STATE OF THE ART (personal fears) I feel really comfortable with jumping off whe

STATE OF THE ART

(personal fears)

I feel really comfortable with jumping off where Penelope Maddy left off with her Second Philosopher’s AREALISM, and transforming her basic arguments into realism via operational language. That’s not hard. That solves the problem of communicating the death of platonism.

As for contemporary philosophy, it looks like there are only two active philosophers worth following. Which is kind of scary if you think about it. The most heralded philosophers are largely the continentals now. A fact which I find terrifying. Because it’s just elaborate christian mysticism trying to justify socialism. (It’s creepy. It’s the mental equivalent of working on weaponizing the bird flu virus into an unstoppable plague. But since we’ve had a number of conceptual plagues – most of them by jewish authors for some reason or other, which I can’t comprehend: zoroaster, abraham, jesus, peter and paul, muhammed, rousseau, kant, marx, freud, cantor, heidegger – I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised that the effort to formulate a new religion continues unabated. )

There are two good and active philosophers: Searle and Dennett. Otherwise contemporary philosophy is a desert. I am not brave enough to think I”m in that class of minds. I’m not. I just stumbled on the right answers like the poor fellows who discovered Lexan. But I have definitely solved the following problems so far as ethics, politics and political economy are concerned:

1) Mathematical Realism. (I seem to be the only one to do this.)

2) Ethical Realism. (I seem to be the only one to do this)

3) The unification of philosophical disciplines

4) The formal logic of cooperation.

5) The institutions of morally heterogeneous polities. And given that I don’t think I’ve really stated anything terribly novel in the institutional solutions department, all I have done is provide an explanation of why a particular set of solutions are scientific, rational, ethical, moral and just. Rather than some arbitrary moralistic Hail Mary play. (see Rawls.)

I understand Kripke’s innovation pretty clearly I think. But I still think that the solution to internally consistent logic is replaced by the logic of cooperation. I just don’t know if I can really take that line of thought any further into a critique of formal logic. So I don’t know the impact that operational language would have on formal logic. So far as I can tell, the problem is no longer one of language and statements but the reducibility of statements to human action. If you grok that one change alone, then you sort of understand all you need to.

I can sort of reconcile this with Kripke. Although I have to go back and re-read Naming and Necessity again with my current understanding and see if my previous understanding holds up.

BUT THE PROBLEM WILL BE READABILITY

I still think it’s going to be hard without the help of a patient editor to capture these ideas as a coherent whole. I can make a philosophy that you can study once you understand it’s value. But I don’t think I can sell someone on that philosophy through easy of comprehension. I have reduced most of the central arguments to pretty simple concepts. But holding the reader’s hand through the journey is a lot harder than simply stating the definitions and methods. I just don’t think I can do it. I don’t think so because I understand the problem of the limit that one can hold in short term memory. And my crutch to get around that problem is to use the text as the short term memory that I don’t have, but that most great authors do have. So far my only solution has been to just keep trying until I can reduce it. But at this point I’m not sure that I’m making further progress at reduction.

ie: I’m afraid to put finger to keyboard. It’s a lot of work. It’s a lot easier to let months pass improving on minor points than it is to tackle the equivalent of Elinor Ostrom’s grammar. I know full well that I’ve completed the ethics, the philosophy, the institutions and the applications. But I’m afraid to confront my inadequacy as a writer. So afraid that it’s hindering me.

Not sure what to do other than power through it in a snowy chalet somewhere… Not afraid of much really. Not afraid of dying even. But I’m afraid to fail at this for sure…..