
Systems of Philosophy: On Robert Brandom’s “A Spirit of Trust” - keiferski
https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/systems-of-philosophy-on-robert-brandoms-a-spirit-of-trust/
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mannykannot
Early in the article, we find this passage, with respect to Brandom's views:

 _" If you claim that the sky is blue but not colored, you’re not just saying
something false — you are showing that you don’t have the relevant concepts
(“blue” and “colored”) at all. At a minimum, you are violating your rational
obligations. Anyone’s ability to mean anything is made possible by social
practices that hold people to such rational rules of entailment and
incompatibility. This approach, in Brandom’s formulations, owes much to Kant
and, especially, Wittgenstein._

 _" The question of whether a certain sentence is true, for Brandom, is
inseparable from rational standards about what it is permissible or obligatory
to say or believe."_

To me, this seems to be putting the cart before the horse, as if the truth of
a statement is dependent on its linguistic properties. In practice, it seems
to me that usage and semantics are bent to a language-independent (but
imperfectly perceived) reality rather than the other way around.

Towards the end of the article, its author writes this, which strikes me as
being to the point, at least with respect to the relationship between language
and reality:

 _" Brandom’s position, in addition, is overweeningly rationalistic; I am not
convinced that my obligation to believe of a blue thing that it is not also
chartreuse is, all things considered, much like my obligation not to hurt
people for no good reason. That is, the 'deontic' status of rational norms is
fundamentally an assumption rather than a result, something that is supposed
to be self-evident or entailed by our existing practices. But if I (like the
arch anti-Hegelian Søren Kierkegaard, for example) resolve to embrace a
paradox, or if I am simply indifferent to certain rational implications of
what I already believe, how could we show this to be 'impermissible'? I’ll
believe what I like, thank you very much."_

~~~
slowmovintarget
> _" The question of whether a certain sentence is true, for Brandom, is
> inseparable from rational standards about what it is permissible or
> obligatory to say or believe."_

I'm trying to unpack that statement. It seems like the article writer is
claiming, in tortured fashion, that Brandom simply believes in axioms. Or am I
missing the point?

I'd have to agree with the last statement. Ethical requirements for baseline
beliefs do come from peer-pressure. There's a point where, if you disbelieve 2
+ 2 = 4 you will be derided. What's interesting is how we extend those
requirements, because that requires a delicacy we so often lack.

~~~
ukj
There is a distinction to be drawn between expression and evaluation.

If I express “2+2” it could be evaluated to 4 (in decimal); or 11 (in
trinary).

If two evaluators disagree on the truth-value of 2+2=11 then one possible
explanation is that they disagree on the number-system in which the expression
was made.

That leads to the usual consensus problems in computer science: leader
election etc.

It can’t be solved without one side “changing its mind” - or, at least
translating its expressions for the target evaluator.

Consensus requires linguistic norms.

------
woodandsteel
Here's a question to someone who has read Brandom: where does he think human
language comes from in the first place?

My position is that language consists of the symbolic representation of
distinctions and connections, and we humans are able to have these because as
animals we have sense and brain systems that can make distinctions and
connections about the real world.

Does Brandom talk about how, according to the scientists, first animals
developed these abilities, and then humans added in the symbolization?

Or does he leave this out, and make it look as if language exists
independently of the animal realm? Which would seem to imply it dropped down
from the heavens, which would fit with Hegel's metaphysical idealism. Or
perhaps he has some third position.

