'For the person or persons that hold dominion, can no more combine with the keeping up of majesty the running with harlots drunk or naked about the streets, or the performances of a stage player, or the open violation or contempt of laws passed by themselves than they can combine existence with non-existence'.

- Benedict de Spinoza. Political Treatise. 1677.




Saturday, December 13, 2014

Philosophical Grammar 82


82. “How must we make the grammatical rules for words if they are to give a sentence sense?”

A proposition shows the possibility of the state of affairs it describes. “Possible” here means the same as “conceivable”; representable in a particular system of propositions.

The proposition “I can imagine such and such a colour transition connects the linguistic representation with another form of representation; it is a proposition of grammar.



“How must we make the grammatical rules for words if they are to give a sentence sense?”

can anyone say – definitively – what gives a sentence sense?

it is no good appealing to grammatical rules – that just moves the question on –

i.e. what gives grammatical rules sense – for surely they must have sense – if they pass it on to sentences –

and  just by the way – isn’t a grammatical rule – a sentence?

so I think in logical terms we can forget about grammatical rules –

they are really no more than the attempt to articulate sense –

with the pretence of ‘authority’ – though no one has ever really explained – just where the authority of these rules resides

just what sense amounts to – in whatever circumstance – is open to question

frankly I think we recognize sense – or we have sense – without knowing what it is

and any ‘explanation’ – is really just a reassertion of the fact of sense

‘A proposition shows the possibility of the state of affairs it describes. “Possible” here means the same as “conceivable”; representable in a particular system of propositions.’?

in so far as a proposition is open to question – open to doubt – it is – it can be – an exploration of possibility

what is ‘possible’ – is what in the end is actually proposed – in any circumstance

as to ‘conceivable’ – well that – like any other conception – any other proposal – is itself a open to question –

what we deal with is just what is put forward – and in any circumstance who knows what that might be?

representable in a particular system of propositions?

any ‘system’ – is just some organizing principle – a proposal –

bad luck if you put forward a proposition that doesn’t fit someone’s system –

not only are you excluded from the system –

it seems here that your proposition is regarded as – not conceivable – not possible

a bad start to the day



© greg t. charlton. 2014.