Meaningful claims don’t have to be specific; they just have to be able to be substantiated by a nonzero number of specific examples. Here’s how I imagine this conversation:
Chris: Love your neighbor!
Liron: Can you give me an example of a time in your life where that exhortation was relevant?
Chris: Sure. People in my apartment complex like to smoke cigarettes in the courtyard and the smoke wafts up to my window. It’s actually a nonsmoking complex, so I could complain to management and get them to stop, but I understand the relaxing feeling of a good smoke, so I let them be.
Liron: Ah I see, that was pretty accommodating of you.
Chris: Yeah, and I felt love in my heart for my fellow man when I did that.
Liron: Cool beans. Thanks for helping me understand what kind of scenarios you mean for your exhortation to “love your neighbor” to map to.
It’s mapping a river system to a drop. Just because something is technically possible and topologically feasible doesn’t make it a sensible thing to do.
I’m not saying “mapping a big category to a single example is what it’s all about”. I’m saying that it’s a sanity check. Like why wouldn’t you be able to do that? Yet sometimes you can’t, and it’s cause for alarm.
Meaningful claims don’t have to be specific; they just have to be able to be substantiated by a nonzero number of specific examples. Here’s how I imagine this conversation:
Chris: Love your neighbor!
Liron: Can you give me an example of a time in your life where that exhortation was relevant?
Chris: Sure. People in my apartment complex like to smoke cigarettes in the courtyard and the smoke wafts up to my window. It’s actually a nonsmoking complex, so I could complain to management and get them to stop, but I understand the relaxing feeling of a good smoke, so I let them be.
Liron: Ah I see, that was pretty accommodating of you.
Chris: Yeah, and I felt love in my heart for my fellow man when I did that.
Liron: Cool beans. Thanks for helping me understand what kind of scenarios you mean for your exhortation to “love your neighbor” to map to.
It’s mapping a river system to a drop. Just because something is technically possible and topologically feasible doesn’t make it a sensible thing to do.
I’m not saying “mapping a big category to a single example is what it’s all about”. I’m saying that it’s a sanity check. Like why wouldn’t you be able to do that? Yet sometimes you can’t, and it’s cause for alarm.