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{{Short description|Philosophical paradox introduced by Nelson Goodman}}
{{redirect|Grue and bleen|the linguistic term "grue", used for translation from natural languages|
'''Grue''' and '''bleen''' are examples of logical [[Predicate (mathematical logic)|predicates]] coined by [[Nelson Goodman]] in ''[[Fact, Fiction, and Forecast]]'' to illustrate the "'''new riddle of induction'''" – a successor to [[problem of induction|Hume's original problem]]. These predicates are unusual because their application is time-dependent; many have tried to solve the new riddle on those terms, but [[Hilary Putnam]] and others have argued such time-dependency depends on the language adopted, and in some languages it is equally true for natural-sounding predicates such as "green." For Goodman they illustrate the problem of projectible predicates and ultimately, which empirical generalizations are [[Scientific law|law-like]] and which are not.<ref name="Goodman.1946">{{cite journal| author=Nelson Goodman| title=A Query on Confirmation| journal=The Journal of Philosophy|date=Jul 1946| volume=43| number=14| pages=383–385| url=http://wordsmatter.caltech.edu/~franz/Confirmation%20and%20Induction/PDFs/Nelson%20Goodman%20-%20A%20Query%20on%20Confirmation.pdf| doi=10.2307/2020332| jstor=2020332}}</ref><ref name="Goodman.1983">{{cite book|author=Nelson Goodman|title=Fact, fiction, and forecast|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=i97_LdPXwrAC|accessdate=8 March 2012|year=1983|publisher=Harvard University Press|isbn=978-0-674-29071-6|page=74}}</ref> Goodman's construction and use of ''grue'' and ''bleen'' illustrates how philosophers use simple examples in [[analytic philosophy|conceptual analysis]].▼
▲The '''
==Grue and bleen==
[[File:Grue and Bleen (EN).png|thumb|Definitions of ''grue'' and ''bleen'', as well as how the original colors ''blue'' and ''green'' can be redefined based on the two predicates]]
Goodman defined "grue" relative to an arbitrary but fixed time ''t'':
For some arbitrary future time ''t'', say January 1, {{#expr:{{#time:Y}} + 10}}, <!-- The expression gives the current year plus ten, for a date guaranteed to be in the future no matter when this page is retrieved. --> for all green things observed prior to ''t'', such as [[emerald]]s and well-watered
==The new riddle of induction==
In this section, Goodman's new riddle of induction is outlined in order to set the context for his introduction of the predicates ''grue'' and ''bleen'' and thereby illustrate their [[Philosophy|philosophical importance]].
===The old problem of induction and its dissolution===
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One response is to appeal to the artificially [[Logical disjunction|disjunctive]] definition of grue. The notion of predicate ''entrenchment'' is not required. Goodman said that this does not succeed. If we take ''grue'' and ''bleen'' as primitive predicates, we can define green as "''grue'' if first observed before ''t'' and ''bleen'' otherwise", and likewise for blue. To deny the acceptability of this disjunctive definition of green would be to [[Begging the question|beg the question]].
Another proposed resolution that does not require predicate ''entrenchment'' is that "''x'' is grue" is not solely a predicate of ''x'', but of ''x'' and a time ''t''—we can know that an object is green without knowing the time ''t'', but we cannot know that it is grue. If this is the case, we should not expect "''x'' is grue" to remain true when the time changes. However, one might ask why "''x'' is green" is ''not'' considered a predicate of a particular time ''t''—the more common definition of ''green'' does not require any mention of a time ''t'', but the definition ''grue'' does. Goodman also addresses and rejects this proposed solution as [[Begging the question|question begging]] because ''blue'' can be defined in terms of ''grue'' and ''bleen'', which explicitly refer to time.
===Swinburne===
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===Carnap===
[[Rudolf Carnap]] responded
* multiple quantification ("for every ''x'' there is a ''y'' such that ..."),
* unary and binary predicate symbols (properties and relations), and
* an equality relation "=".
The [[universe of discourse]] consists of denumerably many individuals, each of which is designated by its own constant symbol; such individuals are meant to be regarded as positions ("like space-time points in our actual world") rather than extended physical bodies.
* Atomic sentences must be logically independent of each other.<ref>cf. Tractatus Nr.1.21</ref> In particular, different constant symbols must designate different and entirely separate individuals.
* The qualities and relations designated by the predicates must be simple, i.e. they must not be analyzable into simpler components.
* The set of primitive predicates in ''L'' must be complete, i.e. every respect in which two positions in the universe may be found to differ by direct observation, must be expressible in ''L''.
Carnap distinguishes three kinds of properties:
# Purely qualitative properties; that is, properties expressible without using individual constants, but not without primitive predicates,
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To illuminate this taxonomy, let ''x'' be a variable and ''a'' a constant symbol; then an example of 1. could be "''x'' is blue or ''x'' is non-warm", an example of 2. "''x'' = ''a''", and an example of 3. "''x'' is red and not ''x'' = ''a''".
Based on his theory of inductive logic sketched above, Carnap formalizes Goodman's notion of projectibility of a property ''W'' as follows: the higher the relative frequency of ''W'' in an observed sample, the higher is the probability that a non-observed individual has the property ''W''. Carnap suggests "as a tentative answer" to Goodman, that all purely qualitative properties are projectible, all purely positional properties are non-projectible, and mixed properties require further investigation.
===Quine===
[[Willard Van Orman Quine]] discusses an approach to consider only "[[natural kind]]s" as projectible predicates.{{sfn|Quine|1970}}
[[Willard Van Orman Quine]] discusses an approach to consider only "[[natural kind]]s" as projectible predicates.<ref>{{cite book|title=Essays in Honor of Carl G. Hempel|author=Willard Van Orman Quine|publisher=D. Reidel|year=1970|editor=Nicholas Rescher|location=Dordrecht|pages=41–56|contribution=Natural Kinds|display-editors=etal|contribution-url=http://fitelson.org/confirmation/quine_nk.pdf}} Reprinted in: {{cite book|title=Ontological Relativity and other Essays|last=Quine|first=W. V.|publisher=Columbia University Press|year=1969|location=New York|page=114|contribution=Natural Kinds}}<!---chapter=5---><!---According to Quine's foreword to the latter book (p. 6 in the German translation), the reprint was issued earlier than the original.---></ref>▼
He first relates Goodman's grue paradox to [[Carl Gustav Hempel|Hempel]]'s [[raven paradox]] by defining two predicates ''F'' and ''G'' to be (simultaneously) projectible if all their shared instances count toward confirmation of the claim "each ''F'' is a ''G''".
Next, Quine reduces projectibility to the subjective notion of ''similarity''. Two green emeralds are usually considered more similar than two grue ones if only one of them is green. Observing a green emerald makes us expect a similar observation (i.e., a green emerald) next time. Green emeralds are a ''natural kind'', but grue emeralds are not. Quine investigates "the dubious scientific standing of a general notion of similarity, or of kind".
{| style="float:right"
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'''Relation between similarity and kind'''
Assuming finitely many ''kinds'' only, the notion of ''similarity'' can be defined by that of ''kind'': an object ''A'' is more similar to ''B'' than to ''C'' if ''A'' and ''B'' belong jointly to more kinds
Vice versa, it remains again unclear how to define ''kind'' by ''similarity''. Defining e.g. the kind of red things as the set of all things that are more similar to a fixed "paradigmatical" red object than this is to another fixed "foil" non-red object (cf. left picture) isn't satisfactory, since the degree of overall similarity, including e.g. shape, weight, will afford little evidence of degree of redness.
An alternative approach inspired by [[Carnap]] defines a natural kind to be a [[set (mathematics)|set]] whose members are more similar to each other than each non-member is to at least one member.
However, Goodman
While neither of the notions of similarity and kind can be defined by the other, they at least vary together: if ''A'' is reassessed to be more similar to ''C'' than to ''B'' rather than the other way around, the assignment of ''A'', ''B'', ''C'' to kinds will be permuted correspondingly; and conversely.
'''Basic importance of similarity and kind'''
In language, every general term owes its generality to some resemblance of the things [[Reference#Semantics|referred]] to. [[Language acquisition|Learning]] to use a word depends on a double resemblance, viz. between the present and past circumstances in which the word was used, and between the present and past phonetic utterances of the word.
Every reasonable expectation depends on resemblance of circumstances, together with our tendency to expect similar causes to have similar effects.
{| align="right" class="collapsible collapsed" style="flush:right"
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| [[File:Falcon scheme of chickens and ducks.gif|thumb|150px]] || [[File:Goose scheme of chickens and ducks.gif|thumb|150px]]
|-
| colspan=2 width=300px | Tinbergen and Lorentz demonstrated a coarse similarity relation of inexperienced turkey chicks.
{{cite book| author=Tinbergen, N.| title=The study of instinct| year=1951| publisher=Clarendon}} here: Chapter IV</ref><ref>{{cite journal| author=Tinbergen, N.| title=Social Releasers and the Experimental Method Required for their Study| journal=Wilson Bull.| date=Mar 1948| volume=60| issue=1 |pages=6–52| url=https://sora.unm.edu/sites/default/files/journals/wilson/v060n01/p0006-p0051.pdf}} p. 34, Fig. 21C.</ref> '''Upper row:''' real hawk (left) and goose (right) in flight. '''Lower row:''' cardboard dummies releasing similar reactions as their originals.▼
|}
'''Genesis of similarity and kind'''
In a [[Behaviorism|behavioral]] sense, humans and other animals have an innate standard of similarity. It is part of our animal birthright, and characteristically animal in its lack of intellectual status, e.g. its alienness to mathematics and logic,
==== Habit formation ====
Induction itself is essentially [[Classical conditioning|animal expectation]] or habit formation. [[Ostensive definition|Ostensive learning]]
==Similar predicates used in philosophical analysis==
===Quus===
In his book ''[[Wittgenstein on Rules and Private Language]]'', [[Saul Kripke]] proposed a related argument that leads to skepticism about meaning rather than skepticism about induction, as part of his personal interpretation (nicknamed "[[Kripkenstein]]" by some<ref>John P. Burgess, Gideon Rosen (1999). ''A subject with no object: strategies for nominalistic interpretation of mathematics'', p. 53. {{ISBN|978-0-19-825012-8}}.</ref>) of the [[private language argument]]. He proposed a new form of addition, which he called ''quus'', which is identical with "+" in all cases except those in which either of the numbers added are equal to or greater than 57; in which case the answer would be 5, i.e.:
::<math>x\text{ quus }y= \begin{cases} x+y & \text{for }x,y <57 \\[12pt] 5 & \text{for } x\ge 57 \text{ or } y\ge57 \end{cases} </math>
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==Notes==
{{notelist|30em}}
{{reflist|group="note"}}▼
==References==
=== Citations ===
=== Bibliography ===
{{Refbegin|30em}}
* {{cite book |first=Nelson |last=Goodman |title=Fact, fiction, and forecast |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=i97_LdPXwrAC |access-date=8 March 2012 |year=1983 |publisher=Harvard University Press |isbn=978-0-674-29071-6}}
* {{cite journal| first=Rudolf| last=Carnap| title=On the Application of Inductive Logic| journal=Philosophy and Phenomenological Research| year=1947| volume=8| issue=1| pages=133–148| url=http://www.hss.caltech.edu/~franz/Confirmation%20and%20Induction/PDFs/Rudolf%20Carnap%20-%20On%20the%20Application%20of%20Inductive%20Logic.pdf| doi=10.2307/2102920| jstor=2102920| access-date=2014-01-27| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060920034402/http://www.hss.caltech.edu/~franz/Confirmation%20and%20Induction/PDFs/Rudolf%20Carnap%20-%20On%20the%20Application%20of%20Inductive%20Logic.pdf| archive-date=2006-09-20| url-status=dead}}
▲
* {{cite book| first=Nelson| last=Goodman| title=The Structure of Appearance| year=1951}}
* {{cite book| editor1=Stanislas I. Dockx |editor2=Paul Bernays |editor2-link=Paul Bernays |title=Information and Prediction in Science |chapter-url=https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/nlmcatalog/41130 |location=New York |year=1965 |publisher=Academic Press | oclc=522269 | lccn=64-24655 | first=Satosi | last=Watanabe |author-link=Satosi Watanabe |chapter=Une Explication Mathématique du Classement d'Objets | pages=39–76}}
▲* {{cite
* {{cite book |title=Visual Intelligence. How we create what we see |first=Donald D. |last=Hoffman |location=New York |publisher=Norton |year=1998}}
* {{cite book| last=Tinbergen | first=N. | title=The study of instinct| year=1951| publisher=Clarendon}}
* {{cite book|first=Willard Van Orman |last=Quine |title=The Roots of Reference |url=https://archive.org/details/rootsofreference00wvqu |url-access=registration | location=La Salle, Illinois | publisher=Open Court Publishing Co. |year=1974|isbn=9780812691016 }}
{{Refend}}
==Further reading==
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| last = Kripke
| first = Saul
|
| title = Wittgenstein on Rules and Private Language
| publisher = Basil Blackwell Publishing
| year = 1982
| isbn = 0-631-13521-9 }}
*{{Cite journal
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| year = 1996
| pages = 1341–1390
| doi =10.1162/neco.1996.8.7.1341
| volume=8
| issue = 7
| s2cid = 207609360
}}
*{{Cite book
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{{DEFAULTSORT:New riddle of induction}}
[[Category:Philosophical paradoxes]]
[[Category:Inductive reasoning]]
[[Category:Concepts in the philosophy of language]]
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