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Author Topic:   I know God exists & the court of highest appeal is me.
Rob 
Suspended Member (Idle past 5849 days)
Posts: 2297
Joined: 06-01-2006


Message 91 of 94 (460185)
03-13-2008 9:13 AM
Reply to: Message 90 by Modulous
03-12-2008 9:32 AM


Re: An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding
Hi Mod, if we are going to play metaphysics, then let's play metaphysics.
Mod:
Yes, welcome to metaphysics. There are some good arguments out there, but no absolute proofs.
Is your statement absolute? If not, then you must mean that there are some absolutes.
Mod:
Sounds like a roundabout way of saying, 'one cannot experience the objective since experience is necessarily subjective'.
Is that conclusion only subjective, or is it an objective truth?
Iano: I don’t know that it is problematic but it does appear to be problematic.
Mod: How do you know that it appears to be problematic unless your mind is able to know truth?
Iano: We both seem to agree that to know something you must have truth.
Mod: Only partly. Since we have established that we cannot know if we have truth, we must modify the meaning of 'know' to represent a communal agreement over the confidence one has in the truth of the proposition based on agreed upon criteria of truth.
Do you mean we must have faith in logic?
Mod:
The three primary truths don't kick start anything - you just have to accept them and note that you are accepting them if you are going to proceed with epistemology.
Yes, yes, that's what you mean. I agree!
Mod:
After we have assumed our mind can know truth, we can develop ways of getting at it. If we don't make this assumption no methodology follows.
I thought that we could not develope ways of doing this without smuggling in subjectivity?
Logic is the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to reality but by logic. Else there is none that is objective.
PLease hear me... It's not that we can know omnipotently that logic will lead us home. It's just that we know we will fall off a cliff as we grope around in the dark. So logic is our only possible light, to see in the darkness because as you said, we must assume it's validity because otherwise we are blind men for sure without hope!
Mod:
According to common usage, what you have is called a belief.
And what you have is what exactly? Are you absolutely sure you can answer that question objectively?
Mod:
Yet you agree that, when not talking about God, certain criteria of truth are just more reliable than others. You know that there isn't a star inside your computer, because it is incoherent with what you know about stars and computers.
If logic is valid yes. And it had better be for all of our sakes!
Mod:
It's language, iano, you are forever doomed to be its slave. If you want to say something you had best make sure you use the words that your audience understands.
But that would be speaking their language. If they refuse to speak logically, then you must either leave them, or join them.
Mod:
The criteria of truths are not a convenience - you use them, I use them others use them. Philosophy has long concluded that we are limited in how confident we can be in the truth of any given proposition.
I think it has been shown that the only way you can get to call your belief in God a knowledge is if you allow every madman and drug user the same licence to call their perceptions knowledge too. If that is your conclusion, that your knowledge of God is on an equal footing with 'The CIA have implanted a chip in my brain that controls my thoughts' and 'The clouds laugh purple as the earth quakes', then so be it.
Personally, I see no linguistic utility in using 'belief' as synonymous with 'knowledge'
Look at you talking out both sides of your mouth; 'modulating' your proofs as it were...
Mod... if belief is not synonymous with knowledge, then your belief in logic is meaningless. And as such, you derision upon my brother Iano is nothing but mystical incantations.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 90 by Modulous, posted 03-12-2008 9:32 AM Modulous has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 92 by Modulous, posted 03-13-2008 11:46 AM Rob has replied

  
Modulous
Member
Posts: 7801
From: Manchester, UK
Joined: 05-01-2005


Message 92 of 94 (460204)
03-13-2008 11:46 AM
Reply to: Message 91 by Rob
03-13-2008 9:13 AM


Re: An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding
Is your statement absolute?
Yes, it was an absolute statement. It was not an absolute proof. There is no absolute proof of my statement which was phrased in the absolute.
Is that conclusion only subjective, or is it an objective truth?
The clue is in the words. First, they were written by a self-confessed subjective being. Second, the words 'sounds like' implies 'to me it sounds like', which is in turn explicitly subjective.
Do you mean we must have faith in logic?
No. We simply cannot escape assumption number 3.
I thought that we could not develope ways of doing this without smuggling in subjectivity?
There's no need to smuggle it in - it's the vehicle we have to ride in order to cross the border. Knowing that this is the case, we can start to map the terrain of the land of epistemology. We realize our craft limits our ability to be entirely sure that our map relates to the terrain, and we accept then the principle of fallibilism. We can say that if the map tells us there should be a hill here, and we find a hill, then there is a good chance that our map is good. If everything we know about the local geophysics indicates that a hill is an entirely reasonable, or even inevitable feature, we can say our map seems to be good. If we can use what information is on the map to navigate to new places implied by the map - then our map seems to be good.
All the while we keep in mind that our map might be wrong, and so we continuously test the map against the terrain in as many ways as we can devise to increase our confidence. If a cartographer tells us that there is a forest of Uranium undulating in a sea of sulphuric acid 4 million miles away from the nearest chartered territories, then we might be sceptical. If they say they know it is the case because they have an inner feeling or they heard a noise they attribute to the forest or read about it in a book by an author they really trust has previously chartered that territory but whose navigational maps seem to be stylistic at best - downright incorrect in other areas which have since been relentlessly mapped by many different cartographers, and there is a blank space covering about 3,999,000 miles of the claimed journey...can we really agree that this counts as 'knowledge'?
And what you have is what exactly? Are you absolutely sure you can answer that question objectively?
It depends what you are referring to. I know that my screen name is Modulous and that people tend to call me Mod, which is the name I go about with in the skinworlds - if anything is to be called knowledge something like that is. That humankind should be free to pursue life, liberty and happiness is a belief that I hold.
I am absolutely sure that I cannot answer that question objectively since I am a subjective being.
But that would be speaking their language. If they refuse to speak logically, then you must either leave them, or join them.
Well, when you make an external communication - you have to make sure you're speaking the same language as the intended recipients. If the recipients are using words differently, try and find a new word to use that fits the usage you intend. If, even with the ambiguities inherent to natural language, the people you plan to communicate with are totally unreasonable - then the only sane choices are to try and teach them to reason, or not bother communicating at all.
Do you think that it is unreasonable to use the word knowledge to mean a held proposition that is true as best can be determined by various criteria of truth?
Mod... if belief is not synonymous with knowledge, then your belief in logic is meaningless.
I don't 'believe in logic'. That logic and reason can be successfully employed by the human mind to come to truths about the world is a starting assumption one cannot help but make if one is to hold any proposition as true. One cannot deny this assumption is true without assuming it is true first. Thus: it has to be if we're going to discuss epistemology.
If, for example, the assumption is false then iano cannot know God indeed nobody can know anything. Of course, since this statement implies also that I know we cannot know anything, I am actually assuming that I can reason towards truth, which I started off as assuming was false.
And as such, you derision upon my brother Iano is nothing but mystical incantations.
Since I have not claimed knowledge or belief in logic or reason - then the charge of mystical incantations thankfully does not follow.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 91 by Rob, posted 03-13-2008 9:13 AM Rob has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 93 by Rob, posted 03-13-2008 7:50 PM Modulous has replied

  
Rob 
Suspended Member (Idle past 5849 days)
Posts: 2297
Joined: 06-01-2006


Message 93 of 94 (460268)
03-13-2008 7:50 PM
Reply to: Message 92 by Modulous
03-13-2008 11:46 AM


Re: An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding
Modulous:
Since I have not claimed knowledge or belief in logic or reason - then the charge of mystical incantations thankfully does not follow.
Do you intend to tell me that you believe in nothing? And again, that you actually believe that?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 92 by Modulous, posted 03-13-2008 11:46 AM Modulous has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 94 by Modulous, posted 03-14-2008 4:39 AM Rob has not replied

  
Modulous
Member
Posts: 7801
From: Manchester, UK
Joined: 05-01-2005


Message 94 of 94 (460316)
03-14-2008 4:39 AM
Reply to: Message 93 by Rob
03-13-2008 7:50 PM


....a belief that I hold
Do you intend to tell me that you believe in nothing?
Do the following words, copied from the post you replied to, sound like somebody who intends to tell you that they believe in nothing?
quote:
That humankind should be free to pursue life, liberty and happiness is a belief that I hold.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 93 by Rob, posted 03-13-2008 7:50 PM Rob has not replied

  
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