[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
In a message dated 1/25/2005 4:36:41 PM Pacific Standard Time, k [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: I will add to this resend, that you are equating universal object truth with
external reality. A common mistake.
I'm intrigued. Since you brought it up, what's the difference? This isn't a trap, I really don't know.
cheers,
frank
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There are consensual shared truths (families, nations, political parties). But not going to get into that.
True: In accordance with the actual state of affairs. Being that which is the case rather than what is manifest or assumed.
Well, some people believe there are hard and fast universal objective truths. Right? And some people also feel those truths can be found in external reality. That they exist independent of us, just laying out there waiting to be discovered.
My original statement was that we always perceive reality through the filter of our own world view, our own experience, our own lens -- whatever you want to call it.
How can we not? We are inside ourselves, looking out.
Are you confusing belief with reality maybe? What we perceive, what we believe, and what is reality may be 3 different things. But it would be very strange to think there is no reality without a perception of it or a belief of it.
So how do you know what's true? What's a universal objective truth out there in reality? Are you sure? Or is it something someone else told you? Let's take scientific truths. Don't they change all the time? Isn't that what someone else told you? (Or did you do experiments in the lab to prove it? :-)) And don't scientists disagree all the time? And, even now, don't they not know how some basic things work? So what is scientific truth?Again, I think that what we believe and what is reality are two different things. If we didn't exist, then do these realities go away? This would mean that the world and everything we know would go away as soon as we die. So why is everything still here, yet people have died.
Take political truth -- George Bush, I think he is the worst President, the worst thing to happen to the US in my life time. Others thing he is an okay guy. I also think, no, he isn't our President, that he only apparently won by fraud and lying, but he didn't actually win (in the previous election). Others think he did win.You don't think he's the President because you don't believe he won? Does that alter reality? It is only your perception. But is there a fact here: The person signing the bills presented by congress is who? If its not George Bush, then who is signing these bills? Who lives in the White House? John Kerry? Is it John Kerry because you believe it should have been John Kerry, so now in your perception/belief he lives there? Is 1 + 1 = 2? Or is this simply what you believe. Is it false because I do not believe that 1 + 1 = 2?
Aren't simple mathematical facts true and immutable? And you can build up these facts into more abstract concepts that can be reduced to these basic mathematical truths. Just because our understanding/belief/perception of the universe is not complete, and we are constantly revising our theory about its composition, does not imply that there is no basis in reality for it. If this was the case, then all theories would be false. Including the one that says that there is no reality.What's true, what I believe, or what they believe?
If you think there are hard and fast truths out there that you can discover, you believe there are some immutable facts. You believe that things don't change. That our perception of them doesn't change. That cultures doesn't change truths. That science doesn't change truths. That we don't change truths sometimes just by our very existence, and our investigations.
Assuming we can perceive reality untainted by our own perspective is rather presumptuous. IMHO.
This is true, our senses and sensibility is limited.
We are not "god like" with the ability to be totally impassive. To stand outside ourselves.And it may never be discovered, but I detect a hint of acknowledgement that there is a fundamental reality here.
And I can't explain it any better than that. And I don't want to. That's it.
I also said, I don't believe we have discovered the nature of reality yet.
As a postscript -- debating rules are silly, because they have a person take one side and another person take another side. And somehow by debating, the "truth" is supposed to emerge. When maybe to the person on one side, that is their truth, and to the person on the other side, that is their "truth." No amount of arguing is going to change that. Debating doesn't arrive at truths, it just sometimes arrives at a winner and loser (if both sides agree to abide by debating rules). The winner is just the most persistent and articulate. See, there is a presumption that by arguing, one side will see the logic of the other side, and "give way." But maybe both sides firmly believe what they believe. And maybe what they are arguing are opinions, beliefs, and there is no point arguing those. Unless you want flame wars. And maybe both sides will never "give way."Again, it sounds like you are talking about subjective truth, not objective truth. I.e. reality vs perception/belief. There is no arguing there, you are right about the subjective truth aspects.
Debating rules also don't really allow for humor, they encourage straightlaced black and white thinking, allow for no tangents, don't allow for changing viewpoints, and I think were designed by men for men. ;-) They are a formalized way to manage verbal aggression.
Sometimes we just have to agree to disagree.
I don't think I said it as well as I could have, but I have to run and make Mom her dinner.
If someone wants to debate it, find someone else who likes that kind of thing.
I don't. :-)
Marnie
rg
