Heaps can be said to exist because of vagueness in the definition of what precisely makes something a heap. Race is the same way, which is why it is a social construct. I'm not saying that "heap" and "race" are not useful terms. They do correlate with actual differences, but they are social constructs because they are convenient simplifications to help us describe phenomena.

If "heap" is a social construct, so is all language, basically, and then everything is a social construct. Sigh.

Maybe this will help -- hot off the bit presses:

Post-modernists sometimes say things like “reality is socially constructed”, and there’s an uncontroversially correct meaning there. We don’t experience the world directly, but through the categories and prejudices implicit to our society; for example, I might view a certain shade of bluish-green as blue, and someone raised in a different culture might view it as green. Okay.

Then post-modernists go on to say that if someone in a different culture thinks that the sun is light glinting off the horns of the Sky Ox, that’s just as real as our own culture’s theory that the sun is a mass of incandescent gas a great big nuclear furnace. If you challenge them, they’ll say that you’re denying reality is socially constructed, which means you’re clearly very naive and think you have perfect objectivity and the senses perceive reality directly.

Plus, you might be interested in the wonderfully named Troll's Truisms:

A Troll’s Truism is an ambiguous statement by which an exciting falsehood may trade on a trivial truth. For example, ‘morality is socially constructed’ sounds like a radical assertion of cultural relativism until we are told that by ‘morality’ the speaker means not morality itself but just our beliefs about right and wrong. Of course, these beliefs are, in some sense, socially constructed, if only because our acquisition of many beliefs is mediated by language and beliefs about right and wrong are certainly among those acquired in that way. Hence in this sense of ‘morality’ the statement is true and trivially so.

Comment author: Elund 05 November 2014 08:20:08AM * 2 points [-]

If "heap" is a social construct, so is all language, basically, and then everything is a social construct. Sigh.

It is true that all language is socially constructed, but I was trying to draw attention to how "race" is especially subjective. Many linguistic terms are much more precise. A "species" for example refers to related individuals who reproduce among themselves, producing viable offspring. There is still some room for ambiguity, but it is less than what you get with "race". Besides, what's wrong with the idea that all language is socially constructed? It is possible to believe that without falling prey to the fallacy of grey.

Then post-modernists go on to say that if someone in a different culture thinks that the sun is light glinting off the horns of the Sky Ox, that’s just as real as our own culture’s theory that the sun is a mass of incandescent gas a great big nuclear furnace.

I would personally prefer to use the term "better informed" rather than "more real". Hypothetically, if both theories turned out to be completely false, and supposing we learned of that but still had no idea what the actual truth was, it wouldn't be certain which of them is more "real", but it would be relatively clearer which one had stronger evidence supporting it at the time. To give a different example, if we knew that one of the two theories is 100% true but aren't told which one it is, it would be reasonable for us to think it is far more likely to be the theory based on scientific evidence (i.e. the theory that actually aligns with the scientific definition of a theory as being a coherent group of tested general propositions, commonly regarded as correct, that can be used as principles of explanation and prediction for a class of phenomena:).

Comment author: satt 13 November 2014 06:57:14AM -1 points [-]

Heaps can be said to exist because of vagueness in the definition of what precisely makes something a heap. Race is the same way, which is why it is a social construct.

Right conclusion, wrong reason. (The first sentence strikes me as incorrect all by itself. I could still call certain things heaps even if I had a sharp definition of a heap.) Race is a social construct because genetic data underdetermine racial categories.

Expanding: although knowledge of human population structure rules out (or at least makes implausible) many potential racial classifications, many other classifications are compatible with it. Therefore an analyst has lots of latitude to decide which genetic differences between groups constitute races.

(The continuousness/blurriness of human genetic variation is mostly a red herring, though it does sharpen the under-determination issue and make it more obvious.)

Comment author: Elund 13 November 2014 08:42:40PM 0 points [-]

I could still call certain things heaps even if I had a sharp definition of a heap.

Sorry, what I meant was, "Heaps as they are currently defined can be said to exist because of vagueness in the definition of what precisely makes something a heap." They can also be said to not exist because of vagueness in the definition of what precisely makes something a heap. However, it is extremely difficult if not impossible for any definition to have absolutely no ambiguity at all, and even if that was possible, language can still be considered a social construct in the sense that linguistic terms are constructed socially. Vague terms have an extra layer of social construction though, because rather than just giving a term to a phenomenon, they also introduce a simplification. This makes the constructed aspect more obvious. I guess I didn't word my above quote very well, since I didn't mention that the social construction of all language itself is also enough to make "heaps" a social construct.

Comment author: satt 14 November 2014 02:58:46AM 0 points [-]

Sorry, what I meant was, "Heaps as they are currently defined can be said to exist because of vagueness in the definition of what precisely makes something a heap." They can also be said to not exist because of vagueness in the definition of what precisely makes something a heap.

That too sounded confusing/wrong to me on a first reading, but are you saying that because the definition of a heap is vague, there are multiple feasible definitions of a heap, so some people (using one definition) would call a candidate heap a heap and other people (using another definition) would say it isn't a heap? (Assuming I've paraphrased you correctly, I think my formulation is clearer.) I'd agree with that.

Vague terms have an extra layer of social construction though, because rather than just giving a term to a phenomenon, they also introduce a simplification. This makes the constructed aspect more obvious.

Almost all terms introduce a simplification, not just the vague ones. Vagueness does often make social construction more obvious, but for a more mundane reason than simplification: vague terms have a wider array of meanings than non-vague terms, so people are more likely to notice the multiplicity of ways to define a term when it's vague.

Comment author: Elund 14 November 2014 06:01:31AM 0 points [-]

are you saying that because the definition of a heap is vague, there are multiple feasible definitions of a heap, so some people (using one definition) would call a candidate heap a heap and other people (using another definition) would say it isn't a heap?

Not that they are necessarily using multiple definitions, but the common definitions themselves do not specify an exact range in quantity in which a cluster of things could be considered a heap. Two people could disagree about whether something is a heap despite using the same vague definition of "heap". They may be comparing the candidate heap relative to things that they have experienced being called heaps in the past. I suppose you could still treat this as being a difference in their personal definitions of "heap". However, I don't think that if pressed to define "heap", that people would be likely to state an explicit quantity range. They would most likely give vague qualitative definitions. The same person may even use inconsistent definitions at different times or forget to include certain aspects that they would consider to be important defining characteristics. People don't normally think in terms of definitions when classifying things. They usually just classify based on what feels correct, and definitions are after-the-fact attempted explanations of their classifications.

Almost all terms introduce a simplification, not just the vague ones.

Doesn't the introduction of a simplification itself give a term some vagueness, because then you don't know the details of the relevant characteristic, just a qualitative judgment? For "heaps", the simplification is one that keeps the exact quantity obscured while providing a qualitative description instead. Even if you had a different quantity term that, unlike "heap", didn't have fuzzy boundaries, it could still be considered vague in a different sense if multiple quantities could fulfill its definition (assuming an exact quantity really did exist in reality). It would certainly at least be considered somewhat ambiguous. For example, the category "integers" has seemingly clear boundaries, but calling an unknown number an integer is still vague if it doesn't express all the relevant information.

vague terms have a wider array of meanings than non-vague terms

Yes, terms can be vague in that way too.

Comment author: satt 15 November 2014 05:58:26PM 0 points [-]

Not that they are necessarily using multiple definitions, but the common definitions themselves do not specify an exact range in quantity in which a cluster of things could be considered a heap. Two people could disagree about whether something is a heap despite using the same vague definition of "heap". [...]

Ahhh, I think I understand. Yes, that makes sense.

Doesn't the introduction of a simplification itself give a term some vagueness, because then you don't know the details of the relevant characteristic, just a qualitative judgment?

Yes, although (as you suggest) that's a different kind of vagueness: vagueness as a definition's inclusiveness vs. vagueness as uncertainty about the definition itself.

Kawoomba comments on 2014 Less Wrong Census/Survey - Less Wrong

Article Navigation

Comments (724)

Nearest Meetups

Virtual Study Room

Recent Comments

Recent Posts

Recent Rationality Quotes

Recent Wiki Edits

Top Contributors, 30 Days

Recent Karma Awards

Comments (724)

Top Contributors, 30 Days

You'll need to login or register to do that

(Don't worry, it only takes a few seconds)

Create

Login