A response to all:
While perusing this last week of blogging I have noticed an implicit consensus from many if not all who have commented on radical constructivism; i.e. RC is impractical in that it renders functionality in a society impossible. This is an inaccuracy, borne, I think, from a misconception of the theory itself. The radical constructivist will not posit the existence of an external reality, but neither will she spend all of her cognitive power constantly exercising the doubt inherent in her philosophy. RC does not beget paranoia in this way. What the realist considers to be true, the radical constructivist does not think to be untrue, but rather, considers it viable. This viability is the solid foundation upon which the constructivist operates and can thus interact with a society.
Elisha is a radical constructivist. She need not actively doubt the metaphysical properties of her daily blueberry bagel; its existence is viable which is enough to for her. Her bike ride to the store is not laden with her constant worry about the existence of the sidewalk; its existence fits with all her previous experiences. Her metaphysical agnosticism does not keep her from playing the flute almost every day; its existence, while not certain, fits and is viable...notice the pattern?...etc...
Radical constructivism is not without its difficulties; they are plenty and fatal. Does Radical Constructivism beget a paranoid person incapable of existing and interacting within a society? No. When is it prudent to doubt the existence of reality? Always.
Question: Does this notion of 'fitting' and 'viability' successfully disarm these concerns?
I am moments away from responding to this
ReplyDeleteThe radical constructivist is, however, in the awkward position of the antitheorist's paradox. She insists there's no problem with living everyday life as a metaphysical agnostic, but devotes endless, terminologically dense books and papers to attempting to show that the metaphysical realist is benighted. This is not the mark of a comfortable, adequate position.
ReplyDeleteI would demur at Jabob's final claim that it is always prudent to doubt the existence of reality. It seems to slip from healthy, curious skepticism about any particular proposition (the mark of a practiced critical thinker) to the rabbit-hole of wholly unwarranted, and even logically impossible, radical doubt.
Their insistence on disproving metaphysical realism does seem counter intuitive and slightly hypocritical. I would certainly agree that the hyperbolic doubt of which I spoke is wholly unwarranted, but I am unclear as to why you would consider it logically impossible. The RCist does not doubt the existence of herself, but anything past that is consistently and constantly doubted. What makes this impossible?
ReplyDeleteRadical skepticism -- doubting everything all at once -- poses some serious logical hurdles. The skeptics in the Academy after Plato held that knowledge is impossible; Pyrrhonian skeptics countered that even that looks an awful lot like a knowledge claim, and proposed instead merely to suspend judgment about all knowledge claims.
ReplyDeleteBut why undertake this suspension, a rigorous denial of the normal process of trying to know and weighing evidence? Presumably because they believed (like the Academics) that knowledge is impossible, and were looking for a consistent way to actualize that proposition without actually stating it (which would plunge them into contradiction, like the Academics).
Thereby, they gave up philosophy in our sense of a rigorous and good-faith search for understanding within the bounds of our faculties, and retreated into lifestyles ("philosophies") of rigorous, dogmatic refusal to think or utter any propositional claims -- "just live," as they put it.
Admirable as that motto might appear, it conceals yet another truth-claim: that it is better to "just live," if one could, than to risk error by participating in the search for knowledge. Perhaps it is, but how could we show that without participating?
I certainly agree with everything you just mentioned; this suspension of belief is neither desireable nor ultimately helpful. But while the Academic Skeptics, and even the Pyrrhonian Skeptics, comitted logical contradictions while articulating their suspension of belief, my original question was why (and please forgive if you have actually answered this and I am merely misunderstanding) this suspension of disbelief is necessarily logically misbegotten.
ReplyDelete