Stephen, You obviously haven't read and/or understood any of Langan's papers...the least you could've done is spell his name correctly.
"The apparent absence of a TOE notwithstanding, has any kind of absolute knowledge ever been scientifically formulated? Yes, in the form of logical tautologies. A tautology is a sentential relation, i.e. a formula consisting of variables and logical connectives, with the property that it is true for all possible assignments of Boolean truth values (true or false) to its variables. For example, the statement "if x is a sentence, then either x or not-x (but not both) must be true" is a tautology because no matter which truth values are consistently applied to x and not-x, the statement is unequivocally true. Indeed, tautologies comprise the axioms and theorems of 2- valued logic itself, and because all meaningful theories necessarily conform to 2-valued logic, define the truth concept for all of the sciences. From mathematics and physics to biology and psychology, logical tautologies reign supreme and inviolable. That a tautology constitutes absolute truth can be proven as follows. First, logic is absolute within any system for which (a) the complementary truth values T (true) and F (false) correspond to systemic inclusion and exclusion, a semantic necessity without which meaningful reference is impossible; and (b) lesser predicates and their complements equal subsystemic inclusion and exclusion. Because a tautology is an axiom of 2-valued logic, violating it disrupts the T/ F distinction and results in the corruption of informational boundaries between perceptual and cognitive predicates recognized or applied in the system, as well as between each predicate and its negation. Thus, the observable fact that perceptual boundaries are intact across reality at large implies that no tautology within its syntax, or set of structural and functional rules, has been violated; indeed, if such a tautology ever were violated, then reality would disintegrate due to corruption of the informational boundaries which define it. So a tautology is "absolute truth" not only with respect to logic, but with respect to reality at large. What does this mean? Uncertainty or non-absoluteness of truth value always involves some kind of confusion or ambiguity regarding the distinction between the sentential predicates true and false. Where these predicates are applied to a more specific predicate and its negation - e.g., "it is true that the earth is round and false that the earth is not-round" - the confusion devolves to the contextual distinction between these lesser predicates, in this case round and not-round within the context of the earth. Because all of the ambiguity can be localized to a specific distinction in a particular context, it presents no general problem for reality at large; we can be uncertain about whether or not the earth is round without disrupting the logic of reality in general. However, where a statement is directly about reality in general, any disruption of or ambiguity regarding the T/F distinction disrupts the distinction between reality and not-reality. Were such a disruption to occur at the level of basic cognition or perception, reality would become impossible to perceive, recognize, or acknowledge as something that "exists". By definition, this is the case with regard to our cognitive- perceptual syntax, the set of structural and inferential rules governing perception and cognition in general. Since a tautology is a necessary and universal element of this syntax, tautologies can under no circumstances be violated within reality. Thus, they are "absolute knowledge". We may not be able to specify every element of absolute knowledge, but we can be sure of two things about it: that it exists in reality to the full extent necessary to guarantee its non- violation, and that no part of it yet to be determined can violate absolute knowledge already in hand. Whether or not we can write up an exhaustive itemized list of absolute truths, we can be sure that such a list exists, and that its contents are sufficiently "recognizable" by reality at large to ensure their functionality. Absolute truth, being essential to the integrity of reality, must exist on the level of reference associated with the preservation of global consistency, and may thus be duly incorporated in a theory of reality." http://www.megafoundation.org/CTMU/Articles/OnAbsoluteTruth.html > > One small point about CTMU. Chris Lagan seems to miss the point > that understanding (at least at the human level) requires Boolean > representability (i.e. capable of being represented in terms of alist of > yes/no type questions). The idea that a mind could "perfectly > understand[model] every aspect and detail of reality" would be an exact > endomorphism of Reality. > > -- > Onward! > > Stephen > > http://webpages.charter.net/stephenk1/Outlaw/Outlaw.html- Hide quoted text - > > - Show quoted text - -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
