From: Brian Holtz [brian@holtz.org] Sent: Sunday, April 07, 2002 7:59 AM To: alt.atheism.moderated Subject: Re: Infinity (was: You' have to be God....ATTN: PH) Jim Humphries wrote: > > the not-fully-understood facility by which a mind induces > > general properties from instances, and > > [..] by which a mind recognizes > > those general properties in other similar instances. > > > Which I think is pretty close to an admission that > the conceptualism you are espousing cannot *explai* > why the idea of 'six' that you have is the same as the > 'six' that someone else has. Saying that a mechanism is "not fully understand" is hardly "pretty close" to saying we "cannot explain" the phenomenon in question. > > the fact that we don't fully > > understand how the human mind forms and uses concepts > > does not at all imply platonism > > > Of course Platonism is not *implied*. Its just that it > is able to explain the 'not fully understood faculty' > of your conceptualism. No. Conceptualism hypothesizes a mechanism that is different only in degree from mechanisms we already fully understand, whereas Platonism is pure hand-waving. Platonism has no explanation for how alleged universals interact with the brain. Demonstrating that conceptualism is superior to Platonism was initially a fun exercise, but your obvious lack of conviction in Platonism has made this somewhat boring... -- brian@holtz.org http://humanknowledge.net