Hi DMB,
On Sun, Apr 18, 2010 at 1:34 PM, david buchanan <[email protected]> wrote: > > dmb said: > ... Jon asked what the moq says about truth and how the moq avoids relativism > but he answered as if Jon had asked what Rorty says about those things. > > > Steve replied: > > Would you like to point out where I said something inconsistent with the MOQ? > ...Can you explain what I said that is inconsistent with the above? I think > you must be misinterpreting me or Pirsig or both. > > > dmb says: > > Seriously? You really don't see how your Rortyism is different from the MOQ? Steve: I do, but that wasn't the question. DMB: > The MOQ subscribes to empiricism. Instead of saying experience is the test of > truth, you conclude (with Rorty) that it's a matter of verbal agreement. As > you put it, "We are left to hash this out in conversation when we want to > convince someone else of what we want them to believe and why we think that > they ought to be convinced to believe it." Steve: As usual, you are confusing the question "what is true? with the question "how can we justify our believes to other human beings?" I dispensed with the first question when I said: "Relativism with regard to truth is that position that there is no such thing as truth. We can avoid such relativism even though people disagree about what the truth is so long as we agree that there is something to be disagreeing about." Is there anything that is inconsistent with the MOQ in that response? Then I addressed the second question: Steve previously: Your second question, "how can well tell what is true?" raises the issue of relativism with respect to justification. Are there standards for justification that we can appeal to that will ensure that if we correctly apply them that we will only ever believe true statements? The universe does't hand us such standards, so we are forced to answer a second order question of justification whenever we believe that we have found a sure fire method for uncovering the truth. That second order question is, how can we justify our particular standards for justification? I don't think that there is anything nonhuman to appeal to here. We are left to hash this out in conversation when we want to convince someone else of what we want them to believe and why we think that they ought to be convinced to believe it..." And you objected to my response as if it was an answer to the first question about "what is true?" Your answer that the MOQ subscribes to empiricism doesn't get to the issue of relativism at all. Best, Steve Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
