What's A "Zettlekasten" (Oh, no, not again!)?

harr · August 13

@Edmund said:
Here the 2nd edition of the book I'm reading: https://www.amazon.de/How-Take-Smart-Notes-Technique/dp/8197022275/

Looks like the same book as in the screenshots above, just with a different cover. Can you find the underlined sections in your book?

Edmund · August 13

@ZettelDistraction said:
In 2020, I had already pointed out Ahrens's use of the term "main notes" as follows:

Ahrens refers to these notes as “the main notes in the slip-box” in exactly one place (Ahrens, 44). Since Ahrens doesn’t provide examples of Zettels or offer a standard template for notes, I offer a template for free at https://github.com/flengyel/Zettel.

That was a reference to the first edition of How to Take Smart Notes. In the second edition, Ahrens presents an example from Luhmann's Zettelkasten. Incidentally, the page number (p. 44) to the cited text is the same in the 2017 and 2022 English translations of How to Take Smart Notes.

Subsequent revisions of From Fleeting Notes to Project Notes are more focused and point out that Permanent notes divide into Literature Notes and Main Notes, in Ahrens's terminology.

Your table, "Note categories named and unnamed", is very convincing! Thank you. Now it leads me back to p. 23:

2.1 Writing a paper step by step
1. Make fleeting notes. ...
2. Make literature notes. ...
3. Make permanent notes. Now turn to your slip-box. ...
4. Now add your new permanent notes to your slip-box ...

If main notes were an important concept, they would have been mentioned here!?

We should ask Sönke Ahrens.

harr · August 13

@Edmund said:
If main notes were an important concept, they would have been mentioned here!?

Yeah, Ahrens is inconsistent with the word permanent note in the English edition. It has caused lots of avoidable confusion. Now it's up to you to decide, how you resolve the confusion in your charts.

What brings more clarity to your readers?

Different words for different meanings?
The same word for different meanings?

The inconsistencies in the book leave enough wiggle room to justify both. If you want, you can say that Ahrens used main note, because he did. But for the same reason you could also the other word. :-)

Some authors who have faced the same decision, opted for other words than the ambiguous permanent note, eg main note (Doto?), point note (Allosso), z-card (@tomp).

Personally, I went with zettel. Partly because I like the sound of it, partly because of the word zettelkasten, partly because Ahrens uses the word Zettel in the German edition.

Personally, I try to avoid the term permanent note for any meaning because of the ambiguity. I use the term fleeting notes as Ahrens proposes: for short-lived notes that get discarded, deleted or thrown away quickly. But I don't need a word for non-fleeting notes, because I prefer words with a narrower meaning like source note or zettel.

harr · August 14

@Edmund said:
We should ask Sönke Ahrens.

Good idea! https://www.soenkeahrens.de/

Sascha · August 14

@ZettelDistraction said:

@Sascha said:

@ZettelDistraction said:

@Sascha said:
@harr You didn't provide an argument but just reworded the negative definition with more words.

@harr did provide an argument. Literature notes are easier to characterize within Ahrens’ system, and the proposed negation is relative to notes in that system rather than to everything whatever.

No, he doesn't. That literature notes are easier to characterize (which I don't follow, but given this) is not an argument it is a statement with no argument using it. The proclamation that a statement is a reason is not sufficient to form an argument.

@harr did provide an argument. Here it is:

Copi permits a negative definition when an affirmative definition is unavailable.

Ahrens characterizes literature notes affirmatively.

No affirmative definition of main notes is available in Ahrens: Ahrens’s scattered positive remarks do not amount to one.

Ahrens divides permanent notes into literature notes and main notes.

Therefore, defining main notes as the permanent notes that are not literature notes satisfies Rule 5 and determines the remaining species.

I will quote the total "argument" @harr made in is orignal post:

My main argument for @ZettelDistraction's approach is that it is much easier to state essential attributes for literature notes than for main notes. As I understand Ahrens: literature notes are about exactly one item of literature; they contain the bibliographical data that identifies the item plus some personal conmments. With literature notes out of the way, every other permanent note is—by negative definition—a main note.

There is no reference to Copi. The above (not quoted) list of five rules is a completely off-topic move since any of the rules is used.
There is claim that the scattered positive remarks are not sufficient for an affirmative definition. (which is, btw., the task at hand if you want to really pin down Ahren's terms)

And most of all, @harr not in the least engaged with the core position: the negative definition is missing the core point (which is even in the quote he put in his post!): The very task here is to capture the intension of the concept, not to just create a term that points to the extension of the term via a hack.

The argument can be challenged, but it cannot be dismissed as no argument.

Yes. I can and I did.

Suppose, I tell you that your squat form is bad and will lead to injury (showing you how what you are doing put you in bad form). Is it acceptable that you say "But it is easier!"?

Or shorter: Incorrect action, won't become correct if it is easier than the correct action.

Neither @harr nor I made the claim that an incorrect definition becomes correct because it is easier. The claim about ease explains why one might characterize one of the two categories affirmatively and obtain the other by exclusion. It is not the basis for the classification.

I made and am still making the claim the definition is incorrect.

The genus is a necessary condition, but it is not sufficient. Identifying the genus is not enough to qualify a negative definition. Or, coming back to squats: Moving the weight up and down doesn't mean that you squat.

We have identified the genus, established that Ahrens divides it into exactly two species, and characterized one of those species. Copi explicitly allows that, once the genus has been stated affirmatively, a species may sometimes be characterized by excluding the other species. His qualification that this is rarely possible is satisfied unusually well here because the genus has exactly two species.

Sufficiency needs to be established. Necessity is not enough.

But Copi is not the only one here making remarks. I gave you the reasons why in the face of met necessary condition there is still not sufficient justification for the negative definition.

The definition is an ordinary relative complement. If $(P)$ is the set of permanent notes in Ahrens’s system and $(L\subseteq P)$ is the set of literature notes, then the set of main notes is $(P\setminus L)$. The affirmative genus is fixed, and Ahrens’s classification leaves exactly two species within it. Characterizing one species leaves the other.

I gave you specific reasons why a negative definition is not doing the trick here. I should've quoted the first rule: A definition should state the essential attributes of the species.

When we ask about what a main note is, we ask for the intension of the term and not its extension. With the negative definition, you covered the extension, but not the intension [emdash] the actual epistemic interest.

The set equation records the extension, but the definition itself is intensional: “permanent note” names the genus, and “not a literature note” supplies the specific difference. Equivalently, M(x)↔P(x)∧¬L(x) states the conditions under which an object belongs to the category. The presence of negation does not turn a definition by genus and difference into a mere enumeration of its extension.

Don't need to overcomplicate that. The negative definition "a main note is a permanent note that isn't a literature note" doesn't name one property that is essential to a main note other than it is permanently stored. Given the general principle of the Zettelkasten to store notes permanently, it is epistemically trivial.

Or does the negative definition instruct you how to practically apply the concept of the main note (e.g. writing the note)?

Whether the definition instructs someone how to write a main note is a different question. A definition need not be a procedure for producing its instances.

Here, it does. We are not the realm of pure math in which the sole goal of true, justified opinions is justified as a goal. This would be highly unfair towards Sönke Ahrens, since his book is not written with a great focus on conceptual consistency.

Ahrens does say that main notes are self-contained and written as if for print, but these scattered remarks do not amount to a positive list of necessary and sufficient attributes or a standard format.

Why not?

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%

@harr said:
Thanks, @ZettelDistraction! I was drafting a similar post. :-)

Unlikely. @ZettelDistraction is making the points that you could have made, but didn't. In school, there was a particular type of student who just raised his hand to say "I wanted to say what he said."

Don't claim @ZettelDistraction epistemic work. It is sore spot for him.

Maybe @Sascha needs to spelled out, that I was comparing two alternatives? When I wrote (emphasis added) …

Maybe you stop talking about me when you have the chance to address me directly. Consider this a warning.

A comparison doesn't imply any argument.

My main argument for @ZettelDistraction's approach is that it is much easier to state essential attributes for literature notes than for main notes."

… I was comparing two options:

state essential attributes for literature notes (L)

state essential attributes for main notes (M)

@Sascha seems to be believe, that I had to state all premises explicitly, because I used the word "argument". However according to Copi, this is not a requirement. Copi teaches readers to pay attention to premises in context and non-formal wording. (Thanks for summarizing them for the less attentive readers!)

Cut out the passive-aggressive insults. Especially, considering the content of your writing. I repeat the warning above. If you repeat this behavior, I will start to delete the complete post in which such behavior is present.

However, I left an important premise unstated. You noticed it and thankfully provided it in a later post:

A reference to Copi is not sufficient justification for pretending to have left out what was never present. A reference to Copi is not sufficient justification at all if you omit the actual reasoning.

What one finds scattered through How to Take Smart Notes is closer to a collection of suggestions than to a definition. I hesitate turning those remarks into a positive list of necessary and sufficient attributes because doing so risks attributing to Ahrens a systematic account that he does not give.

Not sure, if @Sascha actually cares about arguments and definitions within our narrow scope. He tries to expand the scope to "actual epistemic interest" and "how to practically apply the concept of the main note".

I am not expanding anything.

I'm also not sure, if he understands the term intension in Copi's sense. Copi (p. 82) writes:

The set of attributes shared by all and only those objects to which a general term refers is called the intension (or connotation) of that term.

Why do I find it easier to come up with an intension for L than M? Because Ahrens doesn't provide "attributes shared by all and only those objects" to which main note refers. He talks rather vaguely about "own thoughts". For literature notes however, Ahrens repeatedly mentions two attributes. In the German edition he writes about a) "Quellenangaben" or "bibliographische Angaben" and b) "Literaturextrakte" or "Lektüreextrakte".

You are merely repeating yourself with, again, no counterargument.

If I accept the mere juxtaposition of Copi's definition with your writing as a justification, it still falls short. Just because you didn't manage to sufficiently define the concept by its intension, an easier way of defining the same concept doesn't make it a proper definition.

I already gave you the reasons for that.

harr · August 14

@Edmund said:
2.1 Writing a paper step by step
1. Make fleeting notes. ...
2. Make literature notes. ...
3. Make permanent notes. Now turn to your slip-box. ...
4. Now add your new permanent notes to your slip-box ...

If main notes were an important concept, they would have been mentioned here!?

The concept¹ is mentioned, but under a different name. Ahrens is very clear with his concepts, but less so with the names. He consistently distinguishes three concepts:

Temporary notes that go into the trash
Notes about your sources that are stored forever in one box
Notes about your thinking that are stored forever in another box

However, Ahrens is inconsistent with the naming. In his books he refers to these concepts with multiple names (I'm using the original German edition and the second English edition as reference):

flüchtige Notizen, fleeting notes
Quellenangaben, Lektüreextrakte, Notizen zur Lektüre, literature notes,…
Zettel, main notes,…

The confusing part is that Ahrens sometimes uses the term "permanent note" to describe what 2 and 3 have in common and sometimes only for 3. He's much clearer with the terminology in German, where he uses "dauerhaft" (permanent) more systematically for all notes that are neither fleeting nor project-related. Here's another screenshot from the German edition:

You don't have to use the name "main note" for the concept aka "permanent note for the slip-box". Ahrens himself has used several names for that concept, so you have options to choose from. :-) I find clarity about the concepts more important than any particular name.

However, some names make it easier to talk about a concept than other names. I find it confusing, when Ahrens uses the same name "permanent notes" for category and subcategory. Personally, I'd use "permanent notes" only for the category of all notes that are stored permanently. I'd use "main notes"² or "zettels" for the subcategory of notes that are permanently stored but not literature notes.

"A concept is a fundamental unit of cognition that classifies entities and encodes shared features. Concepts make it possible to form and combine ideas, draw inferences, and refer to external objects. They act as the meanings of words and play a central role in many cognitive processes, including perception, memory, and reasoning." https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Concept&oldid=1368133597 ↩︎
https://forum.zettelkasten.de/discussion/comment/26044/#Comment_26044 ↩︎

Edmund · August 14

@harr said:
Yeah, Ahrens is inconsistent with the word permanent note in the English edition. It has caused lots of avoidable confusion. Now it's up to you to decide, how you resolve the confusion in your charts.

That’s exactly the nudge I needed to start thinking about it. I have to make a decision!

My two decisions:

I will use the term 'Permanent Notes' (in capital letters) to refer to a specific category of notes within my Zettelkasten. Title Case for the Technical Noun.
I will use the term 'permanent notes' to describe one of the most important attributes of notes within my Zettelkasten. Lowercase for the Attribute.

It was a very productive discussion. I can now capture the results as:

an argument map,
a 'Decision Note' (in capital letters),
a 'Decision Template' to add to my set of templates, and
a collection of concept maps from analytical reading.

@harr said:
I'd use "main notes"2 or "zettels" for the subcategory of notes that are permanently stored but not literature notes.

"Zettel" is a good choice. Here is a missing piece, a view on Luhmanns' Zettelkasten, showing the "Zettel":

ZettelDistraction · August 14

@Sascha said:
...
Why not?

I don't have time to address every objection, so I will concentrate on what I take to be the main question:

Why not?

Because a collection of positive remarks is not automatically a positive specification.

Ahrens tells us a lot about main notes. They are permanent; they belong in the slip-box; they are to be self-contained and written as if for print. He also discusses linking, from which we can infer that main notes must at least be individually addressable somehow.

But that still does not tell us what attributes are shared by all and only main notes.

Take linking. If a note can be linked to, some mechanism must identify the target. But Ahrens does not, so far as I can find, specify what that mechanism is. A search for "identifier" turns up remarks about DOIs, not a specification of note identifiers, and I have found no corresponding account under related terminology. Linking supports an inference to addressability; it does not supply an identifier specification.

Likewise, “self-contained,” “in your own words,” and “written as if for print” are useful positive descriptions. But which of them are necessary? Which are sufficient? What exactly counts as self-contained? Is location in the slip-box constitutive of a main note or simply part of Ahrens's workflow? Ahrens does not answer these questions by giving a note format or an all-and-only list of properties.

For comparison, my Zettel repository contains what I would call a positive specification. It states the relationship among filename, ID, YAML metadata, title and H1; specifies required sections and their order; specifies the indexing scheme; provides a template that constructs conforming notes; and includes a validator that decides whether those formal requirements have been met. I reconstructed that specification myself. I do not find an analogous specification in Ahrens.

So the claim is not that Ahrens says nothing positive about main notes. He does. The claim is narrower:

Ahrens supplies enough information to infer some structural requirements of main notes—persistence, slip-box membership, self-containedness, and addressability—but does not specify implementations or give necessary and sufficient positive conditions for a note to be a main note.

That is exactly the situation in which I hesitate to manufacture a positive definition by collecting scattered recommendations and presenting the result as Ahrens's specification.

By contrast, if Ahrens's taxonomy divides permanent notes into literature notes and main notes, and literature notes can be characterized, then “a main note is a permanent note that is not a literature note” determines the remaining species without attributing to Ahrens a systematic positive account that he did not give.

That definition may be less informative than we would like. That does not make it incorrect.

ZettelDistraction · August 14

@Sascha said:

@harr said:
Thanks, @ZettelDistraction! I was drafting a similar post. :-)

Unlikely. @ZettelDistraction is making the points that you could have made, but didn't. In school, there was a particular type of student who just raised his hand to say "I wanted to say what he said."

Don't claim @ZettelDistraction epistemic work. It is sore spot for him.

Sascha, @harr is not claiming credit. I elaborated an enthymemic argument. @harr thanked me for sparing him the effort. Copi allows enthymemic arguments but I thought I would spell this out.

ZettelDistraction · August 14

A point of clarification: Ahrens gives several positive descriptions of main notes, but does not establish that they are jointly necessary and sufficient. Collecting them into an affirmative definition would therefore be an interpretive reconstruction, not Ahrens’s stated definition.

A positive definition does not need to specify an implementation or a validator. My specification goes somewhat beyond what an affirmative definition requires.

Also, is the standard that an argument must include every material premise, inferential connection, and supporting reference to count as an argument? If so, that rules out enthymemes and contextual reconstruction of arguments.

ZettelDistraction · August 14

Typo: enthymematic is the correct spelling.

harr · August 15

@Sascha said:
1. There is no reference to Copi. The above (not quoted) list of five rules is a completely off-topic move since any of the rules is used.

I didn't need to reference Copi, because the rules had already been introduced in the thread. You have introduced Copi, when you wrote: "Caution: A definition shouldn't be of negative nature if it could be of positive nature. (Copi 1998, 60)"

I like to check sources. As a service for the other readers, I shared the findings: Copi's original wording (instead of a paraphrase or reverse translation) and relevant context (the other four rules).

You used Copi's rule to caution @Edmund. You made Copi's rule part of the topic.

@Sascha said:
2. There is claim that the scattered positive remarks are not sufficient for an affirmative definition. (which is, btw., the task at hand if you want to really pin down Ahren's terms)

Only you think that an affirmative definition is the "the task at hand". I don't.

@Sascha said:
And most of all, @harr not in the least engaged with the core position: the negative definition is missing the core point (which is even in the quote he put in his post!): The very task here is to capture the intension of the concept, not to just create a term that points to the extension of the term via a hack.

First, I notice that you're talking about me. I'm fine with it, because you @-mentioned me.

Second, I don't claim that the "very task here is to capture the intension" of main notes. Only you do.

Third, what you call a "hack" is a perfectly valid option, according to Copi's rule that you have introduced yourself. In your own wording (emphasis added): "A definition shouldn't be of negative nature if it could be of positive nature". The word "if" makes all the difference. If we had a positive definition, it would be preferable to a negative definition. But do we have such a positive definition? No. Can we come up with such a positive definition? I don't think so. If you think otherwise, please provide the positive definition and support it with verifiable references from Ahrens' books.

@Sascha said:
I made and am still making the claim the definition is incorrect.

OK.

@Sascha said:
I gave you the reasons why in the face of met necessary condition there is still not sufficient justification for the negative definition.

How are squats comparable to our topic?

@Sascha said:

The set equation records the extension, but the definition itself is intensional: “permanent note” names the genus, and “not a literature note” supplies the specific difference. Equivalently, M(x)↔P(x)∧¬L(x) states the conditions under which an object belongs to the category. The presence of negation does not turn a definition by genus and difference into a mere enumeration of its extension.

Don't need to overcomplicate that. The negative definition "a main note is a permanent note that isn't a literature note" doesn't name one property that is essential to a main note other than it is permanently stored. Given the general principle of the Zettelkasten to store notes permanently, it is epistemically trivial.

You might not like it, but that's how Ahrens defines permanent notes. (If you need verifiable references, just scroll back in this thread.)

@Sascha said:
We are not the realm of pure math in which the sole goal of true, justified opinions is justified as a goal.

We are in the realm of logic. We are talking about arguments and definitions. We want to better understand, how Ahrens defines the various parts of his system.

This would be highly unfair towards Sönke Ahrens, since his book is not written with a great focus on conceptual consistency.

I think you're unfair to Ahrens. He is consistent with his concepts, even if he takes liberties with the names.

@Sascha said:

However, I left an important premise unstated. You noticed it and thankfully provided it in a later post:

A reference to Copi is not sufficient justification for pretending to have left out what was never present. A reference to Copi is not sufficient justification at all if you omit the actual reasoning.

That wasn't a reference to Copi. I was acknowledging @ZettelDistraction's contribution.

I'm curious why you think that I was "pretending", when I was in fact acknowledging a gap in my argument.

And I'm curious why you ignore my attempts to clarify the argument. I wrote:

I'm also not sure, if he understands the term intension in Copi's sense. Copi (p. 82) writes:

The set of attributes shared by all and only those objects to which a general term refers is called the intension (or connotation) of that term.

Why do I find it easier to come up with an intension for L than M? Because Ahrens doesn't provide "attributes shared by all and only those objects" to which main note refers. He talks rather vaguely about "own thoughts". For literature notes however, Ahrens repeatedly mentions two attributes. In the German edition he writes about a) "Quellenangaben" or "bibliographische Angaben" and b) "Literaturextrakte" or "Lektüreextrakte".

You replied:

You are merely repeating yourself with, again, no counterargument.

I'm trying to establish a common language. Are you and I talking about the same thing, when we use the term intension? Do you mean the term as Copi defines it or do you have another definition in mind?

If you do have Copi's definition in mind, I'm curious what "set of attributes shared by all and only those objects" to which the term main notes refers you have in mind, when you talk about intension.

@Sascha said:
If I accept the mere juxtaposition of Copi's definition with your writing as a justification, it still falls short. Just because you didn't manage to sufficiently define the concept by its intension, an easier way of defining the same concept doesn't make it a proper definition.

I already gave you the reasons for that.

You have accurately observed, that I "didn't manage" to produce a positive definition of Ahrens' main notes. I doubt that it can be done, given the available information in the book.

But why should I bother, when we have a simpler alternative that is equally accurate? Codi comments his rule (emphasis added):

(…) sometimes, the species can be characterized accurately by rejecting all other species of that genus. Only rarely are the species few enough to make this possible.

In this case the species are few enough. We have only two. :-)

We're not talking about fitness exercises. It wouldn't be very practical to define "squats" as not swimming, not cycling, not push-ups, not whatever, because the options are too many.

- - -

By the way, I found older posts, where you didn't care much about a difference between literature and main note:¹

"Please note that Sascha and I (Christian, who’s awkwardly introducing the post), do not distinguish between “literature note” and “permanent note” in the context of a Zettelkasten, and we don’t want to actively endorse the practice. Our approach is much more simple: There are only notes that are part of the Zettelkasten, and then there are all the other notes.

And:²

I am insisting on a more radical wording: There are no literature notes. Just notes that are part of the Zettelkasten and those which are not.

Do you still think that way?

https://zettelkasten.de/posts/literature-notes-vs-permanent-notes/ (emphasis added) ↩︎
https://forum.zettelkasten.de/discussion/comment/8381/#Comment_8381 (emphasis added) ↩︎

Sascha · August 17

@harr said:

@Sascha said:
1. There is no reference to Copi. The above (not quoted) list of five rules is a completely off-topic move since any of the rules is used.

I didn't need to reference Copi, because the rules had already been introduced in the thread. You have introduced Copi, when you wrote: "Caution: A definition shouldn't be of negative nature if it could be of positive nature. (Copi 1998, 60)"

You need to refer to Copi if you want him to part of your "argument".

I like to check sources. As a service for the other readers, I shared the findings: Copi's original wording (instead of a paraphrase or reverse translation) and relevant context (the other four rules).

You used Copi's rule to caution @Edmund. You made Copi's rule part of the topic.

@Sascha said:
2. There is claim that the scattered positive remarks are not sufficient for an affirmative definition. (which is, btw., the task at hand if you want to really pin down Ahren's terms)

Only you think that an affirmative definition is the "the task at hand". I don't.

I don't merely think it, I gave you the justification why this is the task at hand.

@Sascha said:
And most of all, @harr not in the least engaged with the core position: the negative definition is missing the core point (which is even in the quote he put in his post!): The very task here is to capture the intension of the concept, not to just create a term that points to the extension of the term via a hack.

First, I notice that you're talking about me. I'm fine with it, because you @-mentioned me.

Irrelevant.

Second, I don't claim that the "very task here is to capture the intension" of main notes. Only you do.

Sadly, you still don't. But you should.

Third, what you call a "hack" is a perfectly valid option, according to Copi's rule that you have introduced yourself. In your own wording (emphasis added): "A definition shouldn't be of negative nature if it could be of positive nature". The word "if" makes all the difference. If we had a positive definition, it would be preferable to a negative definition. But do we have such a positive definition? No. Can we come up with such a positive definition? I don't think so. If you think otherwise, please provide the positive definition and support it with verifiable references from Ahrens' books.

There is much more in this thread than just the rule by Copi. And even if there wasn't anything else relevant here, Copi is talking about the possibility of a negative definition in certain cases. He is only talking about the validity of negative definitions in cases in which the negation belongs to the essence of the term.

@Sascha said:
I gave you the reasons why in the face of met necessary condition there is still not sufficient justification for the negative definition.

How are squats comparable to our topic?

@Sascha said:

The set equation records the extension, but the definition itself is intensional: “permanent note” names the genus, and “not a literature note” supplies the specific difference. Equivalently, M(x)↔P(x)∧¬L(x) states the conditions under which an object belongs to the category. The presence of negation does not turn a definition by genus and difference into a mere enumeration of its extension.

Don't need to overcomplicate that. The negative definition "a main note is a permanent note that isn't a literature note" doesn't name one property that is essential to a main note other than it is permanently stored. Given the general principle of the Zettelkasten to store notes permanently, it is epistemically trivial.

You might not like it, but that's how Ahrens defines permanent notes. (If you need verifiable references, just scroll back in this thread.)

What you linked is not a definition but the assignment of one property that is shared with the concept of literature notes.

@Sascha said:
We are not the realm of pure math in which the sole goal of true, justified opinions is justified as a goal.

We are in the realm of logic. We are talking about arguments and definitions. We want to better understand, how Ahrens defines the various parts of his system.

We are not in the realm of logic. Logic is a tool for the context in which we are. The context here is @tomp's attempt to define the Zettelkasten.

This would be highly unfair towards Sönke Ahrens, since his book is not written with a great focus on conceptual consistency.

I think you're unfair to Ahrens. He is consistent with his concepts, even if he takes liberties with the names.

He may or may not be consistent with his concepts. But the style in which he presents the concepts is not in the least done with a focus on conceptual consistency which is perfectly fine. Not any text needs to be written like the early Wittgenstein or Weber's Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft.

@Sascha said:

However, I left an important premise unstated. You noticed it and thankfully provided it in a later post:

A reference to Copi is not sufficient justification for pretending to have left out what was never present. A reference to Copi is not sufficient justification at all if you omit the actual reasoning.

That wasn't a reference to Copi. I was acknowledging @ZettelDistraction's contribution.

I'm curious why you think that I was "pretending", when I was in fact acknowledging a gap in my argument.

By insinuating that an "attentive" reader would see an "enthymematic" argument that @ZettelDistraction made and doubling down by referring to Copi not requiring to state all premises. (which is again not a proper justification. At best, it is an argument from authority)

This is now acknowledging a gap in your argument. It is putting the blame on the inattentive reader who failed at respecting his part of the deal.

I don't believe that you would've written a similar post like @ZettelDistraction, since you still didn't manage to produce a proper argument, unlike @ZettelDistraction who is making the argument for you, because, I guess, it is his approach that his questioned here.

Ironically, the enthymematic syllogism is often (not by Copi in the book linked in this thread which is not about rhetorics) juxtaposed with eristic syllogisms.

And I'm curious why you ignore my attempts to clarify the argument. I wrote:

I am not ignoring your attempts. I am not accepting your attempts to retroactively create an argument that was never there.

I'm also not sure, if he understands the term intension in Copi's sense. Copi (p. 82) writes:

The set of attributes shared by all and only those objects to which a general term refers is called the intension (or connotation) of that term.

Why do I find it easier to come up with an intension for L than M? Because Ahrens doesn't provide "attributes shared by all and only those objects" to which main note refers. He talks rather vaguely about "own thoughts". For literature notes however, Ahrens repeatedly mentions two attributes. In the German edition he writes about a) "Quellenangaben" or "bibliographische Angaben" and b) "Literaturextrakte" or "Lektüreextrakte".

You replied:

You are merely repeating yourself with, again, no counterargument.

I'm trying to establish a common language. Are you and I talking about the same thing, when we use the term intension? Do you mean the term as Copi defines it or do you have another definition in mind?

Copi's definition is good enough for this context.

If you do have Copi's definition in mind, I'm curious what "set of attributes shared by all and only those objects" to which the term main notes refers you have in mind, when you talk about intension.

I don't do the epistemic busy work of massaging Ahren's work.
The proof of burden is on you if you state that that it is not possible.

@Sascha said:
If I accept the mere juxtaposition of Copi's definition with your writing as a justification, it still falls short. Just because you didn't manage to sufficiently define the concept by its intension, an easier way of defining the same concept doesn't make it a proper definition.

I already gave you the reasons for that.

You have accurately observed, that I "didn't manage" to produce a positive definition of Ahrens' main notes. I doubt that it can be done, given the available information in the book.

But why should I bother, when we have a simpler alternative that is equally accurate? Codi comments his rule (emphasis added):

(…) sometimes, the species can be characterized accurately by rejecting all other species of that genus. Only rarely are the species few enough to make this possible.

In this case the species are few enough. We have only two. :-)

We're not talking about fitness exercises. It wouldn't be very practical to define "squats" as not swimming, not cycling, not push-ups, not whatever, because the options are too many.

Again: Possibility ("can") is not a sufficient condition.

- - -

By the way, I found older posts, where you didn't care much about a difference between literature and main note:[^2]

[^2]: https://zettelkasten.de/posts/literature-notes-vs-permanent-notes/ (emphasis added)

"Please note that Sascha and I (Christian, who’s awkwardly introducing the post), do not distinguish between “literature note” and “permanent note” in the context of a Zettelkasten, and we don’t want to actively endorse the practice. Our approach is much more simple: There are only notes that are part of the Zettelkasten, and then there are all the other notes.

And:[^1]

[^1]: https://forum.zettelkasten.de/discussion/comment/8381/#Comment_8381 (emphasis added)

I am insisting on a more radical wording: There are no literature notes. Just notes that are part of the Zettelkasten and those which are not.

Do you still think that way?

Argue to the point please.

Sascha · August 17

@ZettelDistraction said:

@Sascha said:
...
Why not?

I don't have time to address every objection, so I will concentrate on what I take to be the main question:

Why not?

Because a collection of positive remarks is not automatically a positive specification.

Ahrens tells us a lot about main notes. They are permanent; they belong in the slip-box; they are to be self-contained and written as if for print. He also discusses linking, from which we can infer that main notes must at least be individually addressable somehow.

But that still does not tell us what attributes are shared by all and only main notes.

Take linking. If a note can be linked to, some mechanism must identify the target. But Ahrens does not, so far as I can find, specify what that mechanism is. A search for "identifier" turns up remarks about DOIs, not a specification of note identifiers, and I have found no corresponding account under related terminology. Linking supports an inference to addressability; it does not supply an identifier specification.

Likewise, “self-contained,” “in your own words,” and “written as if for print” are useful positive descriptions. But which of them are necessary? Which are sufficient? What exactly counts as self-contained? Is location in the slip-box constitutive of a main note or simply part of Ahrens's workflow? Ahrens does not answer these questions by giving a note format or an all-and-only list of properties.

For comparison, my Zettel repository contains what I would call a positive specification. It states the relationship among filename, ID, YAML metadata, title and H1; specifies required sections and their order; specifies the indexing scheme; provides a template that constructs conforming notes; and includes a validator that decides whether those formal requirements have been met. I reconstructed that specification myself. I do not find an analogous specification in Ahrens.

So the claim is not that Ahrens says nothing positive about main notes. He does. The claim is narrower:

Ahrens supplies enough information to infer some structural requirements of main notes—persistence, slip-box membership, self-containedness, and addressability—but does not specify implementations or give necessary and sufficient positive conditions for a note to be a main note.

That is exactly the situation in which I hesitate to manufacture a positive definition by collecting scattered recommendations and presenting the result as Ahrens's specification.

I guess here is the fork. I'd engage quite differently with Ahren's work.

It is perfectly reasonable that the negative definition of "main note" is formally consistent and points precisely to the extension of the concept. But the negative definition here is the equivalent of giving the answer "42" to the question "What is the meaning of life?".¹ Within the realm of pure and formal engagement both are formally consistent.

But that doesn't mean that such answers are proper replies to the question.

This is the whole point of my criticism of the negative definition here (paraphrasing Copi, sadly I don't have the exact quotes by Gottlob Frege available): If the essence of the concept is negative, then the definition should be negative.

But the negative definition here provides what I call a puzzle information: "Puzzle information" is information that can arise from a form that runs transverse to the actual form-content subject matter.

You can use the form of puzzle pieces to solve the puzzle, but ultimately it is hack. Here it is harmless. But if you have a child who is just doing trial and error with fitting puzzle pieces, it won't gain the benefit meant for it.

Another example: If you watch a movie and infer the danger level for the hero based on the runtime of the movie, you are not watching the movie, but also using a hack and destroy the purpose of the movie. (If you disagree, either keep your yap shut or watch movies alone)

Last example: Bateson concept of information "a difference that makes a difference" is another incorrect definition. Yet another hack (he elaborates on this concept and I don't think that this is meant as a full definition).

So, in other words, I don't criticize the intelligence of the definition, but its wisdom.

By contrast, if Ahrens's taxonomy divides permanent notes into literature notes and main notes, and literature notes can be characterized, then “a main note is a permanent note that is not a literature note” determines the remaining species without attributing to Ahrens a systematic positive account that he did not give.

That definition may be less informative than we would like. That does not make it incorrect.

Perhaps, I left the meaning of "correctness" here under-determined. A correct definition needs to adhere to all conditions of what a definition should supply. I don't know whether the scattered positive remarks about main notes in Ahren's book would amount to a good affirmative definition. But that would mean that there is no correct definition at all.

But I tried with giving the reason what the incorrectness of the negative definition is: It provides the extension of the term but not the intension. The question of what a main note is asks for its intension.

Answering with the extension is akin to saying "42".

@ZettelDistraction said:
A point of clarification: Ahrens gives several positive descriptions of main notes, but does not establish that they are jointly necessary and sufficient. Collecting them into an affirmative definition would therefore be an interpretive reconstruction, not Ahrens’s stated definition.

I think what you did apart from the negative definition does the heavy lifting. I'd go a step further: An incomplete positive definition for the concept of main note is better than a formally consistent negative definition. At least, you meet part of the need and not avoid it.

A positive definition does not need to specify an implementation or a validator. My specification goes somewhat beyond what an affirmative definition requires.

Depends on the context.

Also, is the standard that an argument must include every material premise, inferential connection, and supporting reference to count as an argument? If so, that rules out enthymemes and contextual reconstruction of arguments.

Enthymemes are only "allowed" when the premise is obvious and not controversial.

The problem is that they cannot be properly distinguished from eristic syllogisms. Incomplete syllogisms introduce ambiguity by blurring the line between benign enthymemes and intentionally deceptive eristic arguments. In disagreement, this vagueness creates a game-theoretic conflict, making it unclear whether a player is reasoning in good faith or arguing strategically to win. It is not specifically about deceiving others consciously. It is about giving participants avoiding work and dilligence, deveiving oneself (giving yourself the impression that your point is much better than it actually is) and eroding the debating culture. In interactions they heavily erode the trust which is part of why so many academic debates (witnessed by myself and based of quite some reports of academics) turn into word games and sophistry.

Both in everyday life and in academic interactions unstated premises typically create problems and I try to avoid leaving them unstated. Infact, looking for unstated premises is a quite powerful coaching technique because this habit is a strong indicator for a lack of self-reflection and hidden causes for problems. They point to personal weaknesses (which is good, because weakness are the best leverage for improvement).

I watched the movie and disliked it. So, I never read the books. Please, don't kick my butt for misunderstanding the whole context. ↩︎

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