The face of truth
For something to be true.. It must be knowable. It must exist. Having said that.. the truth doesn't change. It's the truth after all. And such a fundamental constant/ law/ principle as truth - which is unchanging.. Must therefore be inaccesible to systems that change/are under the influence of change. How could information bridge the gap between that which is unchanging and ruling and that which is changing/ruled?
This seems like a paradox in human pursuit of the truth of all things. Such is the mystery of life, the biggest questions - why are we here, where did we come from, what is meaning?
This strange contradictory notion that the truth is both knowable/ it exists... And yet unknowable to the system it underpins/governs could be cause for dismay and sadness/pessimism or for enchantment and allure. Some people demand to know what it is and are upset when they can't and others love a good mystery. It adds that intrigue/ magic back to the possibilities of what could be.
I feel like this truth has many facets whatever it may be. I feel like it discerns the line between blind faith/belief/trust (as is exemplified in spirituality and religions) verses skepticism/ analysis and reasoning (as is exemplified by science). Both good in their own ways and both useful when faced with reality and what it means to us.
And because the truth cannot change fundamentally or it wouldnt be true - it must have something to do with energy and time (the ability to do work/cause change as well as the speed of light and relativity, and quantum uncertainty - heisenbergs uncertainty principle in science) and perhaps (in spirituality/ religion - being, consciousness, ethics, free will and god).
Whatever the truth is - I think it comes down to choices. What way you wish to pursue it, how much of it you want to know and how you decide to observe it. Curiouser and curiouser.
This seems like a paradox in human pursuit of the truth of all things. Such is the mystery of life, the biggest questions - why are we here, where did we come from, what is meaning?
This strange contradictory notion that the truth is both knowable/ it exists... And yet unknowable to the system it underpins/governs could be cause for dismay and sadness/pessimism or for enchantment and allure. Some people demand to know what it is and are upset when they can't and others love a good mystery. It adds that intrigue/ magic back to the possibilities of what could be.
I feel like this truth has many facets whatever it may be. I feel like it discerns the line between blind faith/belief/trust (as is exemplified in spirituality and religions) verses skepticism/ analysis and reasoning (as is exemplified by science). Both good in their own ways and both useful when faced with reality and what it means to us.
And because the truth cannot change fundamentally or it wouldnt be true - it must have something to do with energy and time (the ability to do work/cause change as well as the speed of light and relativity, and quantum uncertainty - heisenbergs uncertainty principle in science) and perhaps (in spirituality/ religion - being, consciousness, ethics, free will and god).
Whatever the truth is - I think it comes down to choices. What way you wish to pursue it, how much of it you want to know and how you decide to observe it. Curiouser and curiouser.
Comments (80)
The position of a projectile in motion can be derived from unchanging equations - or just one when combined - that govern its trajectory. We have a system in which the position of the projectile, measured against time, changes, but is still governed by those equations. The changing position represents a (more contingent) "truth", and the immutable series of equations governing the trajectory represent a "truth".
Quoting Benj96
Why can't truth change? You make that claim multiple times but don't really back it up.
As I noted elsewhere, truth applies to propositions, not to things in general. I think that's an important distinction. How can an apple be true?
Quoting Benj96
Hmmm... I'm not sure about this. I think you'll probably hear from people who disagree.
Quoting Benj96
Well... sure it does, depending on how you look at it. The statement "Today is Tuesday," is true here in the eastern US as I write this, but it won't be true tomorrow. You talk about
Quoting Benj96
What kind of thing is not subject to the influence of change? Can you give some examples. Fundamental rules of reality, e.g. the law of conservation of matter, have to change when we find out new things, e.g. nuclear fusion. Nitpicky things like my example about what day it is change.
Quoting Benj96
I don't understand this.
Why?
There seem to be things that are true or false yet unknown - that you have an odd number of hairs on your forearm, for example.
Is it not possible that something could be true but one could not verify it is the case?
If that is not possible, what is ignorance?
I was thinking of it more as ignorance wanting what it lacks. If what is knowable can be established outside of that desire, then it does not have a job or a place to stay.
If you say something is true then you must know it. Even if you state that something is either true or false you do so with the authority of truth not guesswork.
Truth is limited to a set system of rules and variables. IF THEN is the most common everyday usage. The idea of some all pervading truth may or may not be the case science basically progresses with the assumption that its truths are the current best truths not the be all and end all of knowledge.
That's contentious. As mentioned, it implies that you are omniscient: there are no truths that you do not know.
But further, it commits you to rejecting classical logic. You will need to introduce a third truth value that is neither true nor false.
Are you sure that is agreeable?
I was simply distinguishing between something being true and something being either true or false. The first is known the second is yet to be fully investigated.
It is true that I am human.
The latter may be true or false to you as you may consider that I am AI or some kind.
What?
If, If something is true then you must know it, then anything that is true is known: there are no unknown trues; we know everything.
Basic logic.
The claim was:
Quoting Benj96
The claim was knowABLE not known.
He could know the number of hairs on his forearm. He just happens not to.
So, the proper rejection of Ben's assertion isn't as you've said, but it would be that "You have 100 hairs on your forearm" still has a truth value even if you cannot know it.
But is Ben wrong because that's a different sort of claim, and I'm not sure what Ben means by unknowable. For example, the number of stars in the universe? That is in principle knowable, but not something that will likely be known.
Is "there are more stars in the universe than grains of sand in the solar system" true? Well, we can't know that in actuality, but in principle we could. I would think that does have a truth value even though we will never know it
But what is in principle unknowable? Maybe "Germany wins the World Cup in 2030." Right now, that is unknowable. We have no way to know that. So right now, does it have a truth value?
If A is B then B is A. This has no Truth applied outside the abstract (eg. If a banana is an apple then an apple is a banana). You may say this is logically True, yet in reality we can state an apple is a banana and believe it only in the sense that both are fruit and that is stretching it! For some conscious creature of limited mental capacity I see no reason why they would not equate an apple with a banana given their common attributes.
The point here is the misapplication of Truth into the world we live and inaccurate language we use to communicate.
1+1= 2 in basic arithmetic, yet in other realms of mathematics others may argue otherwise. In reality to say 1 apple and another apple make two apples is also superficially true because the 1 holds universal truth as an abstract and indistinguishable item whereas an apple is different to other apples always in time, space and physical constitution.
In reality we make certain leaps to overcome seemingly minute distinctions and this is highly beneficial in allowing us to navigate the world. The Truth in reality is a guide not a rule. In abstraction it is the rule.
:lol:
Pure ignorance does not want the truth. It doesn't feel it lacks the truth because it is so ignorant it thinks it already has the truth. Pure ignorance is extremely dangerous because it thinks its being just (telling the truth/judging others with the truth) all the while having no wisdom/knowledge (the truth) to do so. It is arrogant, it lacks empathy and nothing can ever be its fault.
Ignorance lives in its own world of delusion, having a false sense of power and authority.
However if ignorance decides to become curiosity... Or is shown there is better on offer elsewhere, it can begin the long rambling road to honing down on truth. Picking up and accepting into themselves pieces of truth along the way by using their newly found curiosity and consequently ever improving logic and morality. Applying those truths to reveal the full complete puzzle and eventually becoming the truth.
It's a spectrum. A duality. It always has been and it always will be.
My thought was a response to the claim that truth is knowable. Taken as the unchanging that is assumed to be the condition for all that exists, how can we, as "systems that change/are under the influence of change", know that truth is knowable? In our ignorance, we can seek the truth but cannot claim that we know enough about it to say what is possible in relation to it. If it were possible to do that, we would already be a lot less ignorant.
Because we have logic - that which connects the delusional (changeable/erratic and ineffectual systems) to the Truth. It's the bridge we have tread many times back and forth through science and religion/spirtuality alike.
Change is the equivalent to irrationality, to an aimless chaotic rambling. This is why we call numbers that never repeat themselves "irrational numbers". And because we are systems that change we must be trained to take in and see the truth around us. We must convert our inefficient network of neurons in our brain into something more efficient and more logical (able to approach truth) . This is the foundation of education.
So to answer your question... We know the truth is knowable as changing systems because we may educate ourselves by being curious, listening and asking questions to our teachers. Just as children do I suppose. Are children not ignorant until taught and are they not innocent until educated?
Well you can. When you reach the truth you are in a process of subtraction (of inaccuracies you previously believed) Descartes got very close with "I think therefore I am" however it can be further reduced to "I am".
You know that you exist. And that is all you need to know what existence is. What the truth is. You are aware so you can observe and you think so you can reason about what you observe. And you have memory so you can gather and make your conclusions. You can choose to be taught by 1).self reflection 2). Observation of the "external" world 3). By other people or 4). A mixture of all of these things. A combination is probably best.
(And also Wikipedia lol)
Descartes based his confidence that he truly knows things from the existence of God, who allows for the possibility:
This confidence does not, however, support the idea that all of what is true can be known.
Yes this is true for a human. All knowledge and happenings throughout the entirety of the existence of the universe at all points in time and space cannot be known by a single person of x amount of years lifespan.
But knowledge of the omnipresence, omnipotence and omniscience of god can be known as the sum of all things (people and the universe) combined. This can be appreciated by an individual person. And in this way God and said person(s) are in commune with one another. As opposites of a spectrum of magnitude and ability. Humans are limited by their short existence but not by their ability to apply logic and derive truth pertaining to god.
The truth is consistent at all levels of magnitude and pervades the universe from the smallest (quantum) to the largest (newtonian and relativistic).
I disagree. If A (electricity) is B (energy) then B (energy) is A (electricity). But this is not strictly true. Because heat, light potential and chemicals are also forms of energy. Therefore A (electricity) is at most a "subset" of but not the equivalent to/ not "all" of B (energy). It is energy but only one type.
If truth only exists in the abstract then truth is only equal to belief/ imagination/ concepts held by the mind. But we know truth is not only abstract things/constructions as the mind is not the only thing that is true. It is not the only thing that exists. Material concrete objects also obviously exist. We can observe them and objectively measure them using scientific method.
Well that is a matter of time. The passage of time elucidates the truth of things as they happen. For us objects bound by linear time - we cannot know of future truths because we are limited by the rate of happenstance.
But for the universe as a whole - all points in time, all states of being and all possibilities are included in the set of the universes existence. In that case Germany winning the world Cup in 2030 is only a possibility from the reference point of the universe. It is not for humans to know the future of all things because we are change - subjects of time. It is only ultimate all inclusive truth to know of the destiny of such things as the truth exists in all moments - past and present and future while we can only exist in the present.
We can know how the truth works structurally but not temporally.
We can only know truth from the present - this moment in time. The truths of the distant past and the truths of the distant future get progressively less sure/ verifiable the further one tries to predict in either direction. Therefore we can only know the constant rules/principles of truth that always apply regardless of time (universal laws) but not the individual consequences of such a truth. It governs and we can understand why it governs but we cannot know all that it governs as we are not the entire universe but humans.
But that's just not so. I went to a Harry Manx concert last night. Past truth.
Bring me number one and show it to me and you can then convince me there is no difference. Better still paint me a picture of AND, OR or IF that everyone will recognise as such without painting the words.
It is important to understand that logical rules to not necessarily map onto reality and that logical propositions need not make sense in reality (ie. If Apples are Oranges when ).
Yes you know its truth from the present moment. From the reference of now. You remember you went to the concert. The memory you formed is currently stored in your neurons. If that structure wasn't there now you woukdnt be able to recall what you did even if others could remember on your behalf having seen you at the concert. Therefore if say something happened to you and nobody else saw it. The only place any evidence, any truth of that claim would exist - is in the structure of your brains.
To others your truth would be a mere belief to them - something they cannot trust/prove absolutely. While if many people observed it it would be fact.
Remembering the truths you know is a present moment activity.
[quote=Ms. Marple]Most interesting.[/quote]
[quote=Master Yoda]Truly wonderful the mind of a child is.[/quote]
You're right on the money mon ami! If truth entails knowledge, someone is omniscient. I'm, however, not omniscient. You probably aren't either.
Who is then?
[quote=Dr. Lanning (I Robot)]That, my friend, is the right question.[/quote]
But I knew it was true when I wrote that post a few hours ago, so it's not only now that I know it to be true.
And yes, if I don't remember that it was true, I wouldn't know it was true, but it would nevertheless remain true.
Being true and being known are two different things.
Something can be true, yet unknown, unbelieved, unevidenced...
[quote=Ms. Marple]Most interesting.[/quote]
If m, n, o, then p. Is that how "it" works?
Quoting Banno
Okay let me explain it another way :)
Imagine for a moment that you are god as the entire universe. As a single entity - all of time, all of matter, all energy and all space is within you as a singularity - the ultimate one thing - pure potential to be. The logos. The entirety of information - the entirety of truth of thinks, knowledge, self awareness.
You are not "nothing" before the big bang as people commonly argue, you are "potential" because you haven't created "something" yet and thus you haven't created nothing by proxy. You are the 0 that has potential to be - 1 and +1, you are the neutral that has the potential to be positive or negatively charged, etc.
In this state... Your sentence something can be true, yet unknown, unbelieved, unevidenced is not valid as you argued. For the reasons I outlined above.
Now imagine you are human but with knowledge of your relationship to god. You understand both how you are like him/her/it and how you are not like him/her/it. You are an object. Only one small part of the whole. You cannot be in all places as an object. You cannot observe everything from all places or all points in time. You have a present past and future because you are not travelling at the speed of light.
In this case... As you are now.. Then you're statement "some thing can be true, yet unknown, unbelieved, unevidenced" can be valid. It's a contradiction/paradox created by self reference, by how you choose to limit your self awareness and your knowledge of the whole truth.
We know the full truth exists because its logical and ethical to do so.
The whole Truth is the paradigm between opposites. Its order/ chaos = creation/destruction = rational/ irrational = knowledge/ignorance = self awareness/ lack thereof = power/impotency = love/hate = authority/ subordinance = moral imperative/immorality. That dynamic is an elegant/ beautiful thing. All the same and yet different, contradictions/paradoxs and yet also not. The choice to accept the truth or not is yours as is your free will.
Dear Australian brother, I have a feeling it's about Fitch's paradox of knowability (there was a thread on that about 6 moons ago).
The issue can be exemplified with the statement "aliens exist" (status: unknown)
Isn't the now of a few hours ago the same now as the present time? Or do you have the capacity to divide time into a multitude of distinct, particular, and separate nows, such that a past now would be distinct from the present now?
Both are correct depending on the perspective of one's reasoning. You cannot exist in any time but now that much is clear. "There is no time like the present". Try living 20 years ago right now - you'll find that sadly we cannot time travel backwards. That's why as a conscious object we have the grandfather paradox of time travel.
However we have memories. And when we focus our attention on them we recall and "relive" in our minds eye the events that took place in the past. That's why we can say someone is "living in the past" if they spend too much time fixating on it - usually due to loss, guilt or some sad emotions they're struggling to let go of.
This thus creates the illusion that the past still exists... But it only truly exists in the conscious memory of a sentient being.
Imagine you took away your memory. All of it. If you cannot remember the past you have no reason to believe it ever exists. Nor do you have any anticipation of a future by deduction. And if you have no past and no future the present moment loses all chronological meaning - time effectively vanishes.
Except we cannot remove our memories while we are alive and have a healthy functional brain. Our structure as physical objects allows us the stability to experience change around us. That is what consciousness needs to be aware of itself as an object. As life/ living things do.
People with dementia - losing the integrity of their brains structure... Are confused for time and place and forget and re-remember who they are and who their relatives are for this very reason. Their brain is struggling against the decay that comes with ageing.
Interesting. I've never come across fitches paradox. But if by "alien" we mean a conscious being that is "other" - different from us I think you'll see the paradox dissolves as we know that other people (other conscious entities) exist around us. To call them alien however may alienate them - make them feel upset that we don't see them as the same as us.
I sometimes wonder if our ancient early ancestors were around today and encountered us what they might think? They would see some strange less hairy animal, wearing strange materials, much taller than them, communicating in some strange complex sounds they don't understand and having all of this baffling technology. Would they fear us or be curious? Probably both.
Would we on the other hand be benevolent towards them? Or would we discard them as simpletons/inferior and not worthy of our attention and protection. Does this line of thinking sound familiar? This is the paradigm we have towards all other living things - animals, and plants, fungi, bacteria etc. Are they owed reverence for their individual functions/purposes? Or ought we abuse them because we think we are better?
Do you think humanity is ready to meet an alien civilisation on another planet knowing that we struggle to see eye to eye with even our own collective species? Do you think a more advanced and benevolent civilisation would come visit us if they felt we would attack them out of fear and ignorance?
Yes indeed. The mind of a child is perhaps one of the purest ones there is. I think children remind us of what we lose along the way - curiosity, innocence, the simple pleasures of wondering the who's, what's, wheres and whys of the world.
We love children for this. For what they teach us, for what they remind us to be in life. Life is meant to be fun and games. We must protect that ideology for as long as we are able while we are parents, while our children grow up and explore their world. Because the future is ultimately theirs. We would not want harm to come to that future if we know how to avoid it.
Ah yes indeed. I see where you are coming from. You're right in that abstraction and objectivity are not exactly the same thing. There is division here. However they are connected to one another, as all things are.
I can draw "one" but only symbolically. If I show many pictures to a child of a singular thing - an apple for example and then I show them pictures of two of the same thing - two apples... By contrast I can demonstrate the meaning of one verses two. In that way I can teach an abstract concept using physically observable objects.
It would not be prudent of me to show a picture of one apple and then show a picture of two bananas and say that is the difference between one and two. The child would be confused because the two fruit are different in more ways than just number. That's why in all the children's counting books we have we use the same iteration in multiples of itself. One apple, two apples, three and so on.
Does that make sense? If not let me know where I've gone wrong.
Furthermore abstraction is analogous to thought, imagination, ideas. And we know that such abstraction can become concrete, can become an object through the actions of the conscious person that holds the thought in their mind. For example an artist can take an idea in their head and demonstrate it on a medium to convey that inner thought to another. An inventor can do the same, and a musician, an author, anyone in any discipline can create from what is not yet real and bring it into reality for others to appreciate and interpret in their own unique way.
That is the sort of thing I don't know.
In the context of Descartes' use of God in his epistemology, it is a large step back from an assumption that how we understand must be related by nature to what we wish to know. Descartes is content to make baby steps toward knowing what is true by demonstrating to himself that he is not being deceived by God.
Yes I understand, he demonstrates favouring belief in a truth over venturing to explain nature through explaining this truth he believes. In essence he shows commitment to a belief without feeling the need to explain it to others. At most this demonstrates his choice of personality - faith over skepticism, ironically by being so skeptical that he reduces what he could believe to one thing - the only remaining thing that he is prepared to believe faithfully. Many people hold similar views. The spiritual. They accept and settle for a belief despite others asking them to please kindly explain why such a belief is reasonable to accept.
I hope i interpreted what you were examining correctly. If not feel free to elaborate and forgive me if I missed the mark.
And its okay not to know by the way. That gives you good leg room to flex your logic and pursue truth whatever you conclude that it is for you.
Personally a god that actively deceives me is not one I wish to know. I feel a righteous god is one that welcomes me to understand their truth if and when I am prepared to accept it into my life. A just God would reveal themselves to me through the truth they speak, rather than allow me to flounder in nonsense and delusion.
Nothing could be further from the truth. While it may have been presumptuous for him to confidently declare how the perfection of God's mind relates to his creatures, he explicitly cautions against thinking our knowledge as being able to approach all that is true:
Descartes' point of bringing up the possibility of being deceived was in order to support his fundamental argument that the method for obtaining authentic knowledge must come through the process of doubt rather than accidentally having the correct opinions.
But if knowledge of god is not approachable by his/her subjects then what ought to be the purpose of a true god? If god is not the ultimate truth then we have no means by which to be ethical (as truth pertains to morality through use of the truth to do right by one another, as opposed to lies and deceit) and also we would have no means to pursue rationality (as the truth pertains to knowability/knowledge and by proxy logic) - that which is consistent and permanent in the world. The laws of existence.
If ethics and reason don't exist and are not approachable then we would be dismally lost. Totally ignorant (lacking all sense of what is ethical and what is reasonable).
But common sense serves to show the contrary. We know somewhat of that which is just and that which is rational.
I don't understand how noting the limitations of our knowledge in the context of all that is true amounts to saying we could not learn anything that is true or what behavior is better from what is worse.
That's a myth, not an explanation.
If that myth doesn't fit the commonplace of it being true now, and yesterday, that I went to a Harry Manx show the other night, then that's enough to reject the myth.
Quoting Agent Smith
Yep. But see how Benj entirely misses the point?
Benj's approach is making stuff up instead of working stuff out. There's not much point in further comment.
Why care about what "truth" is or search for its definition? We're aware through experience and observation that in life the most accurate judgments, conclusions and assertions are those supported by the best available evidence. What constitutes that evidence may vary; new evidence may arise. That's the way of things. Why expect anything more than that, or seek it, let alone try to define it? What else could be "true"--that which everyone would think is the case after everyone knows everything? That's hardly a meaningful or useful thing to spend our time discussing.
Ok. Truth, what are its implications?
Hats off to you sir/madam as the case may be. There's a god of time (the filicidal Cronus), but I haven't heard of a god of space. Is there one?
Haha if that's what you want to believe that's fine. No harm no foul. But at the end of the day I think we all observe the reality around us, hypothesise possible explanations (make stuff up/create ideas regarding existence) and then exercise/ apply that understanding (however inaccurate or accurate it may be) by asking others if they have similar views and if not then why?
And in this way we are exposed to new lines of questioning, new arguments that we may have not considered before, and re-evaluate our beliefs either accepting or rejecting one's that sound logical and or ethical.
Thus we create a paradigm for ourselves to navigate reality.
Is that not the process of reason? Be it scientific reason or spiritual intuition.
I think i reached a point where I saw limits with the strictly scientific approach to understanding nature. As I don't believe you can objectify everything and everyone completely. I think one would find it difficult to "prove" the existence of ethics with scientific measurement - despite ethics being incredibly important in preventing science from doing harm. Likewise I find it difficult to see how a tool like scientific method can prove consciousness (the hard problem), as ironically, the method pre-supposes an observer.
How can one turn scientific method on ourselves entirely - by getting inanimate objects to observe and measure conscious entities to prove we exist. Therefore the hard problem is a fundamental limit to science.
It would be analogous to using a knife to dissect an object to see what's inside. And then to turn that knife on yourself to dissect yourself to see what's inside. It's not ethical or sensible.
I think this is exemplified by quantum phenomena - where the observer, by observing, by measuring... Changes the outcome. This would seem to indicate at a fundamental level of reality that when observed quanta are particulate (objectified) but when not observed they are only "potential" to be (a waveform).
Thus I turned to other disciplines of understanding to fill in the gaps that science cannot prove. I turned to philosophy and spirituality. It sounds reasonable that to understand the truth of things in reality we must not only address the existence of scientific facts but also the existence of subjective beliefs.
Science and faith don't have to be at odds with one another, its just that at their extremes, at their greatest level of dogma- they refuse to entertain the others way of understanding things.
I believe so. Space exists relative to matter, to objects. If there were no material objects/molecules/atoms, the space within/around them by contrast would lose all sense of reference, would lose its "relativity". Just as darkness by itself with no light isn't really darkness. Its only darkness by contrast. Contrasts are the gradient by which change from A to B occurs and thus information. If there was no gradient between things, nothing to distinguish them, then there would be no information. If there is no information - then there is no existence.
In a singularity where all energy and matter are just "potential". And time is not occuring, has not been set in motion (by objects and energy interacting), then there is no space either. No objects, no time, no space.
So conclusion yes there is a god of space.
So you don't believe that everyone could at some point know everything about how reality works - have a unanimous reality together? I understand how it sounds far fetched but consider this:
"If there are infinite ways to be ignorant -(to hold irrational beliefs, delusions etc about reality), then on the contrary pole should there not be only one way to be privy to the truth?"
If this is the case and everyone knew the truth, they wouldn't argue angrily with one another but rather simply discuss its endless implications.
I don't believe acknowledging that we don't know everything instantly means that we know nothing, nor does it mean we can't improve our knowledge.
I think we have varying degrees of knowledge of what is true and what is better between all of us. Some people are delusional and others quite wise indeed. And we all judge eachother from these respective reference points based off what we hold to be personally true.
Haha it seems that from my research online now such as god has been described numerous times and with several variations on interpretation.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sky_deity#:~:text=Within%20Greek%20mythology%2C%20Uranus%20was,Poseidon%2C%20who%20ruled%20the%20sea.
Here is a link to the Wikipedia article on "sky deities" for your interest and browsing.
Uranus was one such god of the sky/ air/ether or space based on whatever people at the time understood space to be. Zeus also had similar attributes. Cosmic god.
The persistence of gods in humanities history seems very telling. There is something deep within us that wants to be connected to/part of our universe... To personify it as the universe personified us by creating life through its various physical and chemical phenomena/laws.
The persistence of gods even in the age of information (explosion) implies that we've good reasons to continue believing in gods. What are these reasons, pray tell.
Well indeed. I think the persistence of gods despite a scientific revolution and information explosion means that perhaps they are more fundamental than we previously believed. As things that are fundamental and constant will not change through time - despite the systems they govern evolving and progressing around their axis.
Another good reason that we may persist in believing gods exist is based on morality. An ethical consideration. If God's or a singular god are the basis for a fundamental logic (or "logos" - see heraclitus) and we know that knowledge or wisdom comes from understanding this logic/this architecture for what is possible and what is not. Then we can make better decisions.
Would you prefer a well informed person or an uneducated one to govern society or make judgements in the interest of society? In this way knowing such a god would place that person in a better position to be ethical.
Its not enough to have what you think are good intentions to be moral. You must also have knowledge. A delusional person going around with what they believe to be good intentions is a very dangerous person indeed. Hitler is likely such a case.
I suspect he didn't think or contemplate very much at all before acting. On the contrary all the wisest rulers and greatest philosophers contemplated almost constantly to ensure they could give sufficiently good guidance as to minimise harm. Think of a Greek statue and what is its pose? A person sitting and staring off into space with their hand rested beneath their chin. An act of contemplation and self reflection.
Allahu Akbar? :snicker:
Jokes aside, I'd say we reexamine the evidence carefully, thoroughly, and then ...
Yeah I think it's prudent to keep an open mind and follow multiple lines of thinking to there end to see where that leads. Be thorough yet measured.
Almost all arguments in life have a counteragument which must be considered also - the sign of a good philosopher is to hold two contradictory statements at once without necessarily accepting either.
I think that is the process of branching out one's network of reasoning - like a tree, or a brain.
Finally, I would even be careful about using the term "evidence" too objectively. Are not historical propositions and philosophical arguments and beliefs not parts of the whole sum of "evidence" just as much as scientific discovers are?
The face of truth! A magnificent title as far as I'm concerned.
Why thank you. I like the title too. Haha. I see what you mean by learning something new that actually you knew all along and had just forgotten. Funny how that is. Like coming full circle. The start also the end. Questions also being answers
Well, my point was that pondering whether or not that may occur is idle. But we're tiny little creatures on a tiny little planet in a tiny little solar system in a moderately sized galaxy that's one among billions of others. I think it's unlikely we'll ever know everything. That doesn't mean we can't make reasonable judgments and conclusions, though.
Quoting Benj96
I don't see why that should be the case. Do you mean it would be nice if it was, or that would be only fair?
Both. I think it would be nice if we all related to eachother and our external reality in a similar way. We likely wouldn't feel lonely or depressed or excluded in such a case as this "togetherness". I think it would be fair to expect such a case too. It sounds like a good thing to be a united community. To feel like "us" rather than "me" and "other".
Many of the world's problems now seem like great titans - poverty, wars, climate crisis etc. I can't reason of any other way to tackle them but than in united agreement. But as far as I see currently we have a conflict of interests as a species.
Sure, we can make stuff up.
But doing philosophy, being rational, involves sorting out the consequences of the things we make up.
Not just anything will do.
Now the consequences of the two contentions I selected from your comments are that we know everything, that there are proposals that are neither true nor false, that we didn't know yesterday that the OP is in English... I could go on.
I agree with you in rejecting scientism, but "spiritual intuition" mixed with "quantum" while leaving aside rational critique... well, let's just say the results are not worthy of due consideration.
Agree.
Quoting Banno
Agree again.
Quoting Banno
We know everything for me = we have an inbuilt capacity to pursue useful knowledge to it's ends. Good or bad Logic/reason (the act of judgement/decision).
In other words, that there is a state of pure ignorance and a state of pure truth - a spectrum that we transverse by accepting or rejecting statements (whether true of false), and the ones which are accepted (whichever case they may be) generating a new paradigm (logic/reason - for better or worse) from which to address further statements as either true or false. Consequently either elevating or diminishing our ability to discern what is delusion from what is true knowledge.
In essence we do know everything we need to know to pursue truth.
An individuals logic/reason is not "thee logic/logos" of actual reality but a collection of what we believe to be true that shapes what questions are available to us to ask and what we assume is absurdity. If we change our reasoning/personal logic (what we believe to be the case) then we change our assumptions and thus change the quality and quantity of questions we can posit. So yes we do have the potential to know everything because we can know nothing. "I know that I know nothing" gets its validity from this Idea.
As for proposals that are neither false nor true consider relativism and paradox. If time has an objective present, past and future then the grandfather paradox is true. If time is an illusion created by observers having memory and thus anticipation through reference; that there is no actual time other than the present moment then the grandfather paradox is false.
Thus times existence as a proposal can be false if believed to be a product of observers and true if believed to be a product of objective external reality. It is true and false.
Anything with a dual state, anything dualistic is both true and false depending on the observers decision. Wave-particle duality exists and is both true and false simultaneously until observed, until an observer determines a singular state.
Quoting Banno
Results are always worthy of due consideration. Even if hypothetical as they lead to stepwise consequences which offer insight. Denying consideration to the possible is merely making a decision to make such possibilities unavailable to you. It is the moment you give up and stop caring about discussion.
This very wording sets my teeth on edge. Pure cream, fine. Pure truth, bullshit.
Quoting Benj96
Utter cobbler's awls.
Quoting Benj96
Fucksake.
Seems you are beyond redemption. The only hope is that you don't infect others. Were I a mod I would ban you for the good of humanity.
Seems a rather personal attack based on mere discourse. I wasn't informed freedom of speech was not tolerated. I also don't believe anyone is beyond redemption. As that would be uncompassionate and unethical. It leaves no room for hope.
If one is beyond redemption then they are unable to change and if they are unable to change their views they have no free will. A slave to how others define them. Not really a moral paradigm to hold. Are you sure you are just in attacking me for what I believe to be true. I am not attacking you. Nor would I ever want to. For me you are free to believe what you want
No, I'm attacking what you say for its incoherence.
If you don't understand what I say you can choose to ignore it in which case our chat stops here, or continue our discussion. What would you like to ask me to elaborate on so I may make it a bit more clear for you?
What you don't have the authority to do is believe you are so outright absolutely and definitively correct that it would be prudent to ban me so I don't infect others for the sake of humanity. I mean sorry but I fail to see how that is constructive and how you are some god that I'm forbidden to contest. As your comment below would suggest
Quoting Banno
Level/temper yourself please my friend.
I fear i do understand what there is to be understood of it; pop philosophy mixed with a bit of Eastern spirituality and Quantum. You have not shown yourself capable of replying to the criticism already levelled at your posts without wandering off on irrelevancies.
There's s saying, which my departed friend Gassendi attributed to Aristotle, that there is a point in attempts to engage in rational conversation at which the only reasonable thing to do is to laugh and walk away. Here we are.
Irrelevancies according to you I guess. Does that mean they're universal Irrelevancies?
Quoting Banno
On the contrary all I have ever been doing is responding with further elaboration to each of your reponses. If your responses were not to outline critiques/ queries you found against something I said then what were they? Does one argue with someone else if they are in agreement? I think not.
I'm quite capable of replying further to your critiques if you'd like.
Happy to entertain them. Quoting Banno
Again "rational" according to who? Are you speaking on behalf of just yourself or humanity here? I think I am rational. You do not. Fine. Let it be so. You are always free to walk away, hell even laugh if that's what would satisfy you. No harm no foul. It is only discourse. I'm sorry my views appear to be so offensive I did my best to explain them.
Welcome to the world according to Banno.
"Nice" yes, but I'm not certain about "fair." But alas, the universe isn't beholden to us to us in any sense. We're merely a very small part of it. As some appellate court judge said of his court (I paraphrase): "The Court is not a performing bear, required to dance to every tune litigants play for it." Neither does the universe dance to our tune. We dance to the music it plays. We (some of us, in any case) barely have the wit to recognize that's the case.
I think you're too fond of absolutes. Dewey had a strange writing style, and his wording can be clumsy, but I think he was right when he wrote that "truth" carries too much baggage and is too prone to misuse, and prefer his "warranted assertibility" as a substitute. There can be nothing more to "truth" than being supported by the best available evidence.
I disagree, on the contrary the universe is beholden to us through every sense. We are not a closed system. Our borders with the environment are open ones. We are in constant transaction, constant exchange with the external world. Give and take, acknowledge and express, observe and project. If we don't accept that fact we simply live in our own internal mental world devoid of external narrative. We become this or that, victim or aggressor when it is a spectrum.
And as far as I see we are so far simultaneously the most capable and incapable species on that spectrum in the capacity to understand the logic/ irrationality of the universe. Other animals simply do what they need to. They live in a natural and balanced ecosystem. An equilibrium. While we are biased - argue and justify every reason for something before committing to it/rejecting it stifleing intuition/instinct in favour of exacting and precision rationale.
In a way that's a great advantage to exacting things like science but a great disadvantage to intuitive things like ethics/morality. We can pretend absolutes don't exist but of course they do. The spectrum has ends, polarity, opposites. If - 10 and + 10 are taken away as the absolute extremes of a set then are they not replaced by - 9 and + 9 (which are still the greatest extreme) available to the set.
Absolutes paint the whole picture but the middle is where one should view them from. It isn't good to "be extreme" but it is good to "acknowledge extremes" for what they are.
I would not dare to underestimate ourselves as part of the plotline in the beholding of the universe. I don't think it's egocentric or naive I simply believe that we are just as much the universe as a mountain is, as the moon is. Its the ego that convinces one that they are separate. That's why egotistical people are self indulging.. Because they only consider a singular object as part of themselves - their own body. Selfless people serve others because they really believe they are part of something bigger.
Interesting. We agree on this. But we disagree on whether we can know everything.
I think the problem with most of the traditional "problems" of philosophy is that they look on us as apart from the world (the universe), rather than a part of it. But, I think being a part of it doesn't mean that we know or can fully know all about the world. What we may know is limited by our abilities and the way in which we interact with the rest of the world. And those abilities and interactions, and the extent of the universe with which we interact, are limited.
I think living/existing in a larger system has inherent uncertainty in it. That is in essence the experience of time isn't it? : it gives us the present moment which we know/can observe actively as it happens. It is known. And the past is progressively less known the further we investigate backwards due to increasing possibility for other variables to result in the same present moment. And likewise the future is also unknown but again can be predicted pretty well at a short range into the future: think of weather forecasts and climate change and current economic instability/stability etc.
Knowing everything and understanding everything are not the same thing. Knowing everything requires all of space-time and all information - all variables.
Understanding everything only requires the present moment. For example if I understand a formula - I can expect to know the result in the future when that future is "realised" - when that future becomes the present (reality).
In essence understanding something (its relationship and interactions with other things - a cause) has predictive value for knowing something (the effect).
If I understand a person behaves selfishly. And my friend wants to help them/offer resources to them, I can expect to know (predict) that my friend will get exploited at that future moment. That such a selfish person would parasatise them and take their help for granted.
Also if the observer is to analyse everything around them as an object they lose the information about others feelings and emotions etc - abstractions that they cannot physically see. That's why scientific method cannot be disconnected fully from ethical consideration. They are "entangled".
And if an observer is to be completely intuitive (only use belief) on the other hand and forego objective observations they again lose information - that offered by control and analysis and objective measure (scientific method).
The system must always have some factor unknown in order to know the other factors. Heisenbergs stated this.
So no its not possible to know everything that has and will ever occur, just as one cannot know everyone's name on the planet, but it is possible to understand of all of their relationships with one another and inherit good predictive ability. You can apply that ability (that formula) to whatever you want to. You can specialise in whatever you want to know.
It's not random or luck that certain people make discoveries or invent things and others do not. It's about building your own algorithms for reality. And testing them
Well, we may differ on our definition of "understanding" and what it entails.
We're largely creatures of habit, and what we interact with is in most cases familiar and it requires little or no thought on our part to interact with the familiar satisfactorily. Perhaps we may be said to "understand" the familiar and our response to it, in that sense.
We only think when we encounter problems (Dewey again). When we encounter problems we're dissatisfied, and seek to resolve that dissatisfaction. We try to resolve the problems in various ways until resolution takes place. Thus do we learn and acquire knowledge.
Maybe that's what you mean. I'm not certain.
Yes that's what I'm saying. We learn through trial and error. Making assumptions, testing them and then getting an outcome. And if the outcome was not expected we then revise our assumptions or how to test them.
This is both applicable in science and in social interaction with one another. I hypothesise something, I make an experiment to test it, the experiment has good controls and is unbiased and the result is what I predicted therefore we can say with a high degree of certainty that the hypothesis is correct.
Similarly I can make an assumption about someone based on what I observe - their behaviour or what they tell me about their beliefs. I test whether me assumption is correct by pointing it out to them/articulating it. If they agree then I was reasonable to assume such a thing, if they disagree they can offer their logic/reasoning as to why my assumption is incorrect. If their logic seems just I apologise for making the assumption and revise it/ accept their reason. If their logic doesn't seem just - for example because it causes harm to themselves or to others, then I can offer that as the reason why I still hold my assumption.