I am writing this specific thread because in many discussions, specific labelled positions ranging from substance dualism, non-dualism, theism and pantheism, consciousness and the subconscious are used as ibasis for discussion. Some of it comes down to aspects of the duality of human understanding. Language may be of great significance here.
However, I also wonder about the categorisation of philosophical positions. It may go back to the academic traditions, especially the traditions of Oxford and Cambridge thinkers of the twentieth century. To what extent was the emphasis on linguistics useful or not? How may categories and aspects of linguistic aspects of thinking proceed? What are the linguistic deficits of categories of philosophy and areas in which language can be useful in critical thinking about ideas? To what extent can philosophy, and its history, be found or distinguished from critical thinking? What works, and doesn’t, in use of labelled positions in philosophical understanding?
Labels can work as a shortcut to identify and show a person’s perspective or worldview so a discussion can begin.
Unfortunately, a self-labelled poster may not even present their position accurately. They also assume that the reader recognises or accepts such a label. A shared understanding, then, may not exist.
For a label to help, we need to clarify what it means, in theory and practice. We need to be able to question underlying assumptions and attitudes without seeming hostile. Without this, labels aren’t very useful.
Even with good language and cognitive skills, we can still talk past or over each other.
Often, it’s less about listening carefully to understand than about defending a stance or promoting a view or belief. Sometimes, what’s really at stake is ego — the feeling that one’s own identity is being challenged.
The discussion can become more of a theatre of ‘us and them’ — black and white positions of either/or — a performance verging on the tragi-comedy.
Care needs to be taken when treading the boards. Without a script, language can trip us up — a well-timed stumble just to keep us humble
Language and framing of ideas is so important, especially in the crossover between ‘fiction’ and what is understood to be 'reality. Labels may be significant in differentiating stances.
Part of my interest in this area is sensory aspects of processing. In particular, within the arts there is an emphasis on sensory experience. Where philosophy steps in is critical, especially in interpretation of human experience.
Words are the building block of human understanding, both in science and the arts. They can be compressed or elaborated on in labels and descriptions. Even scientific models may draw upon metaphorical descriptioms..
I am just adding that black and white thinking may be thought of in terms of the tendency of the human ego towards duality in understanding, especially in clearly demarked philosophical positions.
Using labels like Substance Dualism, Idealism, Pantheism, or Physicalism is a double-edged sword. They provide an efficient way to communicate vast historical/conceptual frameworks without having to reconstruct every argument from scratch but force an individual’s nuanced worldview into an existing label, often distorting their actual argument into something simple and tribe-friendly. Also labeling someone can give the false impression they understand the label, which is not always the case.
What will be found is that when these ‘specific labels’ are used that rarely are there even two people, let alone more, who agree with and accept ‘the definition’, that is; if one would ever be offered up.
Thus, the reason WHY these human beings have been misunderstanding, quarrelling, bickering, arguing, fighting, and even warring with each other for the last few thousand years or so.
Even up to the days when this was being written, they were still fighting and in conflict of things like, nature or nurture, creation or evolution, free will or determination, when, in fact, there was, literally, absolutely NOTHING to fight over. They had just NOT YET learned HOW to ‘look at’ and ‘see’ things properly and Correctly.
I think Nietzsche put the problem in a helpful light:
When the sons of clerks and office workers of every kind, whose main task it has always been to bring order into diverse materials, to distribute it over different files, and in general to schematize things, become scholars, they manifest a tendency to consider a problem almost as solved when they have merely schematized it. There are philosophers who are fundamentally merely schematizers; for them the formal aspect of their fathers’ occupation has become content.
—Nietzsche, The Gay Science, 348, translated by Walter Kaufmann.
There is a contrast to be observed between the “encyclopedic” perspective though which different views are laid out side by side and the perspective of conflict as, for example depicted in Swift’s “Battle of the Books.” I don’t think there is an explanation that explains the matter in a complete way. There would be no use for the dialectic if that was the case.
