Re: THEORY: Are commands to believe infelicitous?

On Sunday, June 12, 2005, at 05:42 , Joseph Bridwell wrote:

>>> Many people (me often among them) disagree that belief
>>> is an act of will. 
>>
>> Then you and I simply do not mean the same things by the
>> words 'believe' and 'belief'.
>
> From a private email from him, it seems to me that the difference
> may be in how he, you & I define "will"  and "conscious". I don't
> want to speak for him, but I believe he holds Feudian-clinical
> seperate defs of them, whereas I hold experiential overlapping defs.
> Does that make sense?
Not entirely - but that is probably because I'm unfamiiiar with
Feudian-clinical concepts & jargon. It has been a very long while since I'
ve concerned myself with Freud.

By 'will' I mean very much what my dictionary states as its first meaning,
  namely: "the power or faculty of choosing or determining."

I guess if one takes a purely mechanical & deterministic view of the
universe, 'will' is an illusion. Fairly obviously I do not take this view.

I've always understood that if one was 'conscious' of something, one was
_aware_ of it, one had some knowledge of it.

>
>> =============================================
>>> Define "disordered", please. I know the Webster's
>>> def. I'd like yours, please.
>>
>> Quite so. I know Tom does not say specifically that he
>> considers your belief and mine to be disordered, but there
>> does seem to be an implication that it is so.
>
> From his email to me, I believe that the word "disordered" does not
> connote for him the negative psychological assessment that it does
> for me, but is more like the word "<progam>bug" for me.
But 'bug' is merely a euphemism for an error. I still do not understand
what he means by "some people would say your belief cannot be subject to
your will unless your belief is disordered."

> I asked him to define "disordered" because I've seen people here
> more than once disagree because they are using diff defs of a key
> word. IIRC, the most recent was "conservative".
Depends in the UK whether it is spelled with an uppercase or a lowercase C
    :)

>> Now if I were blind, I would not know the color of the
>> screen. I would have to rely on/ put my trust in some
>> one else. If several people told me different colors,
>> I would have to decide [act of will] which person I
>> considered most trustworthy. I would believe that person.
>
> Interesting. I have the Australian film "Proof" enqueued to view
> this week. It's supposedly about a blind artist and the conflicts
> with the two people who help him.
Very interesting.

Actually it occurs to me that my blind person above must once have t be
sighted in order even to have some idea of what is meant by "red", 'green"
, "violet" etc. To someone born blind, this must be virtually impossible.
But that is another matter, I guess.

Anyway, to return to the subject heading: i do not believe that commands
to believe are per_se infelicitous    :)

Ray
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"A mind which thinks at its own expense will always
interfere with language."         J.G. Hamann, 1760