Luiseach

Are you talking about words here? Now, you've already agreed (I think) that signifiers are arbitrarily applied to external realities (sense data to be precise). Now you seem to be suggesting that these 'information symbols' (that's a vague term...what do you mean? Images? Sensations? Language?) are acting as conduits for pure information from the 'outside' of the mind.

I sense a contradiction here...

Ah...but our minds aren't just full of archetypes of the forms we have learned. On the one hand, you're quite correct to say that sensory data is measured against imprinted forms we learn through repetition in experience...but how does this tie in with language? Language doesn't function in quite the same way as imagery...letters and words aren't representative (at least in English they're not!).

...and I'm still not convinced that 'information symbols' behave like fibre optics...

John Page

Smart questions! First, I'm not thinking of symbols as conduits.

Here's what I think I'm struggling with by way of examples:
1. A picture or image of an object.
2. A stylized picture of an object
3. A chariacature, accentuating the essential features of the object but still a picture.
4. A pictogram, whose resemblance to the object it represents is obscure unless you know how to "read" it. e.g. The numeral 2 I believe had two points as originally written and 3 had three etc.
5. A letter, say, x, which can be used to represent something irrespective of the form of the something. The x is defined as an arbitrary label.

All of the above refer to the object of the examples but with increasing levels of indirection. What I'm hoping to illustrate is that there are gradations between sense data and arbitrary label. Furthermore I'm thinking there are specific brain mechanisms for language manipulation (where the relationships comprise meaning) - with the end result that written English language looks nothing like what it represents (your comment, with which I concur) - as distinct from representation manipulation that brings forth the mental obects about which we are speaking.

On the word "symbol" here's a link that talks about the speacialized usage of that term viz raw data as bits per symbol. Information Theory Link .

Looking forward to your observations.

Cheers, John

Amos

Hello John, interesting and here is how I would read the numerals.

The number 1 is just one single line. It has a beginnning and an end and stands for singularity. In it we are of one mind, free and omniscient and so thinking is not possible in such a mind.

The number 2 is where we would come full circle but did not because we were tempted by the serpent who promised that we could be "like god" if we would go the other way.

In the number 3 we became like two of us. We now have two minds and really do not know who we are but just think that we know. We therefore must think because there really can't be two of us in one mind. Notice that we are not full cirlce in either mind and therefore we are not free but are indeed free to think.

To assert our existence we made power wealth and beauty our greater goods to be worshipped as lesser gods. We see this in the number 4, which is made out of three sinlge lines to form a square circle with dead ends to indicate how our life will be while we are in pursuit of happiness. Along this path we hunt, gather, create, co-create and procreate and we do this all in effort to substantiate our illusory existence while in exile.

In the number 5 we find that our rational existence has increased at the cost of our non-rational existence and this is when the pride and joy we once had in our pursuit of happiness becomes overshadowed by the feelings of melancholy that are also more persistent than they ever were.

This leads us to the number 6 which is the first time we come full circle in our rational existence and can actually see the emptiness of our life outside of who we really are. This will end our involutionary period and a new beginning is made at the number 7. Here we are not divided but an equal branch on the old tree and therefore we will come full circle in both minds at the number 8 (which therefore is opposite the number 3).

Amos

I liked this question made by Luiseach.

So....if thinking is indeed equivalent to the process of identity formation, then thinking and identity are the result of the 'consideration' of information from the environment.

There has to be a middle-man in there somewhere, doesn't there? I mean, how does 'consideration' actually work?

In my view thinking and the need for thinking is proof of loss of identity or omnicience could not be conceived to exist and without omniscience thinking could not be a learning process because there would be nothing to learn. This argument is just an extension of the fallen free argument because without a falling tree there would be no vibrations coming our way.

Gurdur

:banghead: :banghead: :banghead:

Amos

Sorry Gurdur. Ever tried banging your head against your head.

If there needs to be two of you to have night dreams and day dreams there must also be two of you to have more rational dreams that we call "thinking."

phaedrus

Truth and Meaning

Truth" no longer signifies the "correspondence" of "mental states" to "objective" reality, and "meaning" is no longer conceived of as some sort of objective, in-itself state of affairs which merely awaits being "discovered" and "represented" by a mirroring mind.

"Truth" and "meaning" refer instead to creative operations on the part of human understanding itself, which is always interpretive (never simply "representational"). Truth is inseparable from the interpretive process, and meaning is nothing other than what results from such a process, namely, the existential-practical transformation that occurs in the interpreting subject (in his or her world orientation) as a result of his or her active encounter with texts, other people, or "the world." Truth and meaning have nothing "objective" about them, in the modern, objectivistic sense of the term; they are integral aspects of the "event" of understanding itself, are inseparable from the "play" of understanding.

Knowldege

"Knowledge" is not the possession of a "transcendental signified," a translinguistic "essence". It is nothing other than the shared understanding that a community of inquirers comes to as a result of a free exchange of opinions. It is a process of "communication."

There is an old thread which dealth with this quite extensively....Can truth be found in subjectivity?

Luiseach

Okay.

Right...'increasing levels of indirection'...yes, I like that, and it makes sense.

Okay...I've looked at the link, and read up a bit more on 'Information Theory,' to see how it sheds light on 'truth' and the discussion.

Here are some observations...

‘Information Theory’…(IT)

A potentially interesting aspect of IT is that information is conflated with the physical. Information is part of a physical event, that is communication.

I.A. Richards (literary critic, yay!) gave us a deceptively simple definition of ‘communication,’ namely,

‘Communication takes place when one mind so acts upon its environment that another mind is influenced, and in that other mind an experience occurs which is like the experience in the first mind, and is caused by the experience.’

---I.A. Richards, (I think he wrote this in Practical Criticism, in 1929, although I’m not altogether certain about that, and I don't have the bloomin' page reference...will seek it out)

The salient point, however, is that communication is the act of transferring information through a shared symbolic system.

The ‘shared symbolic system’ is what we are tending to focus on in this thread, insofar that the ‘truth’ is somewhere in there, as opposed to ‘out there.’ There is an external reality, but ‘truth’ seems to have more to do with what we think about this, what we observe about this, what we discuss, the questions we ask, and so forth. Truth seems to emerge where reality (ies) intersect with our attempts to engage with them; engagement with reality (ies) involves communication, both from outside, via our senses, to our brains, translated into images and language, passed through the physical sieve once again, and out to begin the process all over again with other folks. A cycle of transference, transformation, consensus building, dialectic, and so on.

Fascinating!

IT is therefore a bit less about the content of communication, and a bit more about the act of transmitting the content.

Or, perhaps it’s about both…that they are one and the same…or exist in a symbiotic relationship.

I’m reminded of Marshall McLuhan’s statement about communications: ‘The medium is the message.’ If McLuhan is correct, and the content of communication is equivalent to the medium through which it is transmitted, then we would be better off looking to how the human being – as conveyor of communication – ‘works,’ for some useable definitions of the ‘truth.’ Just as you said earlier in this thread, John (re: the physical).

Language (qua ‘shared symbolic system’) is therefore both the medium and the message.

So content cannot be extricated from the means of transmitting it.

The ‘truth’ is to be found in both the medium and the message, both the process of communication and the content.

This has some interesting implications for understanding the nature of truth...what say you?

I hope my ramblings do some justice to the 'Information Theory' link you provided. This is a new area for me...!

John Page

Hi Phaedrus!
Rather, truth arises from a correspondence between mental states. (No need for any "objective" reality.)

Do you agree?

Cheers, John

John Page

This is two-way communication. IMO, one needs a conceptual model where:

1. Information is received although it was not intentionally communicated. For example, "The swaying of the trees told her it was very window."
2. Information is not received, even though it was intentionally communicated. For example, "Nobody heard her cry for help".
3. The kind of inter-subjective communication described in the passage you quote.

In order for communication to take place, the participants need to have an appropriately equipped mind. I think this basically includes the ability to receive information across a sensory boundary, compare this to the results of a prior communication (so that context arises) and make use of the information imparted. Note: "Make use of" doesn't necessarily mean act upon, it could be just stored or absorbed - if it is not used then the information content is lost and no communication has been effected.

Yes, and these are not the symbols in the common use of the word.
I can understand this view, but please see Phaedrus' learned observation and my offering that truth, literally ( ) arises from the comparison of two mental states by the brain.

The mental states are a result, (at least in part) of communication with other entities in reality. It appears we don't have the ability to know reality directly so our comparisons and truth-telling occur via mental process.
IMO he's wrong. I think his statement is useful in making us think about how we communicate but the medium conveys the message about some other part of reality that may or may not be the medium.
I think it can. Try reading the newspaper and typing the words into your computer. Try using the telephone - many media are used to convey the content.
Truth is founded in the mind that perceives the communications process and its content.

Cheers, John