The Metaphysics of Social Construction | Attic Philosophy

[@kingkraft5450]

I do enjoy this so much. Kinda glad to think that I wasn't crazy when I talked to a friend once why sex is both biological and a social construction. Kinda feel validated a bit, but I would love to read more. Thank you for the souces you provided in another videos. Very interesting.

[@AtticPhilosophy]

Thanks!

[@Sam_Saylor]

Im struggling here because one the one hand im fascinated by the subject and on the other hand i think it might be complicating something that is quite obvious. I mean is there really strong opposition to the idea that we socially construct things and that we endow objects with our constructed ideas? I cant see what the counter argument would be? But maybe, that is a cue for me to keep digging haha. Great and informative video here. Thanks a bunch!

[@AtticPhilosophy]

I'm with you in agreeing that it's clear that there are socially constructed entities. So see what opposition might look like, think of claims that certain concepts (eg race, gender) must be underpinned by biology, on the one hand, and on the other hand, "anti-essentialist" claims that 'race isn't real'. For me, the questions isn't WHETHER but HOW: how do our beliefs, judgements, etc, lead to real social entities, which have causal powers of their own?

[@groovybeetlecar]

Thank you for these videos - really interesting. You mentioned posting some reading material but I can't find those links.

[@AtticPhilosophy]

My bad - I've added a reading list in the description.

[@groovybeetlecar]

@@AtticPhilosophy Thank you, that's great! And thank you for these videos!

[@ChocoDrum03]

Hey, huge thanks for this series. I became more interested in social ontology thanks to your videos! Here's what I was wondering. When talking about whether social entities were purely physical, I thought the primary argument against the view was similar to this one (just made up by me): 15 years ago, there was a child right where I was located. But now there is no child co-located with me. Hence, I can't be that child. We (probably) wouldn't accept this latter argument. But how is it different than the first one? Forgive my ignorance on the topic. Thanks again. Cheers :)

[@AtticPhilosophy]

That’s a great point, and it takes us deep into the metaphysics of objects! What it comes down to is where we draw the line between change (in a continuing entity) and that entity ceasing to exist. In the case of the child, the child changes into an adult, with the same person continuing through the change. If your atoms were scattered, by contrast, we’d probably say that’s the end of you, not just a mere change. What about the parking space? We *could* say it’s just a change (the area of tarmac changes from a disabled parking space to something else). But I think it’s more plausible to say that it’s essential to a disabled parking space that only disabled people are allowed to park there. So, change that and you destroy the disabled parking space. That entity ceases to exist, although the coincident area of tarmac remains unchanged. There are loads of deep & controversial metaphysical questions here, hopefully I’ll get around to making a follow-up on this. Thanks for the great question!

[@cosmicwakes6443]

Isn't social construction relational in that people make comparisons among themselves, such as tall against short, male against female, rich against poor, white against people of colour, or any difference that elevates one over the other? So could social construction be a mere vehicle for the subjugation of The Other? Great lecture. Keep them coming.

[@AtticPhilosophy]

I don’t think social construction has any direct relationship with subjugation. Examples like disabled parking spaces create an improved social space for many. You mention Examples like being tall but these aren’t really social constructions, although they are contextual (you can be e.g. tall for a writer but short for a basket baller).

[@nicolai_gamulea-schwartz]

What is a "bundle", isn't it a separable plurality of things? A bundle of properties would be a plurality of properties that can be separated - alas they all refer to a same thing, which would cease to exist as such if essential properties would be removed. Maybe it makes more sense to think of this "bundle" hylomorphically - those "properties" being components (hylos) in a certain arrangement (morphos) that make up a complex object.

[@AtticPhilosophy]

Different people say different things. One idea is that there's something that unifies a bundle, in roughly the way that a set is a single object comprised of distinct things. Some thing this is the part-whole (aka mereological) relation, so that a bundle is a whole whose parts are properties.

[@1yanyiel]

This is a very strange way of looking at reality. For me, a concept is phenomenologically distinct but intertwined with physical things. As we think at this moment, concepts are arising in our experience. There is no way for me to “make sense” of reality without a conception. Therefore, most things are invaded by conception. Hence I cannot stand behind a concept. I can’t know the metaphysics of my mind through my mind. The mind is that which everything is seen through. I can’t understand understanding itself. I can’t think about thinking itself to know it. It’s not an object of knowledge. Basically, I don’t know what is thinking, how it is done and why. But to somehow know that I can’t stand behind thinking itself is itself a form on knowledge, what is this insight then? What we do is speculate about what concept/mind is with more concept/mind. So, going with the idea of social construction explained here, I find it really strange to consider it both a “physical” thing and a conceptual thing. The pure physicality of a thing by itself does not tell me anything, only that which I signify to that thing. So in a sense, ideas are ideas and objects are objects, yet they interact phenomologically in our experience of reality. But you describe them as if those things are external objects “out there”. That there is a location to both a physical object and an idea, that it’s somehow enclosed in a space like it’s an aura or something. I think I misunderstood. In reality, all of this is a mental masturbation haha because no concept is clear of what it defines entirely. There would be no philosophical discussions then. It is an eternal battle. Another metaphysical problem is the existence of a “thing”. Saying that a “thing” is a thing is to differentiate it from another “thing”. It’s identity is determined by other things. So to ask what is something “physical” as opposed to “mental” is confusing once defined. Perception is mental, but reality is physical. Reality is only percieved through a brain, but existence is not a brain. Sensation is a neurochemical phenomena that’s of the brain. But sensations come from physical stuff. A hallucination is of the mind/brain but it is different from physical things. So both mind and matter are different substances simultaneously with conflicts within them. I guess this is the product of the law of identity in logic A=A. Can the inside of my body exist without the outside? Is the inside a thing it itself which exists apart from the outside? That’s how they are objects? One more thing. To say what a thing is will always be an infinite and circular reasoning. Physical is matter, matter are atoms, atoms are sub-atomic particles, sub-atomic particles are strings. If one defines an object in relation to another object one must define what that other object is. And so indefinitely. It leads to the problem of causation, to the problem of “what was the thing that made everything else”. But then one must explain that thing which made everything else. Is there an end? This is way more than the content of the video haha I just was veeery curious as to how you would respond (if you do) to all these ideas.

[@AtticPhilosophy]

There’s a lot here! One thing you say is that we can’t think about thinking itself. That seems wrong: psychology, cognitive science & philosophy of mind are different ways of investigating thinking in general. And we can think about our own thinking, as when we evaluate our own decision making, for example. You also wonder how socially constructed entities can involve both physical matter and concepts. Take the example of a disabled parking space. It’s in part physical: it has a size and a location in space. But it wouldn’t be the thing it is unless as a society we thought a certain way. In a society with no concept of disability, it would just be a regular park space, without the normative and legal features it in fact has.

[@1yanyiel]

@@AtticPhilosophy Thanks for answering! Let me clarify what I meant by thinking about thinking. It's not that I can't think about thinking, this is something we do all the time. It's more that that IS the only way I can barely access the contents of my mind. In fact, I would say it's what drives all neurosis. When a person goes to a psychologist, it's because they don't know what they are going through, how to articulate it, or how to even understand themselves. So therefore, we rely on another person to think for ourselves what is it we're going through. Understanding oneself is a deep phenomenon. There's "me" and "myself"; or "me" and "my mind"; this subject-object distinction. When one says: "I must understand myself" What are you trying to understand? Understanding yourself with yourself?. That's one thing, a second is that we don't know how we can think. Don't think about a tree (You probably thought of a tree as you read this). But it's more fundamental then that. It's the fact that we can think and understand without knowing how we can do such a thing. Can you control if you can follow reading these words right at this moment? Can you "will" the process of "understanding" each and every single word written here? This is what I mean that one cannot get "behind" the thinking process itself. Also, we are incredibly ignorant as to what we think we are. If that were the case, why do we speculate as to the possible reasons as to what I feel/think about something? If there was a direct access to my mind, why would there be a need to speculate about my own intentions, desires, likes, dislikes? Psychotherapy wouldn't even exist if one understood the content of their own minds entirely. At last, one must see this for yourself. Not another source of authority interpreting your mind for you. Albeit psychologists, philosophers of the mind, doctors or whatever. Those are external things. This concerns oneself so it makes no sense to say: "Science says this", or "cognitive science" says this. Those are other people just like ourselves just trying to understand themselves equally. Thank you for your time!

[@Mark73]

My definition of Social Constructs are entities that exist and claims that are true _solely_ because people agree that they are. I would say you're wrong about the parking space. Between the time the council redefines the paint color and the time the space gets repainted, it's still a disabled parking space (defined as social construct) because people that see it still has the handicapped symbol and remember the old color and recognize it as a disabled parking space. It might not be able to be legally enforced, but that doesn't mean anything to the space's status as a social construct. The council defines the disabled space as a _legal_ construct, not a social construct. It's society in general that defines social constructs. Society's view might be informed by legal distinctions, or it might not be. There's plenty of laws that society has no awareness of at all so aren't social constructs beyond the few people that those laws concern. There can also be laws that society is aware of and completely disregards and doesn't care about. What's really going to blow people's minds is that you don't even have to add "disabled" in there. Parking spaces themselves are social constructs. We have a field of asphalt with lines painted on it. We learn growing up (usually through osmosis by watching our parents park) that these are used to put our cars in while we're inside an establishment. I'd also say that you're wrong to say that a social construct must have some physical properties. Take the case of a person making up a story off the cuff and telling it to an audience. The story has a main character. That character is purely a social construct shared between the teller and the audience with no physical properties whatsoever, not even words on a page that can be pointed to. They may have a physical description and a personality but there is no physicality to them whatsoever. To give a simpler example, think of an inch (or centimeter, or any unit of distance you want). You can show me something that is that long. You can show me something that is specifically designed to measure that unit of distance, like a ruler, but you can't show me the actual unit of measurement itself. But units of measurement are absolutely social constructs. They only exist because people agree that they exist and agree on their definition (or agree on who they defer to for their definition).

[@AtticPhilosophy]

There’s not that many truths that are true *solely* because of our beliefs or attitudes or proclamations. Most involve a mix of social & physical facts. Your example, of an inch, is like this: it’s up to us what the word “inch” means, and so what length it denotes. (But that’s the same for any word.) but with the meaning fixed, it’s an objective, non-social fact that I’m 67 inches tall.

[@Mark73]

@@AtticPhilosophy Yes, we need to use a social fact (length of an inch) to describe a brute fact (your exact height).

[@AtticPhilosophy]

@@Mark73 It's not a social fact that *that length* is an inch. The social fact is that the term "one inch" denotes that length. But that's also true of every word's meaning - nothing special to lengths.