Volker.Doormann

I have started an argumentative discussion with him on July 5, 2003 and have ended the pointless discussion on July 5, 2003.

Volker

spacer1

Sophie,
I have not made the claim that consciousness has no influence on understanding, and stated earlier that we may (consciously) intend to understand but may not succeed. You may be consciously aware of when you have arrived at understanding, but my point relates more to what leads up to that understanding (which, as my last Wittgenstein quote points out, "makes its appearance in a moment.") At the moment you understand you become consciously aware that you understand, but you are not in complete conscious control of the processes that bring about such understanding.

I am not talking about the conscious motivation to understand, nor about the moment one does understand. I have already acknowledged both of these points in my previous posts.

leyline

Luiseach

i know you asked the question of sophie but i thought it was such a good question that i couldn't resist

I would say that language influences truth influences language influences cultural understanding influences personal understanding influences truth ..... all together. There are a lot of recursive interplays going on simultaneously and i don't believe we will ever be able to disentangle and seperate them out because of their necessary relationships to each other.

So for example truth for me has no meaning seperated from language, understanding, culture and the individual. Similarly for the others in the relationship. I tend to emphasise the cultural simply because the concept itself implies all kinds of things mixed up together more strongly than the others.

John Page

Pointless? For whom? :banghead:

Come on Volker, where does the truth come from? How do we decide it? If you have any explanations (in addition to your declarations as to what you think truth is) I'd like to hear them.

Cheers, John

John Page

Sophiecles:

I apologize for my poor attempt at irony. Try this unfinishes pseudocode:

If (delivery_system_sophie==INTRINSICALLY_TRUE
&& delivery_system_john_page==INTRINSICALLY_TRUE){

if (delivery_system_sophie != delivery_system_john){
delivery_system_reality == ??}}

In other words, if we are both delivery systems then (for us) we are INTRINSICALLY_TRUE. However, when we differ (as we may) our intrinsic truths contradict. Following from this, if one adopts the axiom "Something that is true cannot be false", then how do we determine (objectively w.r.t sophie and john) what the truth is?

I hope you see that we can begin to define a delivery system for truth that appears independent of our opinons (which I have called delivery_system_reality in the above). Logics are such systems and so might also be courts of law.

However, while we both might agree on a system_x (e.g. propositional logic) to be used to determine intersubjective truths, that "truth" is still intrinsic to and subjective of system_x.

Finally, and somewhat ironically, system_x might implemented in delivery_system_sophie and delivery_system_john such that we can finally agree. The irony for me is that the "truth" can then be said to emanate from system_x, not from any delivery system.

Is does this make my apparent shifting of positions understandable? Also, if we agree to use system_x, do you still consider truth delivery systems must be true?

Cheers, John

Volker.Doormann

What is seen is not the Truth
What is cannot be said
Trust comes not without seeing
Nor understanding without words
The wise comprehends with knowledge
To the ignorant it is but a wonder
Some worship the formless God
Some worship His various forms
In what way He is beyond these attributes
Only the Knower knows
That music cannot be written
How can then be the notes
Says Kabir, awareness alone will overcome illusion
(Kabir 1398 - 1518 CE)

John Page

I take issue with his statement "Nor understanding without words" For example, I think a zebra understands perfectly well without words that the lion may be a threat to its life.

Cheers, John

yguy

Truth is not a thing to be decided, but to be realized.

John Page

How did you decide/realize this?

Cheers, John

yguy

Obviously I didn't decide it, any more than Newton decided there must be a reason why the apple falls but the Moon doesn't. How did I realize it? How does anyone realize anything? I haven't the foggiest idea, but I know it happens all the time.