Philosophy Now Forum

So In Jerry Fodor's Conceptual Atomism theory it seems that we have a concept DOG only insofar as there is a covariant causal relation between this DOG symbol occuring in my mind and my encounters with things possessing the property of DOGHOOD.

But so then "Doghood" itself (in a Kantian manner) must be a kind of noumenal unknowable right?

lukasecho wrote:So In Jerry Fodor's Conceptual Atomism theory it seems that we have a concept DOG only insofar as there is a covariant causal relation between this DOG symbol occuring in my mind and my encounters with things possessing the property of DOGHOOD.

But so then "Doghood" itself (in a Kantian manner) must be a kind of noumenal unknowable right?

I don't thing so. THe nominal part of 'dogness" is removed from our conception of it.
To suggest that what we aspire to is a noumenal dog, reduces the numen a to Platonic Forms, and I do not think that this is what Kant intended.
Dogness is primarily conceptual.

What is this?
OR this


Do these share more or less characteristics with this?

Which is not a dog at all, yet has more kinship to your pet than Goofy in natural terms.

So where is the noumenal "dog"? Where Plato might have suggested that all the above aspire to an Ideal Form (presumably in the mind of god), Kant's dogness is a phantom of the mind, and the Noumenal is beyond our perception.

If you want to get post modern on it. Rene Magritte might well have placed the following under each of the images:


Ceci N'est Pas une Chien

Hey I don't really understand your response - how is that related to Conceptual Atomism?

I'm trying to get a sense of just what Jerry Fodor's model of Concepts is in his "Conceptual Atomism" theory.

SEP: Conceptual Atomism:

the view that lexical concepts have no semantic structure (Fodor 1998, Millikan 2000). According to conceptual atomism, the content of a concept isn't determined by its relation to other concepts but by its relation to the world.

But there is more on it here:
http://www.iep.utm.edu/fodor/#H5

Fodor thus rejects all theories that individuate concepts in terms of their epistemic relations and their internal structure, and instead defends what he calls “informational atomism,” according to which lexical concepts are unstructured atoms whose content is determined by certain informational relations they bear to phenomena in the environment...... For instance, what determines whether a mind possesses DOG isn’t whether it has certain beliefs about dogs, but rather whether it possess an internal symbol that stands in the appropriate mind-world relation to the property of being a dog.......
As Fodor puts it, “it’s that your mental structures contrive to resonate to doghood, not how your mental structures contrive to resonate to doghood, that is constitutive of concept possession” (1998a, p. 76). Although the internal relations that DOG bears to other concepts and to percepts are what mediate the connection between DOG and dogs, such relations are not concept-constitutive.

So if we consider the relations between
a) the concept DOG
b) actualDOGHOOD as the property of an external object
c) mentalDOGHOOD as my mental representation or concept of DOGHOOD (which is possibly distinct from the concept DOG)

It seems that if you admit that you can have mentalDOGHOOD which is distinct from DOG then you cannot know that it is actually related to the concept DOG. the actualDOGHOOD (which is causally responsible for the fact that I the concept DOG) must remain non-conceptualizable, that is unknowable.

actualDOGHOOD thus is somewhat like a Kantian "Thing In Itself" in that it is the unknowable thing that causes the appearance - representation in us?

lukasecho wrote:Hey I don't really understand your response - how is that related to Conceptual Atomism?

I don't know you did not state any theory. I was answering your LAST sentence about Kant.

lukasecho wrote: I'm trying to get a sense of just what Jerry Fodor's model of Concepts is in his "Conceptual Atomism" theory.

SEP: Conceptual Atomism:

the view that lexical concepts have no semantic structure (Fodor 1998, Millikan 2000). According to conceptual atomism, the content of a concept isn't determined by its relation to other concepts but by its relation to the world.

But there is more on it here:
http://www.iep.utm.edu/fodor/#H5

Fodor thus rejects all theories that individuate concepts in terms of their epistemic relations and their internal structure, and instead defends what he calls “informational atomism,” according to which lexical concepts are unstructured atoms whose content is determined by certain informational relations they bear to phenomena in the environment...... For instance, what determines whether a mind possesses DOG isn’t whether it has certain beliefs about dogs, but rather whether it possess an internal symbol that stands in the appropriate mind-world relation to the property of being a dog.......
As Fodor puts it, “it’s that your mental structures contrive to resonate to doghood, not how your mental structures contrive to resonate to doghood, that is constitutive of concept possession” (1998a, p. 76). Although the internal relations that DOG bears to other concepts and to percepts are what mediate the connection between DOG and dogs, such relations are not concept-constitutive.

So if we consider the relations between
a) the concept DOG
b) actualDOGHOOD as the property of an external object
c) mentalDOGHOOD as my mental representation or concept of DOGHOOD (which is possibly distinct from the concept DOG)

It seems that if you admit that you can have mentalDOGHOOD which is distinct from DOG then you cannot know that it is actually related to the concept DOG. the actualDOGHOOD (which is causally responsible for the fact that I the concept DOG) must remain non-conceptualizable, that is unknowable.

actualDOGHOOD thus is somewhat like a Kantian "Thing In Itself" in that it is the unknowable thing that causes the appearance - representation in us?

It's usually the case that any theory that decides to chose between two ideas, usually has to ignore really important notions about the the idea it is leaving behind to favour the other.
Fodor seems to be wrong here.
He asks does the content of an idea come from its relationship with the WORLD, or does it come from its relationship to other IDEAS
Why would he want us to chose?
It seems obvious enough that a concept is totally useless if all it can do is related to another object in the world. It would be just as stupid to assert that it ONLY bears relationships with other words.
It is blindingly obvious that ideas that words relate to HAVE to do BOTH. "Dog" alone relates to nothing. But despite it standing alone without reference to the environment we still have a meaning for it. When you look at concepts that have no direct corollary in the material world - like "political", it seems pretty obvious that these concepts can only derive their meaning from other concepts; many of which also have no direct material signifier: such as "political correctness". Neither word, can be used to point to an object, and there is no unequivocal sense to the meaning or application of "political".
It also seems to me that in the very act of describing his Theory Fodor is actually refuting it, as he is employing concepts which only relate to other concepts, and do not have a direct referent in the environment.
What use is this theory? What work does it do?

I don't think it useful to bring Kant into this.

lukasecho wrote:So In Jerry Fodor's Conceptual Atomism theory it seems that we have a concept DOG only insofar as there is a covariant causal relation between this DOG symbol occuring in my mind and my encounters with things possessing the property of DOGHOOD.

But so then "Doghood" itself (in a Kantian manner) must be a kind of noumenal unknowable right?

Why do you waste time on a blatantly outdated babblehead`?

HexHammer wrote:

lukasecho wrote:So In Jerry Fodor's Conceptual Atomism theory it seems that we have a concept DOG only insofar as there is a covariant causal relation between this DOG symbol occuring in my mind and my encounters with things possessing the property of DOGHOOD.

But so then "Doghood" itself (in a Kantian manner) must be a kind of noumenal unknowable right?

Why do you waste time on a blatantly outdated babblehead`?

I'm not sure are you saying Fodor or Kant is outdated?
I was reading about Conceptual Atomism in a book about theories of Concepts
https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/concepts
and trying to understand what exactly Fodor is suggesting. Why? - well why read any philosophy?

Hobbes' Choice wrote:

lukasecho wrote:Hey I don't really understand your response - how is that related to Conceptual Atomism?

I don't know you did not state any theory. I was answering your LAST sentence about Kant.

huh? My first sentence mentions Jerry Fodor and Conceptual Atomism. and the post Subject is "Conceptual Atomism" ? how much more explicitly do I need to specify the theory i'm asking about?

lukasecho wrote:

HexHammer wrote:

lukasecho wrote:So In Jerry Fodor's Conceptual Atomism theory it seems that we have a concept DOG only insofar as there is a covariant causal relation between this DOG symbol occuring in my mind and my encounters with things possessing the property of DOGHOOD.

But so then "Doghood" itself (in a Kantian manner) must be a kind of noumenal unknowable right?

Why do you waste time on a blatantly outdated babblehead`?

I'm not sure are you saying Fodor or Kant is outdated?
I was reading about Conceptual Atomism in a book about theories of Concepts
https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/concepts
and trying to understand what exactly Fodor is suggesting. Why? - well why read any philosophy?

Hex is only informing your that he thinks all philosophy is babble.

lukasecho wrote:

Hobbes' Choice wrote:

lukasecho wrote:Hey I don't really understand your response - how is that related to Conceptual Atomism?

I don't know you did not state any theory. I was answering your LAST sentence about Kant.

huh? My first sentence mentions Jerry Fodor and Conceptual Atomism. and the post Subject is "Conceptual Atomism" ? how much more explicitly do I need to specify the theory i'm asking about?

Did you miss this bit??/

It's usually the case that any theory that decides to chose between two ideas, usually has to ignore really important notions about the the idea it is leaving behind to favour the other.
Fodor seems to be wrong here.
He asks does the content of an idea come from its relationship with the WORLD, or does it come from its relationship to other IDEAS
Why would he want us to chose?
It seems obvious enough that a concept is totally useless if all it can do is related to another object in the world. It would be just as stupid to assert that it ONLY bears relationships with other words.
It is blindingly obvious that ideas that words relate to HAVE to do BOTH. "Dog" alone relates to nothing. But despite it standing alone without reference to the environment we still have a meaning for it. When you look at concepts that have no direct corollary in the material world - like "political", it seems pretty obvious that these concepts can only derive their meaning from other concepts; many of which also have no direct material signifier: such as "political correctness". Neither word, can be used to point to an object, and there is no unequivocal sense to the meaning or application of "political".
It also seems to me that in the very act of describing his Theory Fodor is actually refuting it, as he is employing concepts which only relate to other concepts, and do not have a direct referent in the environment.
What use is this theory? What work does it do?

I don't think it useful to bring Kant into this.

lukasecho wrote:I'm not sure are you saying Fodor or Kant is outdated?
I was reading about Conceptual Atomism in a book about theories of Concepts
https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/concepts
and trying to understand what exactly Fodor is suggesting. Why? - well why read any philosophy?

If they'r not SEVERELY outdated, then tell me where we use them in our modern society, other than entertaining very naive and ill informed cozy chatters that call themselves philosophers.

I know we use A2 + B2 = C2, E=MC2 each and every day, all day.

HexHammer wrote:... I know we use A2 + B2 = C2, E=MC2 each and every day, all day.

Not sure about Fodor or Kant, although Kant should be required reading for anyone interested in what we can say with reason but we do use from Philosophy (P v ~P) and ~(P and ~P) and P ->Q , P :- Q and ~(P ^ Q) and ~(P v Q) every day, all day. In fact you are using the latter two right now.

Actually it sounds like Fodor is a typical philosophy forum babbler.

We choose a concept that we call "Dog". There is something out there that appears to fit into the scope of that concept, thus we call it "a dog" (an item within the categorical set). Generally it is through abstraction from observations that we choose that conceptual definition, but no matter which came first, the issue is the same.

There is also an exactly accurate concept of what appeared to us out there that might not have really been as it appeared. We might have mislabeled. Whether we choose to accept "the real Dog concept" in place of our "believed to be Dog concept" or just say that a real Dog is actually made of something else, is merely another language adaptation.

There is nothing mystical about it. It's just language and logic.

Hobbes' Choice wrote:Fodor seems to be wrong here.

"Full of shit", for those requiring a translation into the vernacular.

Platonist bollocks for those of a more scholarly turn of mind.

Arising_uk wrote:

HexHammer wrote:... I know we use A2 + B2 = C2, E=MC2 each and every day, all day.

Not sure about Fodor or Kant, although Kant should be required reading for anyone interested in what we can say with reason but we do use from Philosophy (P v ~P) and ~(P and ~P) and P ->Q , P :- Q and ~(P ^ Q) and ~(P v Q) every day, all day. In fact you are using the latter two right now.

What has this P stuff to do with Kant?!?!?