Acceptance study 091919. PRB
Preface
I routinely write that fellow citizens may accept each 1) the U.S.
Preamble’s proposition, 2) responsible human liberty and 3) human individual
power, energy, and authority (HIPEA) to develop integrity. I plan to create a
comprehensive list of acceptances. [Note: on 10/8/19, I discovered ACT, a mindfulness therapy. I plan to read a book or two---perhaps by Stephen Hayes then by Russ Harris to learn thoughts beyond or in parallel with my acceptance that you are human and acceptance of a public agreement to equity under statutory justice.]
Further,
I suggest that the standard for justice is fidelity to the-objective truth, [1]
which is the ineluctable evidence by which truth is measured. Preparing this
essay, I encountered this MW1 illustration of “literal”: “The story he told was basically true, even
if it wasn't the literal truth.” This sentence implies the
speaker’s evaluation and claim to know the literal truth. “The-objective-truth”
expresses humility to the literal truth. I assert that I do not know much of
the-objective-truth, and I rely on it.
In my eighth decade, I realize my quest, to be what I want to be, is a
sequence of acceptances, beginning with acceptance that I am a human being. I
chose to study the philosophy of “acceptance”. The study enhanced ongoing
concern to encourage fellow citizens to voluntarily accept U.S. citizenship and
to never invite fellow citizens to leave/emigrate. The U.S. Preamble (the
preamble to the U.S. Constitution) offers individuals and collectives
(societies) acceptance of responsible human liberty.
Dictionary information
Merriam-Webster (MW) online[2] has “acceptance, noun”: the quality or state of being accepted or acceptable; the act of accepting something or someone; the fact of being accepted; acceptance of responsibility: Law, an agreeing either expressly or by conduct to the act or offer of another so that a contract is concluded and the parties become legally bound; the act of accepting a time draft or bill of exchange for payment when due according to the specified terms; an accepted draft or bill of exchange.
The MW thesaurus divides words into two categories: 1) “a readiness or willingness to accept or adapt to a given circumstance” and 2) “permission given to do something.” The synonyms in both categories are abundant. Interesting to my purpose is the antonyms for Category 1: resistance, defiance, disobedience, intractability, recalcitrance, animosity, antipathy, enmity, hostility, ill will.
The category most interesting to my purpose is acceptance: “[the discipline] to accept . . . a given circumstance.”
Abstract
Much of philosophy of “acceptance” addresses intellectual constructs intended to avoid or resist actual reality. Reviewing 15 of perhaps thousands of philosophical articles which use the word “acceptance,” my criticisms follow, below.
Rules and codes are no substitute for the-objective-truth. Impartiality is an intention but not an option respecting the-objective-truth. On the other hand, in the absence of statutory justice (the worthy goal of perfection), an agreement to aid equity under law enforcement seems worthy. Some people think crime and other infidelities pay. Therefore, the public funds law enforcement. Research designed to prove a belief has no objectivity and may not yield discovery. Discovery usually affirms related theories and vice versa. Societies create rules that lessen individual encouragement to develop integrity to the-objective-truth. The individual may reserve some power, energy, and authority for the-objective-truth. Much like slavery, few would volunteer to be tolerated. In order to communicate, collaborate, and connect to discover the-objective-truth, the parties must establish mutual semantics; expressions are enhanced by words that suggest something, such as “humankind” rather than “man” when people past present and future is the subject. Acceptance without evidence is voluntary and may be honest yet lack integrity. Pursuing knowledge or probability as surrogates for the-objective-truth is unpromising or begs woe. The-objective-truth responds to neither reason, nor “conventional truths”, nor human awareness, nor intentions, nor assertion of the literal truth. Acceptance of the-objective-truth as standard for justice may asymptotically lead to the literal truth. Scientific research is the study of the-objective-truth, and it demands objectivity. Applying subjective statistics to study human psychology is a dubious practice. People who propose research without objectivity seem to value metaphysics. It is useful to be aware of proprietary abuses of “acceptance,” and awareness need not become a burden.
Study method
I searched the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy using “acceptance” and found 546 articles, considering the first twelve and skipping to a 13th choice. Within each article, I searched “acceptance” and copied the sections using the term. Then I read the information to extract my interpretation. Also, I found one article at the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy I felt essential. Their search method does not allow canvasing on one word, but search within a selected article indicates they might also have 546 articles containing “acceptance”.
The following is my analysis of each article I reviewed. I highlight acceptance
to help the reader relate to the respective article’s usage. The articles are
numbered to aid the summary that follows.
This article addresses acceptance of rules and codes more than accepting the-objective-truth. “Impartial” opinion seems recommended as the standard for morality. However, opinion is no substitute for the-objective-truth.
Impartiality seeks a margin from 100% to accommodate punishment of dissidents. The author claims, without evidence, that 90% “seems” defensible.
Impartiality seems sufficient to override personal objections, and everyone is expected to adopt “the rules whose universal acceptance will have the best consequences impartially considered” including efficiency among the society. “Such arguments suggest . . . contractualism and rule-consequentialism,” the latter being questioned as potentially unacceptable respecting unintended consequences and also suitability for public acknowledgement.
The category “contractualism” might include the proposition that is offered to fellow citizens by the U.S. Preamble: communicate, collaborate, and connect for responsible human liberty.
“Van Fraassen [claims]:
Science aims to give us theories which are empirically adequate; and acceptance
of a theory involves as belief only that it is empirically adequate.” Wikipedia
tells us he argues for “skepticism toward the
reality of unseen entities.”
Acceptability of a
theory as the-objective-truth may result from its interconnected verification
by other researched theories. Empirical research is the work to discover actual
reality[5] whether actual reality is
observed[6] or not; in other words,
the research does not always succeed.
Acceptance involves discovery of factual
existence as well as how to benefit from the facts. Benefits accrue not only
from application to human endeavors but to order related research. Imagination
is useful in assessing, proposing, selling, and gaining acceptance of new areas
for research long before there is belief that the research will lead to discovery.
Acceptance
is not likely if benefits from the evidence cannot be established, so pure
research is a difficult sell.
This practice cautions
against metaphysics or speculation. Yet, pure research often wins acceptance
without elements of belief, for example, on predicted benefits versus estimated
research costs if the theory is proved.
If a researcher intends
to prove a belief, there is no objectivity to order the work. The consequence
of the work may be “observation” of falsehood. For example, someone who
believes the earth is flat may “observe” that the sun revolves around the earth
each day when in fact the earth rotates on its axis successively hiding then
un-hiding the sun each 24 hours. “Thus, beliefs may express . . . perception
when discovery is absent.”
I appreciate this
affirmation of the role of discovery regarding the-objective-truth.
Human collectives create “social
phenomena, including conventions, social norms and social institutions
[establishing] institutional structure. Structure entails the specifications
and public acceptance. For example, the U.S. Supreme Court has nine
justices and its authority is accepted by the people. Some individuals do not
hold the Supreme Court as a reliable authority.
Collective acceptance is the
summation of individual actions and differs from the individual acceptances.
The individuals communicate, collaborate, and connect without absolute consent
or explicit contract.
“The term
‘toleration’—from the Latin tolerare:
to put up with, countenance or suffer—generally refers to the conditional
acceptance of or non-interference with beliefs, actions or practices
that one considers to be wrong but . . . should [neither] be prohibited or
constrained [nor affirmed or accepted].”
“Conditional
acceptance” seems an oxymoron. For example, there is no toleration for racism: “an unacceptable prejudice [cannot be] an ethical
judgment.” This confusion comes about because there is no standard for
tolerance. That is, tolerance is a subjective practice. In other words,
tolerance is a matter of opinion. Perhaps “intolerance” is useful whereas
“tolerance” only confuses communication, collaboration, and connection.
Writer Rainer Forst assigns four conceptions to explain
connections involving tolerance:
permission (authority vs dissent), coexistence (conflict avoidance),
respect (public conduct separated from private conduct), and esteem (responsible
private behavior revered). In any of these connections, which party is anxious
to accept the other’s tolerance?
Forst’s construction derives from the privation of
standards for civic behavior. With public acceptance of the-objective-truth, a
civic, civil, and legal standard is established without strife over religious
beliefs. Individuals may observe manners, civility, and legality without
compromising responsible religious beliefs.
In public, there is intolerance to any interjection of the
mystery of whatever-God-is, a private pursuit.
5. Mutual knowledge constraints on conversation[9]
In conversation, the listener often expresses acceptance
of the speaker’s claims yet in privacy holds doubt. Therefore, experienced
speakers carefully establish plausibility if not reliability in their word
choices. The speaker takes the following precautions: uses expressions he knows
to represent the experiences and observations that are common to the audience;
has a purpose that is shared by the audience; cites reliable evidences for the
claims; admits to perception, memory, and induction in forming opinion; avoids
burdening the listener with confirmation of the evidences and builds on any
prior acceptances they express; admits that not everyone in the
audience has already had the experiences or observation to lend reliability to
the claims; and is civic if not humble when a listener perceives they have
reason not to accept the claims.
The speaker and listener share the burden that while
expressions can intend to appeal to experiences and observations common to many
individuals, universal commonality does not exist. Knowing this, listeners may
clarify expressions before considering acceptance of the claims. During
this clarification, the speaker may explore listener’s expressions so as to
establish mutual comprehension. And they may exchange roles, listener becoming
speaker. This iterative clarification may change the speaker’s words and
phrases. If listener merely stonewalls speaker, communication, collaboration,
and connection cannot occur.
Proprietary scholars have bemused the speaker-listener
with the slogan “know your audience and use their terms.” This is often impossible
even in person-to-person conversation. The consequence of placing the burden
solely on the speaker is, for example, endless dialogue about God when no two
people accept a common God. Consequently, I invite discussion about the mystery
of whatever-God-is.
6. The honesty of belief[10]
Everything derives from physics as E=mC2 or
better expression of the origins of actual reality. Humans use imagination and
reason to research physics’ unknowns. Researchers use discovery or ineluctable
evidence to establish the-objective-truth in an asymptotic elimination of
erroneous comprehension. Acceptance of imagination or reason
without evidence is metaphysics---beyond objective experience or observation;
otherworldly; infidelity. Some people honestly fall into metaphysics and
thereby delay integrity.
Some proprietary scholars not only neglect actual reality
but also deflate accepted reason by extoling faith, belief, hope, or fideism,
bemusing integrity as subordinate to reason. Centuries ago, scholars labeled
physics and its offspring “nature,” erroneously ruling reason to be superior.
Some scholars still hold mathematics to be abstract or metaphysical. Some
erroneously argue that if an idea has a strong construct, ineluctable evidence
will eventually be discovered. Supposedly, acceptance of the construct may
accelerate the discovery. For example, the benevolence of whatever-God-is may
be proven someday.
“A warning is in order here: acceptance is typically a
technical notion and characterizations of its nature and ethics differ
radically in the literature. The ethicist of belief who wants to soften or
supplement her view by appealing to some notion of permissible acceptance
would need to say what acceptance is, how the two sorts of
attitude differ, what sorts of norms govern each, and how they interact in a
single subject.” Usually, acceptance without evidence is
voluntary.
7. A thirteenth century logic[11]
Acceptance of an expression is
enhanced by words that suggest something. For example, “humankind” stands for people
living in the past, present, and future. However, “man” indicates gender, may
refer to the superior bipedal species, or in context may be unrelated to
humankind; e.g., an object in a board game.
I appreciate this affirmation of my quest to create a glossary
that is devoid of identity politics. For example, I claim that the U.S. Preamble
proposes to fellow-citizens individual discipline rather than self-governance.
Such discipline is suggested to all people.
8. Conditional logic[12]
Scholarship in conditional logic considers
actual reality, probability, and knowing. The purpose is semantics for “acceptance for conditionals,
rather than a theory of truth.”
“[We] need a notion of acceptance capable of characterizing
the acceptance
of sentences that lack truth values but express important cognitive attitudes.
. . focusing on . . . supposition and its corresponding conditional axioms.”
“ . . . [respecting] grammatical matters . . . this type
of consensus
supposition correlates [imperfectly] with the use of the
indicative mood in English.”
In plain terms, the-objective-truth does not respond to
scholarly schemes, such as “conditional logic”. This concept seems the most
egregious offense against the-objective-truth among all the articles I reviewed.
9. Skepticism 2300 years ago[13]
An ancient skeptic’s acceptance of “‘reasonable’ or tentative hypotheses [did] not require assenting to them.” In another scholarly analysis, “assent is a matter of reason or thinking, rather than the acceptance of a non-rational ‘impression’.”
Beyond impression, the-objective-truth does not respond to human reason.
10. Eighth century Buddhist thought[14]
Evaluating “competing Buddhist” philosophies: 1) “conventional
truths . . . as being of the nature of consciousness,” and 2) “conventional acceptance
of self-cognizing consciousness or reflexive awareness.” Either way, the
purpose is salvation (perhaps especially as effected by Jesus Christ), and the
method is individual consideration of philosophical priorities.
The-objective-truth responds to neither “conventional truths”
nor human awareness.
11. Collective intentionality[15]
“Collective intentionality is the power of minds to be jointly
directed at objects, matters of fact, states of affairs, goals, or values and
comes in a variety of modes, including shared intention, joint attention,
shared belief, collective acceptance, and collective emotion.”
“Collective acceptance is a central presupposition for the creation of a
language, and of a whole world of symbols, institutions, and social
status. Shared
evaluative attitudes provide us with a conception of the
common good. In virtue of this we can reason from the perspective of our
groups, and conceive of ourselves in terms of our social identities and social
roles. This again enables us to constitute group agents such as business
enterprises, universities, or political parties.”
The only valid “common good” I know of is mutual, comprehensive
safety and security, which is the proposition that is offered by the U.S.
Preamble. The U.S. Preamble proposes freedom-from oppression so as to
secure the individual liberty-to develop integrity. Some
develop the liberty-to practice crime and are thus dissidents to freedom-from
oppression. Due to the rule of law, dissidents invite woe.
“When an individual reasons or has attitudes in the ‘I-mode,’
she does function as a group member but her commitments relative to the
respective attitudes are private, i.e., they regard her goals qua private
person. When she reasons or has attitudes in the ‘we-mode,’ she functions as a
group member and conceives of herself as being bound by and committed to what
is collectively accepted and subject of collective commitment within the group.”
Thus, collective acceptance becomes attitudes of collective commitment. Being
a group member seems like voluntary subjugation excepting the special case of
mutual, comprehensive safety and security.
“Such plural subjects, as a particular sort of social group, can
be subjects of intentional states such as intentions, beliefs, and acceptance;
this is the point at which the account regards the subject of collective
intentionality.” For example, “the existence of money depends at least partly
on collective intentional attitudes, or on a shared practice of treating
certain pieces of paper, and not others, as money. [It] is not easy to see how
an attitude, whether collective or not, can” achieve acceptance of a natural
pragmatism.
This seems a case of over philosophizing. The exchange of labor
for goods is not feasible in a bartering system. Money serves as the medium of exchange.
A more interesting philosophical challenge is to compare money with bitcoin. Is
bitcoin an instability of possible reward for commitment to risk? Can bitcoin
be considered as a tool for the common good? Can money?
The-objective-truth does not respond to intentions.
12. The cost of cognitive standards[16]
When a people express “attitudes of acceptance of various
norms or rules governing conduct and emotion” they invite circularity dictated
by either the established norms or the intentions in constructing the norms.
Resulting norms can be irrational and unjust.
“If this line of argument works it will allow non-cognitivism to
gain the allegiance of those who wish to deny relativism while giving the
motivations that lead to both it and non-cognitivism their due.” This dilemma
is nullified when the standard is the-objective-truth.
13. No emotions in the study of physics[17]
Accepting science as research and research’s object physics (expressed
by Einstein’s general theory of relativity), I understand E=mC2 as
the origin of everything including fiction. Fiction is speculation about what
has not been discovered from ineluctable evidence. In other words, fiction is
created from human imagination, the second incentive to enter the rigor of
scientific research. Science is then the work to discover the origins of
everything; everything evolved from physics.
Discovery requires integrity, and infidelity may be
introduced into research during each the authorization, the design of
experiments, the acceptance of experimental results, and promotion of
conclusions.
Most research is authorized on cost versus risk; that is, cost
versus the inverse of chance for research-success. Decisions are guided by
prior discovery (understanding the-objective-truth) and the hypothesis’
compatibility with connecting theories. Emotions, neither of the research team,
the press, nor the public should influence decisions. That is, experimental
design is based-on and intended-to-increase discovery of the-objective-truth.
Philosophers challenge the principle that scientific research is
objective. The fact that the decision to put a person on the moon can, through
objective research, succeed, does not seem like ineluctable evidence to some
philosophers. Others concede objectivity in physics research but deny that
human psychology is physics even though the brain operates on electro-chemistry.
Some assert that statistics can be applied to psychology as science, not
admitting that researchers suspect statistics. On subjectivity and statistical
studies, a dubious industry called “social sciences” hangs.
In the philosophical debate about scientific objectivity,
the-objective-truth exists. In the pursuit of integrity about human psychology,
subjective statistics is a dubious tool. I trust objectivity rather than
“social science.”
14. Scientific unrealism[18]
As though the-objective-truth responds to opinion, this argument
starts with the phrase “we are entitled to” as an arrogant disclaimer to
“may”: “Debates about scientific realism
concern the extent to which we are entitled to hope or believe that
science will tell us what the world is really like. Realists tend to be
optimistic; antirealists do not.”
Scientific researchers trust that they are collaborating on
interconnected theories. Newton’s gravity suffered doubt “with the increasing acceptance
of Maxwell’s theory of electromagnetism” then was affirmed as a special case of
Einstein’s general theory of relativity.
“[We] conjoin theories we accept. But positivist surrogates for
truth, reference, and acceptance cannot underwrite this
practice.”
“To accept a theory is to believe it is empirically adequate, but acceptance
has further non-epistemic/pragmatic features. Empirical adequacy is logically
weaker than truth: T’s truth entails its empirical adequacy but not conversely.
But it [what’s ‘it’; truth or adequacy?] is still quite strong: an empirically
adequate theory must correctly represent all the phenomena, both observed and
unobserved. Epistemic acceptance is belief; beliefs are
either true or false. Pragmatic acceptance involves non-epistemic
commitments to use the theory in certain ways (basing research, experiments,
and explanations on it, for example); commitments are neither true nor false;
they are either vindicated or not. [Instrumental] acceptance suffices to
account for scientific practice.”
Acceptance when there is no
objectivity begs woe. The most egregious reasoning in the above collection of
quotes may be the assertion that an “empirically adequate theory” can represent
the unobserved by design. Second, instrumental acceptance seems
erroneous, because better instruments and ways of using them are often
invented.
Summary
Starting from the premise that I would like to encourage fellow citizens to accept the-objective-truth as the measure of truth and route to literal truth, I sought to inform myself about other uses of “acceptance” by reviewing philosophical articles. I found no survey article, but there are perhaps thousands of philosophical articles that use the word “acceptance.”
Here is a tabulation of dominant interpretations from the articles I read, by key words from their titles or my expression of the subject:
1. Rule-consequences cultural constructs
2. Constructive empiricism belief: a dangerous practice
3. Social institutions concurrent opinion or collectives
4. Toleration dominant opinion
5. Awareness testimony closed minds divided by semantics
6. Ethical belief an oxymoron
7. Natural semantics words that express humankind’s observables
8. Logical conditionals rationalizing potential falsehoods
9. Ancient skepticism reason overrules impression
10. Egocentric awareness spiritual salvation a human hope
11. The common good competition for dominant opinion
12. Civilization collective bemusement
13. Research prevents emotions discover the ineluctable evidence
14. Antirealism “we are entitled to” change the facts
The key observations from my limited study and comprehension are: Articles 1-4, 6, 8-12, and 14 or 11 of 14 or 79% attempt to justify a human construct so as to neglect the-objective-truth. Articles 5 and 7 address the importance of communicating, collaborating, and connecting in order to establish commonly defined words; for example, “whatever-God-is” is more expressive than “God.” Article 13 stresses that scientific research rejects the emotionalism of metaphysics. Support for research for discovery of ineluctable evidence is evident from negative interpretations or modern progress respecting some of the articles. For example, Article 9 can be expanded to make the point that justice reason overrules impression, ineluctable evidence overrules reason.
I would like to read a philosopher’s essay on “awareness.”
Copyright©2019 by Phillip R. Beaver. All rights reserved. Permission is hereby granted for the publication of all or portions of this paper as long as this complete copyright notice is included. Note on 10/6/19.
[1]
“The-objective-truth” is my phrase to invite the reader to consider discovered,
ineluctable evidence as having the potential to represent actual reality,
lessened only by the human frailties of scientific research. When a researcher
trusts-in and commits to the discovery of the-objective-truth, he or she
remains constrained by the instruments that are available and other factors. He
or she remains humble to the literal truth.
[5]
“Actual reality” means factual existence or literal truth.
[6]
This is my interpretation of a priori knowledge, a proprietary term.
[18]
Online at https://www.iep.utm.edu/sci-real/#H9.
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