Does This Make Sense?

[Zaira]

Note: This might just be a load of rubbish, especially if I have misunderstood it.

Oh! My head hurts. I've just been on the net and thought this might explain what we are all doing here on this forum. And it might explain why I put up with you lot - and vice versa.

Segment taken from - Aristotle - Metaphysics (Book 1)

http://etext.library.adelaide.edu.au...e/metaphysics/

With a view to action experience seems in no respect inferior to art, and men of experience succeed even better than those who have theory without experience. (The reason is that experience is knowledge of individuals, art of universals, and actions and productions are all concerned with the individual; for the physician does not cure man, except in an incidental way, but Callias or Socrates or some other called by some such individual name, who happens to be a man.

If, then, a man has the theory without the experience, and recognizes the universal but does not know the individual included in this, he will often fail to cure; for it is the individual that is to be cured.) But yet we think that knowledge and understanding belong to art rather than to experience, and we suppose artists to be wiser than men of experience (which implies that Wisdom depends in all cases rather on knowledge); and this because the former know the cause, but the latter do not.

For men of experience know that the thing is so, but do not know why, while the others know the ‘why’ and the cause. Hence we think also that the master-workers in each craft are more honourable and know in a truer sense and are wiser than the manual workers, because they know the causes of the things that are done (we think the manual workers are like certain lifeless things which act indeed, but act without knowing what they do, as fire burns,- but while the lifeless things perform each of their functions by a natural tendency, the labourers perform them through habit); thus we view them as being wiser not in virtue of being able to act, but of having the theory for themselves and knowing the causes.

And in general it is a sign of the man who knows and of the man who does not know, that the former can teach, and therefore we think art more truly knowledge than experience is; for artists can teach, and men of mere experience cannot.

Again, we do not regard any of the senses as Wisdom; yet surely these give the most authoritative knowledge of particulars. But they do not tell us the ‘why’ of anything-e.g. why fire is hot; they only say that it is hot.



If I understood this correctly, and in reference to us on here, Skeptics have the theory and we non-Skeptics have the experience. Skeptics don't have the experience (we non-sceptics speak of) but they have the theory (about what is going on with us non-sceptics). We non-Skeptics have the experiences but not the theory. .......... Oh! boy! Where's My pills!

If I have understood that correctly, then that's why we are all here on this forum - it's like two halves coming together.

Or am I just reading and thinking too much again?

[Zaira]

Perhaps this will explain it better -

There are two monks walking along by the side of a river, one on each side. They begin to ask each other what it is like on the other side of the river, and they share their views happily as they continue walking along. Finally they come to a bridge, they meet in the middle and shake hands and then carry on over to the opposite sides of the river from that which they were on. They continue walking and talking, describing their side of the river. then they come to another bridge where they meet in the middle and shake hands then carry on to their original side of the river where they feel good, like they had returned home. But neither monk would ever be the same again, they had changed for ever just like the flowing river.

My Notes: Your on the right side because that's where you want to be. I am also on the right side because that's where I want to be. I am sharing with you what it is like on my side. And you are sharing with me what it is like on your side. You don't have to be on my side to appreciate what I'm telling you. And I don't need to be on your side to appreciate what you are telling me. And when we finally part we take a part of each other with us.

[Lord Muck oGentry]

Note: This might just be a load of rubbish, especially if I have misunderstood it.

Oh! My head hurts. I've just been on the net and thought this might explain what we are all doing here on this forum. And it might explain why I put up with you lot - and vice versa.

Segment taken from - Aristotle - Metaphysics (Book 1)

http://etext.library.adelaide.edu.au...e/metaphysics/

With a view to action experience seems in no respect inferior to art, and men of experience succeed even better than those who have theory without experience. (The reason is that experience is knowledge of individuals, art of universals, and actions and productions are all concerned with the individual; for the physician does not cure man, except in an incidental way, but Callias or Socrates or some other called by some such individual name, who happens to be a man.




Again, we do not regard any of the senses as Wisdom; yet surely these give the most authoritative knowledge of particulars. But they do not tell us the ‘why’ of anything-e.g. why fire is hot; they only say that it is hot.



If I understood this correctly, and in reference to us on here, Skeptics have the theory and we non-Skeptics have the experience. Skeptics don't have the experience (we non-sceptics speak of) but they have the theory (about what is going on with us non-sceptics). We non-Skeptics have the experiences but not the theory. .......... Oh! boy! Where's My pills!

If I have understood that correctly, then that's why we are all here on this forum - it's like two halves coming together.

Or am I just reading and thinking too much again?

Zaira,

I admire your energy. Not many people would read Aristotle for fun. ( And fewer still would admit to it... :-) )

There's plenty in the short passage you quote from Bk 1 of the Metaphysics to get students scribbling away furiously about, say, Aristotle's logic ( Does the distinction between particular and general coincide with that between individual and universal? Put a wet towel around your head, and discuss).

Luckily, we needn't go into that to answer your question about experience. If someone turns up and says, for example, " I know from experience that people survive death because I have had had the experience of seeing ghosts and the experience of receiving messages from dead people", it's pretty unlikely that skeptics will answer " Umm, right, now how do we fit your particular experiences- for which, of course, we must take your word, since your experience is your province- into the general theory, of which we are the custodians?"

The notion of experience is turning no wheels in that discussion.

[Zaira]

Lord Muck oGentry,

You're very generous. I'm not sure it says what I was hoping it did. With all the kafuffle from that other forum (I'm on there) and the crap Farside took for one remark, I wanted to show that I understand what you are doing here and to show my appreciation to you all for your help and your patience.

[Zaira]

Aristotle - Is he not well thought of then? I understand it to an extent. He thought people in ordinary labour didn't think? He thought they simply carried out routine tasks like robots? Aristotle's logic good or bad? Just wondering whether I should bother trying to read the rest of it?

[Lord Muck oGentry]

Aristotle - Is he not well thought of then? I understand it to an extent. He thought people in ordinary labour didn't think? He thought they simply carried out routine tasks like robots? Aristotle's logic good or bad? Just wondering whether I should bother trying to read the rest of it?

Well, I'm hardly the person to ask. I wasn't an expert even when I was studying the stuff, many years and squillions of brain-cells ago.

Still, if you want want my opinion of the old boy, it isn't so very low. He was a crashing snob, certainly, and no friend to the democracy of his day, but he seems almost enlightened by comparison with Plato.

As to his logic: for over two thousand years his work on the syllogism (and on fallacies) was thought to be the last word on the subject. It wasn't really overtaken until Peano, Frege and Russell came along to show that he was wrong on some points and inadequate on others. But even now champions can be found for some of his apparently refuted ideas:

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/square/#StrDef

Not bad for an old fart.

[Zaira]

Thank you, old fart. You're very kind. I'll check that link out. Since, about ten or fifteen years ago, I recovered from a crappy childhood, I discovered I had a brain after all and I have been an insatiably curious knowledge seeker. I'm way behind but it's been fun learning about myself and the world I live in. Thanks again.

[Tin Lizzie]

Note: This might just be a load of rubbish, especially if I have misunderstood it.

IMO that stuff from your first quote is quality. your own summary at the end is, quite honestly, the very explanation i have been trying to come up with! nice

hang on...why won't my smilies work? help?!

[Zaira]

Thanks. I was getting a bit tired and wasn't sure if it made sense. But I've had a sleep and yes it was what I was trying to say. Only one person so far has shown their appreciation for my intended sentiments. Now you make two. Thank you for the validation.

[Lord Muck oGentry]

Only one person so far has shown their appreciation for my intended sentiments. Now you make two. Thank you for the validation.

Zaira,

As the one person so far that could have been meant, I do indeed appreciate your intended sentiments, but I hope you won't mistake me to be agreeing with you. Please look again at the third post in this thread:


'Luckily, we needn't go into that to answer your question about experience. If someone turns up and says, for example, " I know from experience that people survive death because I have had had the experience of seeing ghosts and the experience of receiving messages from dead people", it's pretty unlikely that skeptics will answer " Umm, right, now how do we fit your particular experiences- for which, of course, we must take your word, since your experience is your province- into the general theory, of which we are the custodians?" '

If Aristotle supported your view ( IMO he doesn't, but that's a story for another day), he would just be wrong.

Best wishes, as always.

[Zaira]

Lord Muck oGentry,

"I do indeed appreciate your intended sentiments, but I hope you won't mistake me to be agreeing with you."

No I wasn't. I know you appreciated the intended sentiment. I didn't mean to imply that you had agreed with the post.

I wrote - "Thanks. I was getting a bit tired and wasn't sure if it made sense. But I've had a sleep and yes it was what I was trying to say. Only one person so far has shown their appreciation for my intended sentiments. Now you make two. Thank you for the validation."

Thank you for your reply.