Re: Why choose a paragraph element for a paragraph?

On 2009-03-14, dorayme <doraymeRidThis@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
[...]
David, I do not deny that there are such things as paragraphs in much
the same way that I do not deny that there are facts.

However, without contradiction, I do deny that there are facts as
understood a certain way. I do not think facts form part of the ontology
of our world. They are not extra things to chairs and tables and film
reels. They - at best - supervene on the things that do exist.

It's often thought that this is the other way round, mainly because you
can do experiments to verify facts, but not to verify choice of things.

For example, "the sun rises", understood as "rises as opposed to
doesn't" is a fact that can be verified.

But you might say it doesn't rise at all, it stays where it is, it's
just the Earth rotates. But if you do that you aren't really disputing
the fact, just proposing a change of basis-- you aren't really saying
the sun doesn't rise (nobody would dispute that) just that that's not
the best way of describing what's happening.

In the same way you can talk in terms of chairs and tables or in terms
of atoms or particles strings. The choice of terms is important for
understanding, and some choices are better than others, but "the world"
is just what makes some suggestions true and others false.

This is what's meant by saying "The world consists of facts not of
things" (Wittgenstein).

[...]
To explain this idea of supervenience (well known and variously
controversial in other fields), I would need to know anyone was still
listening or interested!

Go on then.
.

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