Bound by Suspense, in More than Iron Chains

Sonnet XXXV
by Alexander Thomson 

 Suspiciens altam lunam, sic voce precatur. -- Virgil 

Fair, silver Queen! whose all pervading eye
Beholds at once whate'er the world contains!
Wilt thou in pity listen from on high,
To him whose lonely heart to thee complains?
Thou seest his soul in anxious torture lie,
Bound by suspense, in more than iron chains;
Thou know'st the cause that prompts his frequent sigh,
And fills with terror's frost his shiv'ring veins.
Oh, tell him then, and end this cruel fear,
Why the dear Youth to whom his heart is join'd,
With Friendship's voice delays to soothe his ear;
Oh tell him this and ease his frantic mind:
From trembling thoughts relieve his cheerless day,
And save his restless night from dreams of wild dismay. 

 Edinburgh Feb 1789

Two Poem Drafts

The second is a poetic exercise, based on Catullus 8, in which you try to use English words to suggest the sound, rather than the meaning, of the original Latin. I cheated a bit by reading v as English v rather than as the classical Latin w-sound, which would give a weally, weally weird sound, and using a few other anglicizations. Of course, it's hard to make anything that does that well and makes any sense in English, but I confess myself rather pleased with "you fill, sir, your ferry with candies, to be solaced" (the original is fulsere vere candidi tibi soles, 'truly, brilliant suns blazed for you'). 

 Two Epics

Two great prose epics did England make:
one was the Tale with Hobbits,
of humble things that rise to wake,
all the schemes of pride to break,
of friends who never will forsake;---

two great prose epics did England make:
one was the Tale with Rabbits,
the quiet hearts who hold up the light
amidst the crashing of darkness and night,
the peaceful folk who rise to the fight;---

and in these epics, clear and bright,
true sustenance the soul may take,
and form heroic habits.

Not Quite Catullus 8

Mister Cattle, in designing ineptly your rage
at what the days, perishing prettily, declare,
you fill, sir, your condo with candies, to be solaced;
conventuals treat of this, corporeally, with caveat.
Who matters? Known but by quantity, name beaten out newly,
a ballet like to molten tomb, choked with seafaring boats,
or, like to volleyballs, now pulled nigh apart,
you fill, sir, your ferry with candies, to be solaced.
Now I am ill and unveiled, too quiet, important -- no lie --
not quite frugal, unstaring; now, mister, vividly
obstinate man, perfect your dark art,
that no rogue have any invitation -- 
yet too you dole out like a rogue bearing nullities.
Scholastically weighed, too! To be man and vital,
quick as night-bats flit in day's light failing,
but unknown by the mob in its sea-saw declaiming,
unbiased and replaced and, labelled, in morgue placed --
that's you, Cattle, destined to suffer.

Subjunctive Modus Ponens

 We have subjunctive conditionals of the form, If p were true, q would be true. We can abbreviate these as (p > q). Indicative conditionals admit of modus ponens, (If p is true, q is true; p is true; therefore q is true). So it seems natural that there would be something analogous for subjunctive conditionals. However, there are complications.

The antecedent of If p were true, q would be true is ambiguous. It could mean something like:

If p were true [rather than what is actually true], q would be true.

Call this the properly counterfactual interpretation. But it could also mean:

If p were true [as it may be], q would be true.

Call this the fortassic interpretation (from Latin fortasse). These are not at all the same thing, but subjunctive conditionals can be used in both ways. This matters a lot. The Supplement on Debates over Counteractual Principles at the SEP has the following example:

If George were caught, he would face years of prison.
Actually, George did get caught.
In that case, he will face years of prison.

This is clearly invalid on the properly counterfactual interpretation. It is at least defensible on the fortassic interpretation. Another example, from the same source:

If the soldier had shot the prisoner, then (even) if the captain hadn’t given the order to shoot, the prisoner (still) would have died.
Actually, the soldier did shoot the prisoner.
So, if the captain hadn’t given the order to shoot, the prisoner would have died.

Again, this is clearly invalid on the properly counterfactual interpretation. But if the main conditional is fortassic, then it is again defensible.

The essential thing is that when we construct a subjunctive conditional, we can do so in such a way as to rule out the possibility of the actual state of affairs from falling under the antecedent (properly counterfactual) or in such a way as to allow that it could (fortassic).

In both of the above examples, we need fortassic interpretations in order to allow the indicative second premise to be combinable with the antecedent. On the counterfactual interpretation, it becomes irrelevant and we have committed an equivocation, namely, treating the indicative p is true as if it were the same as were p to be true. 

Thus, if we have a genuine counterfactual conditional, we can only get modus ponens if our ponens premise is shifted toward the same set of counterfactual situations as the antecedent of the counterfactual conditional:

If p were true [given some change to the actual], q would be true.
p were true [given the same change to the actual].
Therefore, q would be true [given the same change to the actual].

Colloquial English doesn't let us do anything directly like p were true on its own; the usual way we would say something like this is, 'p would be true'. Thus:

If George were caught, he would face years of prison.
George would be caught.
So he would face years of prison.

The shift in how it's stated is awkward, but I suppose it could be argued that it serves a function. In 'George were caught', we are, from the way things actually are, positing a counterfactual situation in which things would be different; with 'George would be caught', we are shifting to the perspective of that counterfactual situation. We then draw a conclusion from within that perspective.

The fortassic interpretation allows us to do the same thing; it just also allows us to treat the perspective of no-difference-from-the-actual as one of the options.

The abbreviation (p > q) unfortunately obscures this. If we say,

p > q
p
Therefore q,

there is nothing to indicate that the ponens premise (p) is to be taken subjunctively and not indicatively. Thus we should probably require something like an index in the antecedent of a subjunctive conditional, to let us indicate when we are in the same region of possibilities:

p₁ > q
p₁
Therefore q.

But this is not always adequate, either. When we have the fortassic conditional and an indicative ponens, the indicative does not cover the same region of possibilities; it's only a part of it. We could do something like p_∈1, but this does not distinguish the indicative situation from the other situations that fall within that region of possibilities. Perhaps p_@∈1? But we need something along such lines if we are to handle counterfactuals properly in a formal notation.

Links of Note

 * A. T. Fyfe, The Need for God and the Problem of Evil within William James' Moral Philosophy (PDF)

* Brandon Warmke, Commencement Speech Morality

* Oliver Traldi, Jane Austen and the Defence of Virtue, at "The Common Reader"

* There Exists an X, The strange history of abortion before Christianity

* John Psmith, REVIEW: 50 Years of Text Games, by Aaron Reed, at "Mr. and Mrs. Psmith's Bookshelf"

* Christopher Kennedy and Malte Willer, Assertion, expression, experience (PDF)

* B. Jack Copeland and William Lyons, Ryle's War

* Senia Sheydvasser, Where are Groups? What are Groups? Why are Groups?, at "The Deranged Mathematician"

* Hunter Coates, A Fresh Translation of Romans 9-11

* James Hartley looks at Watership Down at "The Madrid Review"

* Fr. Justin Hewlett, Choose Your Own Programming Adventure, at "Geek Orthodox"

* Lucas Thorpe, Kant on moral character, immortality, and holiness as the limit of virtue (PDF)

Greatness and Brevity

  My mouth will speak the praise of the Lord: of that Lord, through whom all things were made, and who was made among all things: who is the revealer of the Father, the creator of the mother: the Son of God from the Father without a mother, the son of man from a mother without a father: great in the day of the angels, small in the day of men: the Word God before all times, the Word flesh at the appointed time: the creator of the sun, made under the sun: ordaining all ages from the bosom of the Father, consecrating this day from the womb of the mother: remaining there, coming forth here: maker of heaven and earth, born under heaven on earth: ineffably wise, wisely an infant: filling the world, lying in a manger: ruling the stars, sucking at breasts: so great in the form of God, brief in the form of a servant; so that neither was that greatness diminished by this brevity, nor was this brevity oppressed by that greatness. For nor did he abandon divine works when he took on human limbs: nor did he cease to reach from end to end mightily, and to dispose all things sweetly; when clothed in the infirmity of the flesh, he was received in the virginal womb, not enclosed; so that neither was the food of wisdom withdrawn from the angels, and we might taste how sweet the Lord is.

[St. Augustine, Sermon 187.1]

Apostle of Andalusia

 Today is the feast of St. Juan of Avila, Doctor of the Church.

Take courage, and set out with diligence and fervour: nothing is worse than for a beginner to commence badly by indulging his body and trying to please the world. Shut your ears against all human praise or blame, for in a little while both the critic and the man he judges will be dust and ashes. We shall one day stand before God's tribunal, where the mouth of wickedness shall be stopped and virtue will be exalted. Meanwhile, embrace the cross, and follow Him Who was dishonoured and Who lost His life upon it for your sake. Hide yourself in our Lord's wounds, so that when He comes, He may find you dwelling in Himself. Then He will beautify you with His graces, and give Himself to you as your reward for having left all things, even yourself, for His sake. How little, indeed, does the man who forsakes all things give up! He but leaves now, what, whether he will or no, he can keep but for a very brief time. Even while he possesses it, it brings him misery, for all that is not God only burdens and saddens the soul, which its Creator alone can satisfy. Open your heart to Him, and rejoice in Him, and you will find Him more tender and loving than can be imagined.

[St. John of Avila, from Letters of Blessed John of Avila, p. 101.]

Judging as Man and for Man

 The Express Moral Principles of which I have spoken, as the basis of Duties, are those which express, in an imperative form, the five Cardinal Virtues: namely, the Principle of Humanity, that Man is to be loved as Man: the Principle of Justice, that Each Man is to have his own: the Principle of Truth, that We must conform to the universal Understanding which the use of Language among men implies: the Principle of Purity, that the Lower Parts of our nature are to be governed by the Higher: and the Principle of Order, that We must obey positive Laws as the necessary conditions of Morality....They commend themselves to our assent, in proportion as our moral nature is cultivated and educed: they become evident to us when we think and feel as really moral creatures. The perception of them may be obscured by the influence of the ferine part of our nature ;---by savage rudeness, passion, partiality: but in proportion as the ferine element is subdued, and the human element brought out in its proper force, these Principles are accepted. When man judges as man and for man, he is enabled to see their full meaning; and with their meaning, their truth.

[William Whewell, Lectures on Systematic Morality (1846), Lecture V, p. 108.]