> The problem is: who is to judge what is rational and
what is not?

We all are, and without reference to a final authority
who would validate
our judgements for us. We are likely to disagree, of
course; the point is
that such disagreements count for something, since
they are disagreements
about what is the case, rather than mere expressions
of sentiment or matters
of taste..."

What is the point of this dribble? I'm sorry, guys
(specifically, Domfox and Massey Suzanne or something
like that), but it just seems neverending, seeping
into my e mail box again and again. Endless, pointless
debates, the subjects and parameters of which are
hopelessly vague, the goals of which are
uncertain...Reading this stuff is like wading through
sour cream. Thought without discipline or end.  If you
just stopped to think for 5 seconds before you posted
it you could save a lot of people the trouble of
deleting it, I'm sure. Here's an example from your
latest epistle:

"who is to judge what is rational and what is not?

We all are, and without reference to a final authority
who would validate
our judgements for us."

As usual, abstractis chronicus (that constant
companion of dribblers) leaves its thin and
short-lasting patina of profundity on this nonsense.
If we bother to take a look at the real world, we see
immediately that 'rational' is a good deal less
torturous than it is presented as being here. A couple
of years back, during that madcow scare, I wondered
whether the fear which I had started to feel toward my
formerly-favourite food, the Big Mac, was rational. I
asked an acquaintance of mine (a, clear
throat,solemnise voice 'higher authority') who
specialised in biomedicine. He told me how the madcow
thing was restricted to the UK, or Europe (can't
remember which), and gave various reasons why it
couldn't exist in New Zealand blah balh blah. Simple
then - it wasn't rational for me to run from my
favourite snack the way I'd run from a snake, if we
had them here. Where's the mystery in that?

Is that a dumb enough refutation for you?
The task of thinking is to remove complications and
solve problems, not to add to them" - Wittgenstein










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> The problem is: who is to judge what is rational and
what is not?

We all are, and without reference to a final authority
who would validate
our judgements for us. We are likely to disagree, of
course; the point is
that such disagreements count for something, since
they are disagreements
about what is the case, rather than mere expressions
of sentiment or matters
of taste...

- Dom




=====
"Why is it not possible for me to doubt that I have never been on the moon?  And how
could I try to doubt it?  First and foremost, the supposition that perhaps I have
been there would strike me as idle.  Nothing would follow from it, nothing be
explained by it.  It would not tie in with anything in my life...  Philosophical
problems occur when language goes on holiday.  We must not separate ideas from life,
we must not be misled by the appearances of sentences: we must investigate the
application of words in individual language-games"      - Ludwig Wittgenstein

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