Is there any such thing as an absolute?

ProtoTypical writes:The best reduction that I can manage this morning is to ask if you all agree that there is, in fact, an absolute state of the universe? That there is such a thing as an absolute truth about the way that things are or the way that the universe works?

ProtoTypical writes:How many times do I have to bounce off the wall before I can know that I will not be going through it?

It seems to me that the fact is that the real possibility of me going through the wall is zero.

I appreciate Paulk's distinction between practical and absolute certainty but with hypothetical possibilities on the one side and the span of time on the other, how many 'solid' objects have ever passed through another 'solid' object?

However, repetition and verification and consensus serve to bring the chances of being wrong down. Can they not bring them down to zero?

2 + 2 = 4 simply because it is defined to be such.

Stile writes:But, we can eat crispy crunch blizzards from Dairy Queen... so it's not all bad news

frako writes:Um well no its because of mathematical laws we proved that 1+1 = 2 so 2+2 = 4

1.61803 writes:There is only one reality.

Love DQ.

Theodoric writes:In rural Wisconsin one of the first signs of spring is the local DQ opening for the season.

Stile writes:Can you show that this is necessarily true?

Created 2000 March 27 by Lawrence D’Oliveiro writes: More Than One Reality?
Let the number of possible objective realities be N. I have proven that N cannot equal zero, but does that mean it has to equal one? So let us consider the proposition:There is more than one objective reality.Now, what does it mean for there to be more than one objective reality? Let us define an objective reality as a collection of statements which are true in that reality. So what does it mean to come up with more than one collection of such statements?Given any collection of more than one such statements, you could easily construct another such collection by leaving out one of those statements. Let us ignore such subset realities, and consider only maximal ones, that contain all the true statements they can contain, and are not subsets of any other reality. For if the only way to come up with different realities is by subsetting, then there must be one ultimately maximal reality that contains all the others, and the others are simply incomplete versions of this reality.Clearly, then, the only possible difference between two different maximal objective realities is that they must disagree on the objective truth of some statement. Consider two of these objective realities, R1 and R2, and the statement S, such thatStatement T: Statement S is demonstrably true in reality R1, and demonstrably false in reality R2.Aside: It is true that not every statement may be demonstrably true or demonstrably false. This doesn’t matter. For suppose that statement S is demonstrably true (or perhaps demonstrably false) in reality R1, but cannot be shown to be definitively true or false in reality R2. Then we simply construct the statement:Statement S': Statement S is demonstrably true (or demonstrably false).and statement T simply becomes Statement S' is demonstrably true in reality R1, and demonstrably false in reality R2. In other words, every statement about a difference between two objective realities can be put into the original form we have given for statement T.Before proceeding any further with the consequences of statement T, let’s ask a more fundamental question:Question H: Can different objective realities contain true statements about one another?Before we even try to answer this question, consider this: to which objective reality (or realities) does the answer to question H belong? Clearly, whichever one (or ones) it belongs to does contain at least one true statement that applies to the others (namely, the answer to question H). Therefore the answer to question H must be yes.Is it possible for different realities to disagree about the answer to question H? Consider an objective reality called RX, in which the answer to question H is no. In other words, no objective reality can contain a true statement about another. But this is a true statement, within RX, that applies to realities other than RX! In other words, the statement contradicts itself.Therefore, the answer to question H must be yes in all objective realities.Now, another, slightly more tricky question: is it possible for one reality to contain false statements about another?Remember our statement S, which was demonstrably true in reality R1. Is it possible for another reality RB (possibly the same as R2, possibly a different one) to contain the following statement?Statement I: Statement S is false in R1.But an objective reality is a collection of true statementsthe only way we can distinguish one reality from another is by which statements are true in one but not the other. If all the true statements are the same, then the two realities are the same. Thus, if RB contains the above statement, it can’t be referring to R1, but to a different reality.To make this clearer, the name R1 is simply a shorthand for referring to the set of all statements which are true in R1. Thus, the expansion of this name looks like{ ... Statement S is true; ...possibly other statements ...}Or, substituting this expansion into statement I, we get:Statement I: Statement S is false in { ... Statement S is true; ...}.which is clearly a contradiction.Now come back to our original statement, and consider the question: in which reality or realities is statement T true?Clearly, it must be true in both R1 and R2. The first half, statement S is demonstrably true in R1, must be true in R1, otherwise that reality contradicts itself. The second half, statement S is demonstrably false in R2, must also be true in R1, otherwise R1 would contain a false statement about R2, and we have already shown that this cannot be. A corresponding argument applies to the two halves the other way round for R2.In fact, statement T must be true in all realities. For in any reality R3 (distinct from R1 and R2), the first half must be true, to avoid containing a false statement about R1, and the second half must also be true, to avoid containing a false statement about R2.Which leads to quite a powerful conclusion:Theorem D: for any disagreement between two objective realities, all realities must agree on what that disagreement is.So what is there left to disagree on?To try to answer this, apply the following transformation to each objective reality: take the true statements comprising that reality and qualify them with its name. So for example the statements comprising R1:{ ... Statement S is true; ... Statement T is true; ... }become{ ... Statement S is true in R1; ... Statement T is true in R1; ... }And similarly R2 becomes{ ... Statement S is false in R2; ... Statement T is true in R2; ... }But if we substitute the definition of statement T, R1 becomes{ ... Statement S is true in R1; ... Statement S is false in R2; ... }while R2 becomes{ ... Statement S is false in R2; ... Statement S is true in R1; ... }which looks like they start to resemble one another, doesn’t it?In fact, by Theorem D, for every point on which two objective realities disagree, all objective realities must contain exactly the same set of true statements spelling out what that disagreement is. While for points on which they agree, they obviously already contain the same set of statements spelling out those points. From which it follows that all objective realities must consist of exactly the same set of true statements. So the only difference between them is in their names, which are arbitrary anyway.Thus, there is in the end only one objective reality.The proof I have given of the above is not merely an existence proof: it is a constructive proof, giving one or more examples of statements that are objectively true.

I don't think it's a separate question at all. If you don't/can't know what the absolute truth is, how can you know it's absolute?

No. Otherwise you could dismiss the probability of winning the lottery as zero.

We've only observed the tiniest fraction of such interactions.

So there should always be some doubt.

but, unfortunately, induction is not capable of ever "bringing the chances down to zero" for anything at all.

ProtoTypical writes:How many times do I have to bounce off the wall before I can know that I will not be going through it? I mean I will not live long enough to bounce off the wall enough times before I encounter the one time that I actually go through it. It seems to me that the fact is that the real possibility of me going through the wall is zero.

A poor example I guess because I can see people actually winning the lottery but I think that I get your point.

If the real (absolute?) probability is very nearly zero that I can walk through a wall given an eternity's worth of attempts what is the probability that I can do it in a lifetime? If .999... is equal to 1 then how small does that probability have to be in order for it to be equal to zero?

I think RAZD gives a good explanation of why .999... = 1 but at the same time I think that only 1=1.

The tiniest fraction of all such interactions but the sum total of all observations. Are we not certain that you don't have to actually witness the event to know what is going to or did happen?

Are you not absolutely certain of anything whatsoever?