: Life and Language in the Amazonian Jungle, Everett gives a semi-autobiographical account of his interactions with the Pirahã.

Intuition in Philosophy

Intuition has an interesting role in philosophy, particularly analytic philosophy. One of its functions is epistemic. It's used to test various assumptions and conclusions in philosophy for validity or truth. If something fails to stand up to intuition the propositions in question get dismissed.

There's also a good deal of literature in a field known as "experimental philosophy". The research often takes the form of surveys to different groups of individuals (intro to philosophy students, professional philosophers, etc). The purpose of the surveys is to assess what "intuitions" people have. What the research tends to indicate is that intuitions vary greatly between groups depending upon a variety of circumstances (culture, philosophical exposure, etc.)

Currency and Price Stability

There are two related claims made by gold standard advocates. These claims are:


1) Under a gold standard, prices are stable.
2) Prices ought to remain stable.

I) We'll start by looking at the first claim. What does it mean to say that prices are stable?

Modeling Gold Returns: A Case Study

In my previous post, I considered the problem of induction. Looking at emeralds and noting that they are green (or grue) is supposed to be a simple example since making color judgements is presumably a simple task. The example could be further complicated if we factor in the vagueness of making color judgements. After all, it's likely the case that the distribution of electromagnetic frequencies differ between one emerald and the next. (And they would differ further depending on the distribution of EM frequencies of the "white light" used upon it.)

In most real world scientific inquiries, these uncertainties are present and need to be dealt with. So instead of focusing on the sorts of examples used in "simple" philosophical thought experiments, I thought I would provide a more detailed example.

The motivation for looking at this came from an interesting paper entitled The Golden Dilemma. I will make frequent reference to Exhibits from this paper. [1]

The Problem of Induction

This is a continuation of a series devoted to the question of what an "empirical question" is. See Part I and Part II if you're interested.

One tool that is considered essential to the empirical sciences is induction. It's importance is, in my opinion, overstated by most philosophers (I firmly believe that abduction rarely gets the proper credit it deserves). In spite of that, I do not dismiss its important role in scientific inquiry.

That's an Empirical Question: Part II

See here for Part I.

Thus far I've conjectured that an empirical question in some way or form entails the use of empirical tools as distinct from other kinds of tools. One type of alternative tool is mathematical while another is philosophical. This interpretation rests on the idea that (some) philosophers believe there to be a distinct set of questions which can be addressed only with a particular set of tools. I would like to further explore this issue.

That's an Empirical Question: Part I

Having studied philosophy and having discourse with many philosophers, I had heard (and used) this phrase on many occasions. At times during the course of a conversation a conjecture or question is generated and it's decided that the conjecture or question can (should) be decided empirically. After demarcating the question into the "empirical" pile, philosophers then move on to other questions, discussions, etc.

My goal today is to offer a brief overview of two questions to which I will offer hypotheses regarding them (whether or not my questions and/hypotheses are "empirical" can be decided by the reader.)

There is no external world!

There is much discussion in philosophy about the "external world". Questions arise about what we know about the external world (if we know anything at all) and some even question the very existence of the external world. Kant considers it a "scandal" that philosophy has not offered a proof of the external world. Skeptics are quick to point out that the external world is inaccessible to us and perhaps even question whether or not such a thing exists.

Along with these skeptics, I, too, deny the external world but on entirely different grounds and in a way that is quite distinct from the usual skeptical inquiries. For what I deny is not that there is no external world but rather that the world is not partitioned into "external" and "internal" to begin with. Those who question our knowledge, the existence or request a proof of the external world take for granted that distinction between an "internal" and "external" world. I deny that very distinction. At the very least, it needs to be shown that the world is divided in such a way; to me, there is not any clear reason for partitioning the world in such a way.

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