Deus ex machina

Subsequent to Brett’s in-class reading, the discussion about metaphor seems to have reemerged. Accordingly, I thought I should mention a point regarding metaphors that I have wanted to bring up. Everyone seems to be sure that a metaphors meaning can easily be determined; however, I wonder how much confidence we can put into most interpretations that we give. In other words, how sure can we be that a certain interpretation is the correct one? I understand that we have textual evidence, but how strong of a case does this evidence provide us?

Donald Davidson, in short, views metaphors as a linguistic tool in which no linguistic rules can apply because metaphorical language does not abide by normal linguistic functions. Accordingly, metaphors cannot be described as having literal function. This leads to my next point in regards to metaphors: Does Davidson actually maintain that metaphors do not have any meaning? According to Davidson, "the attempt to give literal expression to the content of the metaphor is simply misguided”. But, does this mean that metaphors do not have meaning? Most of the blogposts I have read have argued against the idea that metaphors do not have any meaning, implying that Davidson held this stance. However, I am not fully sold on this. Davidson believed that metaphors did have a function of pointing the reader to some novel understanding or insight. He only did not view metaphors as being able to be described in a literal fashion. I wonder if we are misinterpreting his stance in stating that he simply viewed metaphors as having no meaning.

Mid-Reading Note-

Although it is not a major problem, I do think there may be an inherent contradiction within Stecker’s writing piece on interpretation.

On page 274, when discussion the nature of “acceptable interpretations, Stecker says, “Such interpretations are acceptable because they satisfy criteria of acceptability which have nothing to do with the truth of these interpretations.”

Later, Stecker says, “To be acceptable, [acceptable interpretations] must be consistent with some facts about the work.” Accordingly, it seems that acceptableness does in some way have to do with the truth of the interpretation. As I previously states, not a big issue, but I find it interesting none the less.

In Response to Andrew “Red in Tooth and Claw”

I enjoyed reading Andrew’s post, which was a comment direct towards Schopenhauer. Schopenhauer was quoted as saying, "every animal can maintain its own existence only by the incessant elimination of another's”. Andrew responded to this by giving the converse example of symbiosis, where a relationship between animals benefits both groups. I agree with Andrew in that symbiosis presents a counter example to Schopenhauer’s claim, but it seems that this conversation may be missing Schopenhauer’s central point. I think that Schopenhauer makes the statement quoted above primarily because of the lack of resources that exist in our universe. Naturally, it one animal obtains a certain resource, it means that another animal will have a lack of that resource. Accordingly, this is why he states that in order for every animal to maintain its existence, it needs to eliminate another’s in the process. It is my belief, unfortunately, that Schopenhauer was spot-on with this observation. We live in a society in which there are scarce resources and vast population of diverse individuals.

In Response to Kyle “Free Will”

I was really happy to see Kyle’s post regarding our recent class discussion about free will. Kyle made the comment during class that determinism may be difficult to apply to a completely novel circumstance. As he states in his post, this idea was possible pre-maturely thrown out because of the fact that there are no such thing as completely novel circumstances. I think that I was the person that pointed this out, but from what I remember, I do not think I was able to make this point in a clear manner. Accordingly, it seems that Kyle may have felt that this idea of a completely novel circumstance was thrown out prematurely.

First, I should point out that the idea of a CNC is a great point to make during a discussion on free will. However, I want to make my point across in a more clear and concise manner. In order for humans to intercept any experience, it must be broken down into smaller cognitive components that the brain already understands. Accordingly, every human experience that it is able to be perceived is somehow related to some other experience. Although, conceptually it seems possible to have a experience a CNC, this is simply not possible. At least not from the way in which the human brain functions. We may have experiences that, from a holistic view, are completely novel, but they are not actually a CNC. If this experience were broken down into its simple components, it would have to be related to another experience.