I don't think there's anything problematic about saying that other smart people just lack concepts that you have. I don't think Parfit's reply to Williams was uncharitable. I have no trouble believing that you lack my concept of reasons.
I have yet to see a good account of concept acquisition that would support the view that moral realists are capable of acquiring concepts that other people are incapable of acquiring. This, for me, is an empirical matter similar to suggesting that some people can see infrared or hear high frequency sounds. I'd want to see some explanation for how and why one population of people can acquire a concept and another population can't: does the latter have some kind of brain damage? Conceptual agnosia? What is going on, exactly, and what is the evidence for that particular account?
As far as I can tell, Parfit and others who just go around claiming others lack concepts offer nothing in support of this other than their supreme confidence that they "have" the concepts in question. It's all private. There's no publicly evaluable arguments or evidence that I've ever seen. The whole thing looks like one of a group of people who all report something epistemically akin to private, personal revelations, for which they can offer absolutely no external means of corroboration, beyond the fact that others claim to have the same revelations. We're given no good story as to how or why you and other realists would be some kind of a prioristic oracles and the rest of us are intellectually bereft...again, for clear reason.
The whole thing strikes me as very bizarre and I'm not sure why you buy into this, and why you don't share my view that if you were correct about this, there'd be more to the story than simply claiming it's the case, and that, short of actually making a case for such a story, that I and others like me have very little reason to take you or Parfit seriously. (Edited to add: it does not strike me as any more serious a *philosophical* position than a sect of Christians claiming to have personal, divine revelations from God.)
I don't agree with that. I do think it's a problem if people just go around claiming other people lack concepts. Among other concerns, I have yet to see any good explanation as to why some people would just not be able to acquire or "have" a particular concept.
In the case of people who have e.g., prosopagnosia, we have means of empirically evaluating the condition and identifying the physiological differences associated with it. I know of no similar account that would explain why some people just "lack concepts."
This is an empirical claim about human cognition, and yet no substantive account of how or why this would occur has been given, much less have you or anyone else presented empirical evidence in support of such an account. So it just seems like idle empirical speculation.
I agree wholeheartedly!
That is unexpected.
Well, not with the anti-realism bit, but with the other part.
Ha, I appreciate the engagement but could you be a bit more specific?
I don't think there's anything problematic about saying that other smart people just lack concepts that you have. I don't think Parfit's reply to Williams was uncharitable. I have no trouble believing that you lack my concept of reasons.
I have yet to see a good account of concept acquisition that would support the view that moral realists are capable of acquiring concepts that other people are incapable of acquiring. This, for me, is an empirical matter similar to suggesting that some people can see infrared or hear high frequency sounds. I'd want to see some explanation for how and why one population of people can acquire a concept and another population can't: does the latter have some kind of brain damage? Conceptual agnosia? What is going on, exactly, and what is the evidence for that particular account?
As far as I can tell, Parfit and others who just go around claiming others lack concepts offer nothing in support of this other than their supreme confidence that they "have" the concepts in question. It's all private. There's no publicly evaluable arguments or evidence that I've ever seen. The whole thing looks like one of a group of people who all report something epistemically akin to private, personal revelations, for which they can offer absolutely no external means of corroboration, beyond the fact that others claim to have the same revelations. We're given no good story as to how or why you and other realists would be some kind of a prioristic oracles and the rest of us are intellectually bereft...again, for clear reason.
The whole thing strikes me as very bizarre and I'm not sure why you buy into this, and why you don't share my view that if you were correct about this, there'd be more to the story than simply claiming it's the case, and that, short of actually making a case for such a story, that I and others like me have very little reason to take you or Parfit seriously. (Edited to add: it does not strike me as any more serious a *philosophical* position than a sect of Christians claiming to have personal, divine revelations from God.)
I don't agree with that. I do think it's a problem if people just go around claiming other people lack concepts. Among other concerns, I have yet to see any good explanation as to why some people would just not be able to acquire or "have" a particular concept.
In the case of people who have e.g., prosopagnosia, we have means of empirically evaluating the condition and identifying the physiological differences associated with it. I know of no similar account that would explain why some people just "lack concepts."
This is an empirical claim about human cognition, and yet no substantive account of how or why this would occur has been given, much less have you or anyone else presented empirical evidence in support of such an account. So it just seems like idle empirical speculation.
Let's talk about this over call at some point.