forum 11: week of 26 March - knowledge and accomplishment

Fragment of a discussion from Course talk:Phil440A

I agree that the difference seems to be skill and effort, without which I do not believe you can call something an accomplishment, at least in some cases. But how does this difference turn into an argument about language? And the element of luck is what makes something that seems like an accomplishment not an accomplishment. Or am I wrong about what makes something an accomplishment?

NicoleJinn07:43, 2 April 2012

It is necessarily a discussion about language since a common understanding of the term itself,one we can agree on for the sake of discussion and clarity,is required.Luck,skill and effort are important ingredients of accomplishment, but another term needs to be added to complete that list:attribution.Accomplishment implies a claim,it is someone's accomplishment.This someone can be an individual or a group,but ownership is implied,because accomplishment is a particularizing and polar term and concept,further implying competition.Success is opposed to failure.This is also true of negative accomplishments,as in crimes,where blame is attributed to someone.Blame is placed on a designated accomplisher,just as credit is given in cases of positive attainment.These concepts are firmly established,even foundational,in our language and culture,to the degree that they function as unquestioned norms.Inflated claims of expertise and to celebrity on one side,or to scapegoating on the other,raise further questions around how we understand and then define personal identity,and whether reputation can really be regarded as a discrete,private property.We live in the culture of the signed work.Who accomplished the great cathedrals of the Middle Ages?Who accomplished the pyramids.Trout would undoubtedly credit the chrono-synclastic Infindibulum:-)

Robmacdee20:20, 2 April 2012

To me,in Dr. Morton’s paper titled Accomplishing Accomplishment, page two, last paragraph, on success, the definition “I have in mind getting what you want because of your efforts” has a clarity, and a concrete connotation. Brute effort. The online dictionary defines accomplish to succeed in doing, and Merriam-Webster, to bring about by effort.

JamesMilligan21:49, 2 April 2012