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p.1 The history of philosophy is an ongoing intellectual struggle to develop ideas that render comprehensible the seemingly endless diversity and complexity that surrounds us on all sides.
[JLJ - Yes, but what if the "meaning" of what surrounds us is beyond our present capability to understand? Pre-historic man did not possess the capacity to understand the cosmos, so "he" made up stories and myths and those answers stood for thousands of years. We should be wary of any attempt to "render comprehensible" specifically those parts of the "seemingly endless diversity and complexity that surrounds us" which are presently beyond comprehension.]
p.2 The mission of philosophy is to ask, and to answer in a rational and disciplined way, all those great questions about life in this world that people wonder about in their reflective moments.
[JLJ - This does not guarantee that the answer arrived at is correct - merely that it "works" for the author of the published text.]
p.2 In the first book of the Metaphysics, Aristotle tells us that "it is through wonder that men now begin and originally began to philosophize, wondering in the first place at obvious perplexities, and then by gradual progression raising question about the greater matters too, for example, about the origin of the universe."
[JLJ - Yes, and philosophy is a written record of such wonder.]
p.3 Philosophy's mandate is to answer questions in a manner that achieves overall rational coherence so that the answers we give to some of our questions square with those that we give to others.
[JLJ - Yes, but like beauty, rational coherence is in the eye of the beholder.]
p.10 Keeping on good terms with all the possibilities requires that we embrace none. But the point of having a position at all is to have some answer to some question or other. If we fail to resolve the problem in favor of one possibility or another, we do not have an answer.
[JLJ - Is that such a bad thing? It is naive to think that one can "solve" all of philosophy's problems correctly in a lifetime.]
p.16 In philosophy... Anything might, in the final analysis, have to be abandoned, whatever its source... Those data are not truths but only plausibilities. Nothing about them is immune to criticism and possible rejection; everything is potentially at risk.
[JLJ - In 'playing' a complex game of strategy, we determine plausibilities by exploring with plausible tools of understanding. We arrive not at truths, but at plausible positions that have been tested to some degree and found to be promising, to various degrees.]
p.17 Philosophers must speak for themselves and conduct their business on their own account. They cannot hide themselves behind what X thinks or what Y thinks, but must in the end present a position of their own with respect to what is to be thought.
p.18 If you cannot fit your philosophical contentions into a smooth systemic unison with what you otherwise know then there is something seriously amiss with them.
p.20 authentic knowledge is only that which is certain and undeniably true... But do we ever achieve absolute certainty?
[JLJ - This is irrelevant if our only task is to determine how to 'go on.' Show me a task - any task - that requires absolute certainty in order to proceed. Life is more or less about developing and refining practical and ethical schemes which in part develop and manage potential, and which we execute in order to 'go on.' Certainty is for philosophers, religious fanatics, and fools.]
p.32 The object of rational inquiry is not just to avoid error but to answer our questions, to secure information about the world... we shall certainly get nowhere at all if we do not even set out on the journey
p.44 Scientists from time to time indulge in eschatological musings and tell us that the scientific venture is approaching its end.
[JLJ - As long as we can keep coming up with experiments that produce results that can be intelligently analyzed and discussed, there will always be a science - even if to say that such and such an experiment seems to confirm what we already know.]
p.47 we do have "knowledge" of sorts, but it is manifestly imperfect.
[JLJ - Information becomes knowledge when we intelligently or practically consider to use it/consider it useful in our constant quest to determine how to 'go on.']
p.48 We can understand "progress" in two senses. On the one hand, there is O-progress, defined in terms of increasing distance from the starting point (the "origin"). On the other hand, there is D-progress, defined in terms of decreasing distance from the goal (the "destination.")
[JLJ - I have previously written how in a complex game of strategy, we can measure an advantage in two ways: the size of a mistake that would result in an even game (Rescher's O-progress), or the number of moves from a won game (Rescher's D-progress.)]
p.50 The value of an ideal, even of one that is not realizable, lies not in the benefit of its attainment... but in the benefits that accrue from its pursuit... An unattainable ideal can be enormously productive.
p.66 In order to emerge to prominence through evolution, intelligence must give "evolutionary edge" to its possessors.
[JLJ - Intelligence led to differentially more offspring that themselves survived and reproduced. If we define intelligence as a generic problem solving ability - one that allows the agent to develop practically effective schemes to 'go on' and more so - to develop 'postures' against the unknown that are sustainable through the development of "capacities" that allow creative adaptation - we can see how this is possible. But intelligence might at root be simply the ability to clearly understand what is happening and to acquire wisdom - then to act or proceed accordingly. Perhaps intellience is also an ability to suspend base instincts long enough to allow pondering in the current predicament. Intelligence might also refer to the ability to perform a specialized role in society, which can then function more effectively.]
p.87 there is some further clarification of what free will involves. There gradually emerges from the fog an increasingly clear view that what is at issue here is the capacity of intelligent beings to resolve matters of choice and decision through a process of deliberation on the basis of beliefs and desires that allows for ongoing updates and up to the bitter end revisability.
[JLJ - Yes, but 'free will' is actually more complex than this simplistic thinking. To a large extent we are "programmed" by our environment and the culture of our upbringing. To what extent is the "appearance" of free will, actually free, especially when agents are typically in predicaments and must at evey moment decide how to 'go on'? Specifically what "test" of free will can one perform, to see if one's will is truly free? Is a conscript into the military, upon given an order, truly 'free' to execute that order or not? What if one is ordered to kill someone? Can we then put captured enemy soldiers on trial and charge them with attempted murder? When we choose - do we actually do so freely, or instead, do we actually do so as part of a strategic system which we develop in order to 'go on', which we merely execute, because at every moment of our lives, we have to do something? I wonder. Choices themselves rarely stand on their own but are more appropriately seen as part of a strategic system we develop for 'going on,' within our current predicament, because the problems of today lead into the problems of tomorrow and tomorrow's tomorrow. Perhaps, and from a higher level, what we initially choose is our values and our strategic system for 'going on' - we then subsequently choose to execute a practical scheme for accomplishing that. Perhaps I initially decide that I want to be physically fit and therefore I need to exercise. That accomplished, I then choose to buy a gym membership or a pair of running shoes or a weight bench in my basement. I then choose to use this system every other day. The second and third choices follow from the first - but are we then still truly 'free' to eat doughnuts and binge-watch TV every evening after work, once we have made our first value choice, to be physically fit?]
p.99 Pragmatism's historic concern has always been not with the descriptive characteristics of things but with their normative appropriateness. And here its logical starting point is the uncontroversial idea that the natural and sensible standard of approval for something that is in any procedural - anything that has an aspect that is methodological, procedural, or instrumental - lies in the question of its successful application.
p.100 Given any aim or objective whatever, we can always provide a correlative validation in terms of the effectiveness and efficiency of its realization.
p.101 Our evaluations are appropriate only insofar as their adoption and cultivation are efficiently and effectively conducive to the realization of human interests... that root us in our place in the scheme of things.
[JLJ - Which is why, in my view, evaluations ought to be considered and performed as part of a scheme for 'going on,' they need to be part of a strategic approach for 'dealing with' the current predicament, perhaps to help us to unravel the complexity we face in a way that helps us to make a decision on how to proceed. Of what use is an evaluation when it is not used by (or useful to) an agent in a predicament - even one that is manufactured, such as in sport or leisure?]
p.102 Pragmatism's standard of adequacy pivots on procedural efficacy.
[JLJ - A pragmatic looks at a procedure and says, 'in this type of situation, procedure X simply works better than anything else, which we are welcome to try if we get suspicious or even doubtful. But for now, we ought to do what ought to work, else we learn something if it does not.']
p.102 The human situation being what it is, existential circumstances spread a vast range of possibilities before us. At many junctures, life confronts us with alternative ways to proceed. And only through the evaluation of such alternatives can we affect a sensible... choice among them. On this basis, values are instrumentalities that serve to possibilize and facilitate the satisfactory conduct of life.
p.103 values... are by nature functional instrumentalities since their mission is to canalize our action via our rational choices. They have objective impact, relating not to what we do prefer but to what we can and should appropriately deem preferable - that is, worthy of preference... our values themselves... pivot not on mere wants and the vagaries of arbitrary choice in fortuitous preference but on our best interests and real needs - on what is necessary or advantageous to a person's well-being.
p.103 the fact is that values are valid just exactly to the extent they serve to implement and satisfy our needs and our correlatively appropriate interests.
p.104 in the end, evaluation lies at the very heart and core of rationality. For rationality is a matter of best serving our overall interests.
[JLJ - Some evaluations, such as deciding on a college major, produce not answers but instead 'maybe' answers. Maybe I should study engineering or chemistry or math or computer science. Maybe I should buy this model car rather than that model car. There is no crystal ball to look into the future to see if I will be happiest in that type of car, or if there will be a demand for that profession ten years or more from now, or even if I have the skills and patience and resolve and resilience to pursue a degree over four or more years of hard work. If an evaluation, such as a career choice or car purchase, has too many unknowns - perhaps it can produce only guesstimates, not solid answers. We might have to decide based on these assessments, or guessed-estimates. Exactly how rational are we to put aside a promising career as a musician for an Engineering degree? I would say that sensitive evaluation lies at the heart and core of deciding how to 'go on,' as part of the execution of a practical scheme for meeting our needs today and tomorrow, and tomorrow's tomorrow.]
p.105 Reason accordingly demands determination of the true value of things.
[JLJ - Perhaps, but all we might be able to determine is 'heuristic estimates' rather than 'true values'. Does this imply that we will never be rational? We ought to use 'rationality' as a guide to action, one voice of many, because we can never determine the true value of anything. Better to have a practical and ethical scheme for going on that 'works,' even when things are not as they seem.]
p.108 We have to go on from where we are. It is in this sense alone that there is no deliberation about ends. The universally appropriate ends at issue in our human condition... are fixed by the inescapable (for us) ontological circumstance that - like it or not - we find ourselves to exist as human beings, and thus able to function as free rational agents.
p.108 We humans are so situated that from our vantage point... various factors can and should be seen as goods - as aspects or components of what is in itself a quintessentially good end in relation to us. Without achieving such goods, we cannot thrive as human beings - we cannot achieve the condition of well-being that Aristotle called "flourishing."
[JLJ - In a similar manner, certain observations and rules of thumb and efficient yet broad exploratory behaviors deemed 'good' or even necessary for 'playing' a complex game of strategy need to be seen as good in and of themselves, because engaging in them often results in achieving flourishing positions, which can lead to won games. The trick is determining what these 'various factors' are, and writing sensitive but practically efficient code to execute them.]
p.162 The validation of an ideal is ultimately derivative. It does not lie in the (unrealizable) state of affairs that it contemplates - in that inherently unachievable perfection it envisions. Rather, it lies in the influence that it exerts on the lives of its human exponents through the mediation of thought.
p.164 To attain the limits of the possibilities inherent in our powers and potentialities, we must aim beyond them.
p.165 in the sphere of human endeavor we cannot properly explain and understand the reality about us without reference to motivating ideals.
p.178 Nothing guarantees that the phenomena are always and everywhere as they are within our range of observation.
p.190 What most fundamentally stands in the way of conjectural improvability is the pervasive interconnectedness of things. This means there is no real prospect of local tinkering with the world without wider ramifications. In this world - and indeed in any possible world - states of affairs are so interconnected that local changes always have pervasive consequences.
p.191 The domain of fact has a systemic integrity that one disturbs at one's own peril: a change at any point has reverberations everywhere... Reality's reach has a grip that it will never entirely relax: it is a tightly woven web where the cutting of any thread leads to an unraveling of the whole.
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