What is a lie? [Archive]

Valley Oak

11-27-2007, 07:51 PM

Someone in this thread astutely observed that in order to answer this question it is necessary to find out what "truth" is. I remember many years ago in one of my classes at SRJC that most philosophers have said that there is NO Truth. Not with a capital "T," anyway.

That's an interesting subject all by itself and there's plenty of good thought out there that has supported that claim very effectively (e.g. a community "knows" that if someone steals then that person needs to have their hand cut off and americans "know" that if someone kills another person then the murderer has to be executed, etc. The idea is that because there is no "truth" (and therefore no "justice") then everything falls on the shoulders of the prevailing ethics of that community. If you think about the logical consequences of this point of view it can create a very chilling realization).

If we take the reverse of "there is no truth" and arrive at "there are no lies" or there is no dishonesty, what does that give you? If you disagree with the idea that lies or dishonesty don't exist, why do you feel that way? If a lie is based on a "truth" that doesn't really exist first place then how can you lie about it?

Strongly held beliefs, assumptions, and values are a lot like noodles; they start from nowhere and end up nowhere, with a lot of hot air and even a lot of bloodshed in between. For what? So some people can feel satisfied that they are "right?" This thought reminds me of the movie "Easy Rider," specifically the night camp scene where the two protagonists are having a conversation with the character played by Jack Nicholson. Nicholson's character, among other anecdotes, talks about how people who believe they are free (when in reality they are not) will get real busy killing people to prove that they are free.

What do you think about any of these reflections?

Edward

Braggi

11-27-2007, 10:47 PM

mykil

11-27-2007, 11:15 PM

Spoken like a true atheist!
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Now is it a lie we are talking about or THE LIE? LMAO!

If you are decapitated, you will die.

That is The Truth with two capital "T"s.

-Jeff

Willie Lumplump

11-27-2007, 11:57 PM

I remember many years ago in one of my classes at SRJC that most philosophers have said that there is NO Truth.
Which philosophers might those be? Like Don Carlos, for example--Don Carlos and his famous 100-foot gnat? Do you think it is true that the area of a square is the length of one side multiplied by itself? Do you think it is true that the Declaration of Independence was signed on July 4, 1776? Do you think it is true that child molesters are a menace to society, or does that simply depend on one's subjective point of view? Do you think it is true that global warming is occurring, or does the temperature of the earth depend on who's doing the measuring? To say that there is no truth is to say that there is no reality. To say that there is no truth also leads to an embarrassing and inescapable contradiction: If the statement "There is no truth" is true, the statement itself must be untrue. In other words, the statement contains its own negation. This situation is a sure sign that you're barking up the wrong tree.

Strongly held beliefs, assumptions, and values are a lot like noodles; they start from nowhere and end up nowhere, with a lot of hot air.
I believe strongly that the value of pi, to an approximation of five decimal places, is 3.14159. Would you care to point out the hot air in that belief?

Willie Lumplump

11-28-2007, 12:01 AM

In my view, a lie is when you feel guilty about something you say that is not true!
So what you're saying is that a sociopath cannot tell a lie. Is that correct?

ChristineL

11-28-2007, 01:32 AM

So what you're saying is that a sociopath cannot tell a lie. Is that correct?

Mykil, I've got to take up Willie's point here. Those of us with consciences could define a lie the way Mykil did. Sociopaths, and I have know a few, lie continuously, and feel no guilt.

When it comes to personal disagreements between two individuals (which do not involve anything along the lines of the value of pi), there is usually His truth/her truth (or his/his or hers/hers) and the real truth somewhere in between. Gossip is sometimes a lie, sometimes a truth and often an exageration or personal interpretation of a particular event. I would say a lie is a purposeful and/or deliberate misrepresentation of facts or emotions meant to mislead another or others.

Braggi

11-28-2007, 07:06 AM

Spoken like a true atheist!
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But I'm not an atheist, Mykil.

I'm a deeply religious man.

But I'm not an imbecile.

-Jeff

alanora

11-28-2007, 08:31 AM

What is your own, personal, subjective "perception" of the value of pi, and should not a pluralistic, democratic society like ours respect the right of local school boards to choose a different value more suitable to children's needs?
Pi works in this dimension, however may not in others. Useful hypothetical construct.
What is your "slant" on the date of the signing of the Declaration of Independence?
Weren't there folks that signed at a later date?Date also being a human useful construct in this dimension, vibratory rate.
What is your personal "attitude" toward child pornography, and how much tolerance and respect should we accord those who take a different attitude? There is great diversity of opinion what constitutes pornography. How about the naked baby butt picture every one thinks is so darling? What about american babies with guns..that is pornographic to me. Playing devil's advocate? Real beliefs? Got to go sorry messed up in quotation land.....

If the Greenland and Antarctic ice caps melt and your house is submerged under 20 feet of sea water, to how do you propose to honor the politicians who attribute the submergence to an unusually heavy morning dew? No matter the example given and chosen response, we will have to wait til the event to see how we all deal with it. Somehow, we put those politicians in their post......they are us, we are them, it is all one.

mykil

11-28-2007, 09:55 AM

Funny you should mention such a thing their Willie; for I have lived with a sociopath for many years. She was the mother of my children. In her eyes it was clearly a lie, she just would not help herself. Thus this really became HER reality. She new she was telling a lie, but in what she would say there alwayz was a little truth to make the story more presentable. In her manipulating little mind if there was a little bit of truth she could justify exaggerating the rest. An example would be, one of the kids fell and hit her head. Well that ran into a big dog came running by that was huge grabbed the child by the arm and dragged her down the street, while all the time she was running after the dog screaming and the dog finally dropped her and the child hit her head. Thus I was so upset I went to get something to calm my nerves and now I am lying on the bed and can even move, also that might be why I am slurring my words! In my mind it was really simple, the child hit her head and you took a little pill. End of story. Every thing that came out of her mouth was somehow fabricated, everything! So it was not a lie cause I pretty much new the story before I walked into the house, one of those psychic things their Mr. LMAO!
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A few years latter I happened to date another social path and she was just too much, I don’t think she was a where of how it would play out, but she really had a story line form hell. She was an FBI agent, working in forensics, going to the JC to become a doctor at the same time. Man she was out there it took me almost a month to figure out her story, and I am like, what am I doing here, another one, how many of you are out there? WOW! Anyway she new she was telling a lie, and there really was no truth to her little fantasy either, so the severity varies in what little I have seen. But they all have a little guilt going on, there for my scenario stands firm. From personal experience that is. I am not so sure about how deep it goes, how much further you can take it before losing the guilt. I think it starts as a thrill and continues throughout ones life just to seek that thrill of getting away with something. They do have the guilt, so there for it is a lie, they know they are telling a lie; they do have the guilt in there somewhere. If they did not have the guilt they would not do it! Plain and simple, for that is why they do it to get a little high just by saying a little lie!

So what you're saying is that a sociopath cannot tell a lie. Is that correct?

Dark Shadows

11-28-2007, 10:04 AM

This is a distorted view of reality, and not really so much a lie because the person believes its true.

My children seem to remember things that happend in the past differently than I do. I think it has something to do with their brains not being fully developed when they experienced whatever it was. Also, parents tend to remember things differently when their brain functioning has started to decline. I don't believe that has happened to me yet! Also, your memory seems to be colored by what you are told by other people, especially when your brain has not fully developed, or if your functioning is diminished.

What is a lie?

Please give your understanding of what a lie is, keeping in mind the fact that there are different kinds of lies (white, etc) and situations in life (work, duty, family, religious faith, politics, etc).

For example, if a person says something that is untrue but honestly believes that it is the TRUTH, then what is that called?

Edward

Valley Oak

11-28-2007, 12:38 PM

I can't remember the philosophers but I'm not asserting that there is no truth, although it may seem that is what I'm doing. I do believe in the 'relativity' of truth (truth depends on many variables) and also that strongly held beliefs routinely substitute the truth (religion, patriotism, social class, administration of justice, cultural traditions, public policy, etc).

I believe that the Declaration of Independence was signed on that date unless I'm making an uninformed mistake. But you need to take into account that that date is an empirical and observable fact (unless someone 'cooked' the books). An historical event, however, is profoundly different from prevailing cultural values. People too often make the mistake of confusing a strongly held belief or generally accepted social value with the truth.

You made a razor sharp observation by saying that the statement, "There is no truth" contradicts itself. I don't think that most people picked up on it.

Like you, I also strongly believe what you said about the five decimal places of pi and global warming but those are supported by scientific research and (to help explain their objective validity) anyone in the world with the proper procedures and materials can reproduce those same findings with little or no variation.

When I submitted my question to this list, "What is a lie," I did so to encourage debate and help answer some of my own questions. When I mentioned in one of my posts the idea that "there is no truth," I did so to help stimulate discussion; I did not mean it as a statement of fact nor that I believe it myself to be "true." ;-D

Thank you for your input. I always enjoy your posts.

Edward

Which philosophers might those be? Like Don Carlos, for example--Don Carlos and his famous 100-foot gnat? Do you think it is true that the area of a square is the length of one side multiplied by itself? Do you think it is true that the Declaration of Independence was signed on July 4, 1776? Do you think it is true that child molesters are a menace to society, or does that simply depend on one's subjective point of view? Do you think it is true that global warming is occurring, or does the temperature of the earth depend on who's doing the measuring? To say that there is no truth is to say that there is no reality. To say that there is no truth also leads to an embarrassing and inescapable contradiction: If the statement "There is no truth" is true, the statement itself must be untrue. In other words, the statement contains its own negation. This situation is a sure sign that you're barking up the wrong tree.

I believe strongly that the value of pi, to an approximation of five decimal places, is 3.14159. Would you care to point out the hot air in that belief?

Willie Lumplump

11-28-2007, 02:37 PM

No matter the example given and chosen response, we will have to wait til the event to see how we all deal with it.
I'm going to hope that you're referring to the part of my post concerning global warming rather than child molestation. However, global warming is as much a current event as child molestation, so the moment that you're waiting for is here. Now what?

Somehow, we put those politicians in their post......they are us, we are them, it is all one.
"We"? "We"? I'm reminded of the joke about the Lone Ranger and Tonto who find themselves in the middle of four bands Indian warriors converging on them from all directions. The Lone Ranger asks in desperation, "What are we going to do now, Tonto?" Whereupon Tonto replies, "What you mean 'we,' White Man?" Anyway, I bridle against any attempt to associate me with the present crop of corrupt, war-mongering politicians who have done their utmost to set up a fascist government in this country. Like Tonto, I have to ask, "What you mean 'we'?"

But to return to your original point, do you still hold to your agument that truth is always relative to people's perceptions? If so, when your house is 20 feet under water, you'll have no problem. Just alter your perceptions a little so that the water only covers your front steps.

Willie Lumplump

11-28-2007, 02:50 PM

Valley Oak

11-28-2007, 03:58 PM

I think we are making progress but not the kind you want.

Specifically, you want me to make a public declaration on the "truth" about child molestation, womens equality, and other cultural issues. I will humor you by saying that I honestly believe that child molesters are a threat to society and that womens' equality is a critical and fundamental right that is still being denied today, including right here in the United States (e.g. access to abortion, employment, aggregate accumulation of wealth, occupation of public office, etc). (and the subject of abortion is another biggy).

But the "truth" is that you are missing the point here. Human values, tragically, don't enjoy the same privilege as pure science does because it is subjective and not empirical and provable like math or the natural sciences (the Earth is round and revolves around the sun, which is a star). Sorry to disappoint you. If you have this conversation with a deeply religious person then their "truth" is that god exists, of course. That is clearly a cultural bias. You cannot scientifically prove or disprove the existence of "god," whatever that is (and it is a different "god" for every person who chooses to believe in such a thing).

I remember I had a highly charged debate with The Phiant (dead or alive?, male or female?) over the existence or not of "god" and it came to a stalemate because "she" insisted that I had to declare publicly what my conception of "god" was. Absurd, of course, because you can't demand from an atheist like me to express what "god" is. I posted the Webster's Dictionary's definition of "god" in order to provide her with a response and "she" flew off the handle big time.

Your (Willie's) cultural prejudices and hot emotional buttons are with child molestation and womens' equality and you are blind to it, just as blind as a religious fanatic is about the "truth" of the existence of "god." You are very american and very subjective in your prejudices about what the "truth" is.

Try to remember the Burning Times: (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Witch-hunt). This was a period of a few hundred years of European history where the "truth" (the christian truth) was to publicly burn to death witches and heretics. It was obviously "true" that they were satanists or some such social evil that had to be done away with through the most barbaric means possible.

We are not much different today with our cultural prejudices (torture in Iraq and kidnapping, suspension of habeas corpus, etc) except that because we were all born and raised in this historical time period then what is "true" is not questioned because we are caught up in the cultural subjectivity and prevailing ethics of our time period. People who question these contemporary and prevailing cultural prejudices are often labeled as "supporting the terrorists" or the communists or, ultimately, the "witches" of our time. The last public execution of "witches" anywhere in the world took place right here in territory that was later to become the United States (Salem, Massachusetts).

"True" to our cultural heritage, we americans have never stopped scapegoating a minority group (Arabs, Muslims, blacks, Jews, women, the poor, political dissidents, etc) for a new version of "witches" to persecute for our social ills. Hitler did this with the Jews, Communists, Socialists, gays, and the mentally and physically challenged (the mentally retarded and invalids were also executed in Nazi Germany). It worked very well; just ask a Holocaust survivor who ever tried arguing for his rights with a Nazi (the discussion was a short one if it even took place at all, as you might imagine). If you had asked Hitler or most any German if it was "true" that these minority groups had to be rounded up and executed in mass, I don't think there would be any doubt they felt it was the "truth."

The questions you are asking are not if our prevailing cultural prejudices (in the U.S. today, for example) about what the "truth" is are very relative, because they are. Your questions are about specifying and agreeing with what exactly those prevailing prejudices are. But that's another turn in the discussion.

Edward

Maybe we're making progress. I dunno. I'm still interested in your opinion about child molestation. How relative is the statement that child molesters are a menace to society? How relative is the statement that American culture is superior to Saudi Arabian culture with respect to the recognition of the innate dignity of women? These are cultural traditions, are they not? By cultural tradition, we disapprove of child molesters. By cultural tradition, American women are accorded the same rights as men (at least in principle), and Saudi Arabian women are treated like prisoners and children. Is there no objective truth to be found in these comparisons? Can we identify no truths for all humanity to use as guideposts? Did John Stuart Mill have any valuable insights on this subject?

mykil

11-28-2007, 04:28 PM

Edward; I don’t give way to your outcome on the above mentioned. I truly believe it has to all come down to the guilt. You say that all of Germany thought killing Jews and others was the truth, when I believe every single one of them had some sort of guilt locked up knowing what they where doing was wrong, even Hitler himself! Knowing you have guilt about something is plain and simple. That makes it a LIE! Getting all warped and wrapped up in trying to prove something is the truth is just plain outside of the box. Way outside the box, and way off track You asked what is a LIE. This has to be what each of us conger up in our own worlds and our own conscienceless. Nothing more nothing less!!!

https://home.comcast.net/%7Ejunknjewels/images/offtopic.gif

I think we are making progress but not the kind you want.

Specifically, you want me to make a public declaration on the "truth" about child molestation, womens equality, and other cultural issues. I will humor you by saying that ...

Willie Lumplump

11-28-2007, 05:25 PM

Your (Willie's) cultural prejudices and hot emotional buttons are with child molestation and womens' equality.
I think your philosophy would put us on a very slippery slope. If negative feelings towards child molesters are an example of cultural prejudice, then what else would be a cultural prejudice? Negative feelings toward murderers? How about perpetrators of genocide? Would it be fair to say that the Nuremburg trials of Nazi war criminals were based on the cultural prejudices of the victorious allies? It seems to go against intuition to say that objections to the holocaust are somehow prejudicial. Yet that seems to be exactly what you're saying:

"If you had asked Hitler or most any German if it was 'true' that these minority groups had to be rounded up and executed in mass, I don't think there would be any doubt they felt it was the 'truth.'"

I'm reminded of Abraham Lincoln's question to one of his colleagues: "How many legs does a dog have if you count the tail as a leg?" "Why, five, of course," came the reply. "Wrong," said Lincoln, "only four. Calling the tail a leg doesn't make it one."

As a committed humanist, I believe in moral absolutes just as strongly as any religious person. Religious people derive their moral authority directly from God. Where do humanists believe that morals come from? I guess I don't have a complete answer to that question, but I think that a partial answer is to be found in our genes. It's been demonstrated experimentally that our closest relatives, the chimpanzees, have a sense of fairness. They know what their fair share of a food source is, and they don't like it when another member of their tribe takes more than his share. The nature of fairness in human beings is an active subject of psychological research. Although I don't know how much of this research cuts across cultural lines, I'd be willing to bet that some basic principles are nearly universal in human populations.

Game theory, now an important part of evolutionary biology, shows that any sizeable population over time must include both a majority of "law-abiders" and a minority of "cheaters." When a population consists entirely of law-abiders, any cheater who arises in the population will have a significant advantage in capturing resources which make him reproductively successful. However, when the proportion of cheaters reaches a certain level, it is more advantageous to be a law-abider who can capture a greater share of resources by cooperating with other law-abiders against the cheaters. Somewhere in there are the beginnings of a comprehensive theory of evolutionary morality. No God, and no moral relativism that posits endless "prejudices." Rather, an actual biological theory of morality based on selective pressures and gene frequencies.

Valley Oak

11-28-2007, 07:15 PM

As far as being off topic is concerned, I felt it was more of an evolution of the thread because I really liked what one poster observed. The poster (can't remember who it was) said something along the lines of needing an understanding of what "truth" is first before we can answer my original question of "what is a lie?" If you want to insist that I'm still off topic then so be it:
Edward is off topic!!!
(dramatic music in background).

Your belief that it all comes down to guilt is your perception of the world, your interpretation of human nature, and how things work. It is just that: a belief, one that I and many other people do not share. The stereotype of Catholics and Jews "guilting" other people as a matter of cultural practice is famous because it is so negative, destructive, and wrong. But truth be told, it is a stereotype because most people in most cultures use the manipulative psychological weapon of guilt; it's not just catholix and Jews. Maybe you are a good example of this if you are not either catholic or Jewish. There are people in who are locked up for life in mental institutions for the criminally insane who have no conscience whatsoever. Your idea that there must be some little notion of guilt locked up somewhere in the person's brain or soul is a fabricated assertion.

I do not believe that Hitler and other people who did what they did felt secretly guilty inside. The idea that Hitler and his Nazis felt guilt about their actions is just plain silly. Hitler and the rest of his gang believed just as strongly in the horrible acts they were committing just as strongly as you believe (and probably more so) in your "guilt theory." On another note, a lie is a lie by its own "merit" and not because a person feels guilty about it. What if a person feels guilty about something they shouldn't feel guilty about. Thousands of therapy sessions are about this. This concept of guilt, by the way, has a strong, religious root.

Another huge misconception is that Hitler and other Nazis, if not all of them, "were crazy." Nothing could be further from the truth. Many people for decades hypothesized, with no evidence at all, that Hitler suffered derangement from a venereal disease such as syphilis or Gonorrhea, again, totally false. Hitler and his entire Nazi Party pals were in a perfect biological state of mind when they did what they did. Sure, their ethics were really fucked up in a huge way but they were physically healthy and successful in their personal lives with careers, most with good incomes (the top officials), with a house, a family, a dog, and a cat! If you look at the newsreels of the "administrators" and functionaries of the deadly concentration camps you will see that they were are normal, healthy, hard-working people who swallowed Hitler's lies whole or were coerced into doing whatever they had to do for a living. This is critical truth (and yes, I'm not putting quotes around it this time) that most people are either unaware of or simply refuse to believe.

Furthermore, I did not say that ALL Germans believed in what they were doing (genocide, the Fuhrer, etc). In fact, millions of Germans (many of which later became soldiers against their will for Hitler's invasions) had voted for the Communist Party of Germany, the Social Democratic Party (which today is in a coalition government with Chancellor Angela Merkel's Christian Democratic Union), and were also members or supporters of labor unions and other political formations that vigorously and publicly opposed Hitler and his Nationalist Socialist German Workers Party (Nazi Party, NSDAP) in both national elections in 1932 (July and November). Hitler was appointed Chancellor in January of 1933 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_election%2C_July_1932).

Edward; I don’t give way to your outcome on the above mentioned. I truly believe it has to all come down to the guilt. You say that all of Germany thought killing Jews and others was the truth, when I believe every single one of them had some sort of guilt locked up knowing what they where doing was wrong, even Hitler himself! Knowing you have guilt about something is plain and simple. That makes it a LIE! Getting all warped and wrapped up in trying to prove something is the truth is just plain outside of the box. Way outside the box, and way off track You asked what is a LIE. This has to be what each of us conger up in our own worlds and our own conscienceless. Nothing more nothing less!!!

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Valley Oak

11-28-2007, 08:10 PM

I edited the original version of this post so please try to respond (if you care to) this latest one. The previous one is incomplete. Thanks.

It would be interesting to elaborate on what you mean by "slippery slope." I find it interesting that you equate a child molester with a murderer. The State of Virginia executes convicted child molesters. Maybe you should go live over there (and yes, this is a clear example of cultural prejudice).

Your mentioning slippery slope makes me think that if we don't take a stand somewhere on all issues then who and what is going to fill in all those millions of pages in our law books? Granted, each country is going to have a different set of rules for different kinds of administration and behavior but that is in part what I'm trying to underline. If the truth was so clear as you seem to make sound then WHY DO ALL COUNTRIES HAVE DIFFERENT LAWS FROM ONE ANOTHER REGULATING MOST ISSUES??? If "TRUTH" was so objective as you seem to believe then why all of the confusion and different interpretations of law and morality? Why aren't all the laws the same? Try answering that one.

Every country has to design its own laws and therefore on the shoulders of what do the creation of all of those laws rest on if not on the cultural orientation of that specific culture? That is what I believe.

I have negative feelings towards child molesters and murderers too. Did you think otherwise? On the other hand, I'm steadfastly against the death penalty because I think that is just as wrong. Do you think that I'm warped, like Mykil does, because I'm against capital punishment?

Regarding cultural prejudice, perhaps a more appropriate term would be "cultural orientation" or something else. Do you beleive that the U.S. cultural orientation, in the way that it is manifested in all of its laws and cultural practices is the only right way, better than any country in the world? If so, I beg to differ. The U.S. and its people are simply people and another system of government. We are not better than many countries around the world.

As a matter of fact, in comparison with quite a few other countries, the U.S. is a pretty fucked up society to live in with a lot of pig headed assholes for citizens and public office holders (e.g. Bush and his voters, practices of torture, lying to start a war with tens of thousands of dead people and counting to get the petroleum, etc). Also, the U.S. pales in regards to the quality of its democracy, its government, its social programs, and its domestic and foreign policies in general when contrasted to that of of dozens of other nations. The quality of democracy and the standard of living in many other industrialized democracies around the world is clearly and significantly superior to that of the U.S.

I object INTENSELY to the Holocaust! I'm sorry if my wording is giving you the wrong idea of where I stand on serious issues like that. But again, these are specifics and I guess using examples is hard to stay away from in a discussion of this type. I am still trying to emphasize the concept of "cultural orientation" and how they differ and differ greatly from one culture to the next. The "truth" for the average German citizen walking down the street (those who supported Hitler and his policies, anyhow) made sense to them.

BUT, this does not make it the truth just because they believed it to be so and did so STRONGLY. Having a very strong belief does not make something true, no matter how strongly and absolutely you believe it to be. If it's not true then it's not true. It doesn't matter how much you assert it or make laws to support it. But then, what is "truth?" I heard there is a sale on "truth meters" at Sears. I think we can all use one but who is the manufacturer of these truth meters?

I like and agree with Lincoln's witticism very much. The dog still only has only four legs.

Edward

I think your philosophy would put us on a very slippery slope. ...

mykil

11-28-2007, 08:24 PM

don

11-28-2007, 08:26 PM

What is a lie? For me it has less to do with the truthfulness of what is said or having guilty feelings, but rather more to do with the intention of what is being said.

If someone says something that they believe to be true and it's not, I would consider that a false statement, not a lie since there was no intent to mislead or deceive whoever they were telling.

Example: If someone tells me the time and they don't know that their watch is off by 30 minutes, I don't consider that a lie, even though that is not the "correct" time. Conversely, if they know the correct time and are trying to be deceptive or manipulative (like wanting to stay 30 minutes longer or leave 30 minutes earlier) and knowingly give an innacurate response, to me that is a lie.

Cheers
don

Valley Oak

11-28-2007, 08:39 PM

I'm glad to hear you are a Humanist. I identify with them, especially one of their former Presidents, the late Kurt Vonnegut.

Most religious people lose big points with me because they believe in something that doesn't exist; they are very gullible and delusional because of this. So, if I were in your shoes (and I clearly am not) I wouldn't go around comparing myself to religious people, especially with the notion that they actually have some enviable quality, such as moral absolutes. If you want to talk about moral absolutes as a topic in and of itself, fine, but not because it is something good just because religious people try to monopolize it.

As far as good moral judgment is concerned, I admire this quality in Humanists because they don't need the big threat that "You are going to burn in hell forever if you do this or if you don't do the other..."

People do not need god. The main reason is because it is a lie. Many people are afraid that if the majority of folks don't believe in god then all of society will up in flames and chaos and mass murder. That is such a foolish fear. Many people who people who believe in god have a pathetic opinion of human nature and feel better if their is the "fear of god" in us to keep us in line. Those people often hate atheists like me with a passion (passion of the christ, maybe?).

I believe that it was people who wrote all of those books on ethics and morality that we see in bookstores and Amazon.com, not other members of the animal kingdom or "god." There is obviously, in my opinion, an immense system of ethics because human beings are very intelligent animals. We created the ideas of right and wrong, ethics, morality, truth, lies, etc. Of course humans are capable of knowing the difference between right and wrong (or at least a satisfactory notion of it) without the "help" of the fear of god in them.

Sheer human intelligence and upbringing are the reasons for people's ability to perceive, practice, and perfect moral absolutes. The holy bologna is beneath us by several miles. Primitive men wrote that hogwash thousands of years ago. The bible is good to have around when you run out of toilet paper.

The game theory bit is interesting but it will have to be for another discussion.

Thanks again,

Edward

As a committed humanist, I believe in moral absolutes just as strongly as any religious person. Religious people derive their moral authority directly from God. Where do humanists believe that morals come from? I guess I don't have a complete answer to that question, but I think that a partial answer is to be found in our genes. It's been demonstrated experimentally that our closest relatives, the chimpanzees, have a sense of fairness. They know what their fair share of a food source is, and they don't like it when another member of their tribe takes more than his share. The nature of fairness in human beings is an active subject of psychological research. Although I don't know how much of this research cuts across cultural lines, I'd be willing to bet that some basic principles are nearly universal in human populations.

Game theory, now an important part of evolutionary biology, shows that any sizeable population over time must include both a majority of "law-abiders" and a minority of "cheaters." When a population consists entirely of law-abiders, any cheater who arises in the population will have a significant advantage in capturing resources which make him reproductively successful. However, when the proportion of cheaters reaches a certain level, it is more advantageous to be a law-abider who can capture a greater share of resources by cooperating with other law-abiders against the cheaters. Somewhere in there are the beginnings of a comprehensive theory of evolutionary morality. No God, and no moral relativism that posits endless "prejudices." Rather, an actual biological theory of morality based on selective pressures and gene frequencies.

Willie Lumplump

11-28-2007, 10:28 PM

this wuold be a good example of what is a good time to vote on one subject, whom feels the guilt, I am betting everyone, that would be one hundred percent! Any less and their is your lie! It really can only be this way if everyone feels the guilt, this qwould also become the Truth!
Roble is absolutely right about this. Many people don't feel guilt. People with Narcissistic Personality Disorder don't feel guilt because they simply aren't interested in other people's feelings. They know that other people have feelings, and they know that other people suffer, but people with NPD just don't care. The only feelings that they care about are their own. Around 1% to 2% of the population are this way. They make good criminals (sociopaths) because they don't have to worry about hurting anybody.

Willie Lumplump

11-28-2007, 11:20 PM

It would be interesting to elaborate on what you mean by "slippery slope."
What you're proposing is a philosophy of moral relativism. You're saying that all moral positions are only cultural orientations and therefore have a kind of parity. If that's true, it's impossible for a society to progress because there's no standard by which to evaluate progress. It wouldn't even be possible to judge a culture by its own standards because those standards wouldn't be any more valid than any other standards. I think that a system of moral absolutism can be based in reason (a la John Stuart Mill) or in biology (as various sociobiologists are doing now, although that may not be their explicit aim).

I find it interesting that you equate a child molester with a murderer.
Well, only for heuristic purposes.

WHY DO ALL COUNTRIES HAVE DIFFERENT LAWS FROM ONE ANOTHER REGULATING MOST ISSUES??? If "TRUTH" was so objective as you seem to believe then why all of the confusion and different interpretations of law and morality? Why aren't all the laws the same? Try answering that one.
Laws are not uniformly based in reason or biology, and that (along with different regional problems) accounts for the diversity of legal standards. However, the fact that all legal systems share certain common features suggests an underlying rational/biological basis for absolute standards. It's illegal to steal in all cultures. Murder is generally illegal, although certain cultures excuse it in some circumstances through redifinition. Incest is universally illegal, although there is some variation in how cultures define relatedness. Delivering false testimony under oath is universally illegal. One can argue that these similarities merely reflect specific cultural orientations, but it seems to stretch credulity to chalk the marked similarities up to coincidence.

I have negative feelings towards child molesters and murderers too. Did you think otherwise?
No, certainly not. I just think that you're mistaken to believe that your repugnance for these crimes reflects nothing deeper than arbitrary cultural standards.

Do you beleive that the U.S. cultural orientation, in the way that it is manifested in all of its laws and cultural practices is the only right way, better than any country in the world?
No, but that isn't what's at issue here.

The "truth" for the average German citizen walking down the street (those who supported Hitler and his policies, anyhow) made sense to them.
I doubt this. Most Germans grew desperate under the Weimar Republic, and desperation can drive people to make bad choices, but I believe that underneath, most Germans knew that what their country was doing was wrong. After all, only a few years before the catastrophe of the great German depression, Germany had been perhaps the greatest center of Western Culture.

BUT, this does not make it the truth just because they believed it to be so and did so STRONGLY. Having a very strong belief does not make something true, no matter how strongly and absolutely you believe it to be.
Yes, but you try to explain moral diversity by claiming that there is no such thing as absolute moral truth. That's the point that I disagree with.

mykil

11-29-2007, 09:55 AM

Please explain again one more time and write slowly so I may understand! I am not sure what your meanings are relating to this subject, what is a lie. From what you both seem to be saying is that if one percent gets away with only having feeling for themselves that the rest of society cannot decipher what a lie is? That is more than a Majority that feels they may be lying, you know like 99 to 1. So just because of that one percent there is no truth their for there is no lie? Get real! WE as a society can surly see past this, that is how with we actually know these people exist yes? I mean we wouldn’t know that they where even there in the first place if we didn’t believe they were lying the entire time yes? So you are going along the psychiatrics views that they really do exist, yet you are saying that they can’t be lying cause? You are denouncing and counter attacking everything these people have tried to focus on and teach us about these people that have a serious problem with their personal being in general when you say when can’t be telling a lye because in their world it is just the way they get by to make amends for themselves to come out on top. Explain to me again why that is not wrong? Why that as a majority, we the ninety nine percent, could possibly believe them to begin with, hell we know it’s a lie, they even know it’s a lie, just because they do something to get an edge for themselves does not make it right. That is why we have jails, institutes, police, and the whole psycho ward at Napa state and beyond yes? Do these people need our help because oh there truth? Do we need to keep them in check because they believe that they are right? Does the ninety nine percent count as truth? HELL YA!!!! <?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /><o:p></o:p>

Roble is absolutely right about this. Many people don't feel guilt. People with Narcissistic Personality Disorder don't feel guilt because they simply aren't interested in other people's feelings. They know that other people have feelings, and they know that other people suffer, but people with NPD just don't care. The only feelings that they care about are their own. Around 1% to 2% of the population are this way. They make good criminals (sociopaths) because they don't have to worry about hurting anybody.

Lorrie

11-29-2007, 10:07 AM

Well, only for hueristic purposes.
<DT class=hwrd>Main Entry: <DD class=hwrd><SUP>1</SUP>heu·ris·tic </DD><DT class=pron>Pronunciation: <DD class=pron>\hyu̇-ˈris-tik\ </DD><DT class=func>Function: <DD class=func>adjective </DD><DT class=ety>Etymology: <DD class=ety>German heuristisch, from New Latin heuristicus, from Greek heuriskein to discover; akin to Old Irish fo-fúair he found </DD><DT class=date>Date: 1821 </DT>: involving or serving as an aid to learning, discovery, or problem-solving by experimental and especially trial-and-error methods <heuristic techniques> <a heuristic assumption>; also : of or relating to exploratory problem-solving techniques that utilize self-educating techniques (as the evaluation of feedback) to improve performance <a heuristic computer program>
A heuristic is a method for helping in the solving of a problem, commonly informal. It is particularly used for a method that often rapidly leads to a solution that is usually reasonably close to the best possible answer. Heuristics are rules of thumb, educated guesses, intuitive judgments or simply common sense. In more precise terms, heuristics stand for strategies using readily accessible though loosely applicable information to control problem-solving in human beings and machine.

Learning something new everyday!!
:vali::vali::vali:

alanora

11-29-2007, 10:18 AM

There is no Absolute Moral Truth.

What you're proposing is a philosophy of moral relativism. ....

Willie Lumplump

11-29-2007, 10:55 AM

Please explain again one more time and write slowly so I may understand!
<HR style="COLOR: #a6a852" SIZE=1>You said, "In my view, a lie is when you feel guilty about something you say that is not true!" In the language of formal logic, you're saying that feeling guilt is a "necessary and sufficient condition" for telling a lie. (If A, then B.) Therefore, according to the rules of logic, if that necessary and sufficient condition (feeling guilt) is not present, then a lie cannot exist (If Not A, then Not B).

Willie Lumplump

11-29-2007, 10:57 AM

<DT class=hwrd>Main Entry: <DD class=hwrd><SUP>1</SUP>heu·ris·tic <DT class=pron>Pronunciation: <DD class=pron>\hyu̇-ˈris-tik\ <DT class=func><DT class=func>Oops! My dyslexia got the better of me. I reversed the e and the u.</DT>

Willie Lumplump

11-29-2007, 11:02 AM

There is no Absolute Moral Truth.
Perhaps, but here you're merely asserting the proposition that's in dispute. We all already know what the proposition is, the question now is, "What is the rational justification?"

Lorrie

11-29-2007, 11:09 AM

But only in Mykil's view...

[/color]

<HR style="COLOR: #a6a852" SIZE=1>You said, "In my view, a lie is when you feel guilty about something you say that is not true!" In the language of formal logic, you're saying that feeling guilt is a "necessary and sufficient condition" for telling a lie. (If A, then B.) Therefore, according to the rules of logic, if that necessary and sufficient condition (feeling guilt) is not present, then a lie cannot exist (If Not A, then Not B).

Willie Lumplump

11-29-2007, 11:21 AM

I edited the original version of this post so please try to respond (if you care to) this latest one.
Let me try another angle. Our earliest ancestors appeared about 6 million years ago; that's when our line, the hominids, split off from the chimpanzees. So man has had six million years to evolve a set of behaviors that maximize his chances of survival. Most of those behaviors have a social context because man has always lived in social groups. Behaviors that benefit the individual by benefiting the group we call "good" or "moral." Behaviors that benefit the individual but are neutral to the group we probably would also call "good" or "moral" because the group recognizes the individual's legitimate need to maximize his own chances of survival. Behaviors that benefit the individual at the cost of the group we would call "bad" or "immoral" because the group cannot tolerate individuals who reduce the group's chances of survival. Out of this admittedly primitive moral taxonomy, it might be possible to construct a comprehensive theory of moral absolutism. John Stuart Mill proposed his famous dictum "the greatest good for the greatest number of people" on rational grounds, and that was a foundation for moral absolutism (or at least I consider it so). What I'm saying here is that biology might provide another foundation.

Valley Oak

11-29-2007, 12:03 PM

It is believed that Jeremy Bentham coined and developed the idea of Utilitarianism although it is not 100% certain and there is a Greek philosopher who came close to the idea: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utilitarianism
But that's a just a quibble.

I find the idea your expressing to be interesting. I have a couple of reflections on this.

One, although I attribute humans' ability to create a system of ethics to biology (the large brain) I do not do so with the same idea that you are describing. Our complex system of morality is comparable to our other complex systems of economics, culture, technology, language, the arts, medicine, engineering, academia, government, law, science, religion, and a very long list of etceteras. Human beings are the only animals that have been capable of creating all of these complex systems to the extent that we have. Therefore, people's complex system of "right and wrong" is simply another complex system developed by a complex and intelligent animal.

The other reflection is that if we take into account our social class structure with our capitalist system we have clear, hard, and abundant evidence that a minority is exploiting, ripping off, and subjugating the majority in our society. All this while there are other countries around the world with much smaller economies yet with better democratic systems and higher standards of living. How does your idea stack up to that?

Edward

Let me try another angle. Our earliest ancestors appeared about 6 million years ago; that's when our line, the hominids, split off from the chimpanzees. So man has had six million years to evolve a set of behaviors that maximize his chances of survival. Most of those behaviors have a social context because man has always lived in social groups. Behaviors that benefit the individual by benefiting the group we call "good" or "moral." Behaviors that benefit the individual but are neutral to the group we probably would also call "good" or "moral" because the group recognizes the individual's legitimate need to maximize his own chances of survival. Behaviors that benefit the individual at the cost of the group we would call "bad" or "immoral" because the group cannot tolerate individuals who reduce the group's chances of survival. Out of this admittedly primitive moral taxonomy, it might be possible to construct a comprehensive theory of moral absolutism. John Stuart Mill proposed his famous dictum "the greatest good for the greatest number of people" on rational grounds, and that was a foundation for moral absolutism (or at least I consider it so). What I'm saying here is that biology might provide another foundation.

mykil

11-29-2007, 12:53 PM

A question comes to MY mind

Ok then let me examine things from my point of view. If I meet a woman and lie to her to get her to fall in love with me, she is really happy throughout our life and we die in each others arms of a very old age and truly happy and amazing life by anyone’s standards was I living a lie?

Willie Lumplump

11-29-2007, 02:03 PM

Willie Lumplump

11-29-2007, 02:14 PM

Our complex system of morality is comparable to our other complex systems of economics, culture, technology, language, the arts, medicine, engineering, academia, government, law, science, religion.
Not really. Morality is a part of culture, so you can't count the two separately. Economics, technology, the arts, medicine, engineering, academia, government, law, and science are all relatively recent inventions within the past 20,000 years or so and so aren't old enough to have played an important role in human evolution, including the evolution of moral behavior. Nobody knows how far back language goes, but probably not much more than 100,000 years. One hundred thousand years is less than 2% of the period of human evolution. Since chimpanzees and even New Caledonian crows have culture, it's probable that man's earliest ancestors did also. So in that sense morality is not comparable to other complex human behaviors and institutions.

if we take into account our social class structure with our capitalist system we have clear, hard, and abundant evidence that a minority is exploiting, ripping off, and subjugating the majority in our society. All this while there are other countries around the world with much smaller economies yet with better democratic systems and higher standards of living. How does your idea stack up to that?
In this country the elite ruling class is composed of "cheaters" (in the language of game theory) who have found a way to exploit the majority. Any realistic theory of moral absolutism will recognize that certain individuals will attempt to cheat. Non-religious "absolutism" doesn't mean that every single individual in a population will have the same moral system. It only means that there is a rational basis for standards of moral behavior that should be applied to all, even to cheaters.

alanora

11-29-2007, 07:38 PM

Not really. Morality is a part of culture, so you can't count the two separately. Economics, technology, the arts, medicine, engineering, academia, government, law, and science are all relatively recent inventions within the past 20,000 years or so and so aren't old enough to have played an important role in human evolution, including the evolution of moral behavior. Nobody knows how far back language goes, but probably not much more than 100,000 years. One hundred thousand years is less than 2% of the period of human evolution. Since chimpanzees and even New Caledonian crows have culture, it's probable that man's earliest ancestors did also. So in that sense morality is not comparable to other complex human behaviors and institutions.

In this country the elite ruling class is composed of "cheaters" (in the language of game theory) who have found a way to exploit the majority. Any realistic theory of moral absolutism will recognize that certain individuals will attempt to cheat. Non-religious "absolutism" doesn't mean that every single individual in a population will have the same moral system. quoteIt only means that there is a rational basis for standards of moral behaviorquote that should be applied to all, even to cheaters. Rational seems to imply a degree of agreement, as does standards. Morals has the same implication for me, as in agreed upon. We have not reached consensus in our relatively small bb community about anything as far as I can recall, and our population is more similar than dis. Morals change.....divorce, dress, abortion, women voting, blacks in the back of the bus and not in the pool are examples. There were those who would have screamed about the immorality of bared ankles on a woman. So it returns to the questions of whose morals, who's rationale and who does the applying? What exactly is cheating? fudging on those illegal irs deductions? Lusting after thine neighbor's wife in thought and/or deed? There is no common sense. There are as many slants as there are perceivers at least.....

"Mad" Miles

11-29-2007, 08:35 PM

Willie, Edward, Lorrie, Mykil, Alanora et al,

So what do we do when the "cheaters" are also the ones in charge of deciding what is the "rational basis for standards of moral behavior that should be applied to all"?

The subjects you are discussing here are highly complex and have been debated for centuries. As a student of Philosophy and Social / Political Theory "back in the day" some of what I learned is that there is a history to these debates. Some questions are perennial. But the details vary in different eras and different specific social / cultural / economic circumstances.

That said, one of the big questions seems to be, "Is reality/truth a concrete objective phenomenon subject to eternal, immutable natural law?" (Whatever the source of those laws, God, the accidental nature of things, or some combination of both) OR "Is all that we know as reality/truth the result of complex social/psychological processes and events which are fundamentally embedded in the human psyche, both individual and collective?" (i.e. It's all subjective, a matter of consensual validation, both conscious and unconscious. And for that matter what does it mean to say there is an unconscious and how does that work?)

Or better yet, it's all of the above in the following complex explanatory array of ...... which books do you want read?

A lie is a conscious misrepresentation of the truth, the truth as understood by the liar, for the purpose of deceiving others, or even oneself.

Accidentally or inadvertently mistating the truth is not a lie, its what called making a mistake.

(Yeah, I'm repeating previous comments, but for the purpose of affirming my agreement with those comments.)

Lieing can be overt. Stating a falsehood to deceive. It can be by omission. Not giving relevant facts while shading the truth by only reporting what will reflect well on oneself.

I discovered that in our society lieing is sometimes demanded by the power structure. Lies become necessary for the sake of avoiding unjust punishment. Or to simply survive. Is it a lie when one lies to liars who are threatening ones welfare and the only way to resist is to lie?

Willie, your sociobioligical reduction of all human behavioral motivation to the unconscious and random/chaotic patterns of genetic history, is just that, reductionism. It is internally consistent, and fairly easy to apply to multiple and complex human behavioral phenomenon. But it is just one way to explain things.

What about the ability of conscious humans to recognize their genetic and behavioral legacy (baggage?) and make choices to adapt and overcome the limits of "survival and seminal dispersal" in favor of adopted values and goals which are not reducible to the basic logic of sociobiology?

As to whether the Germans thought the Holocaust was a great idea, or were dragged into it by manipulative and corrupt/evil leaders (who of course thought they were doing the right thing for their people and did not see themselves as evil).... Well that debate is ongoing and has many, many levels and nuances too compex and requiring knowledge of a very large bibliography to address in this format. But the jury is still out on that one. It is an interesting debate, especially from the perspective of the statistically favored citizens residing at the center of the current world empire.

Edward, do you ask the provocative questions you ask to stir the swamp and see what floats to the top? Or are you just looking for interesting and beautiful patterns in the muddy eddies?

Utilitarianism was first articulated as such (although almost all ideas go around and come around under different labels over the ages) by Jeremy Benthem (also notable for having "invented" the Panopticon, the model for modern methods of surveillance) and it was further refined and articulated by his student John Stewart Mill. "The greatest good for the greatest number."

Or "The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few." as restated by most probably Gene Rodenberry (sp?) for his character, Spock.

But, there are different kinds of Utilitarian Ethics. From my fuzzy memory of the upper division Ethics class I had to take to complete my Philosophy B.A. requirements (twice since I incompleted the first time.) there is something called Act Utilitarianism as opposed to other variations, the names of which escape me.

In the early eighties, the most contemporary form of Ethics being touted in academia was....! Can't remember, but it wasn't Utilitarianism. There are various Ethical models used to discuss issues of Truth, Justice, Fairness, etc. Existentialist, Marxist, Utilitarian, Religious Tradition, Platonic, Kantian, etc.

Utilitarianism, in the Marxist interpretation of it, was an expression of the growing English Industrial Revolutionary Middle Class who needed to justify; their overthrow of traditional feudal Christian values, their new-found wealth and leisure at the expense of the masses of rural and urban industrial laboring poor. And to claim that their success was a result of a rational application of scientific Enlightenment and Post-Enlightenment ideas/values/truths to prove that their place in society was contributing to the general welfare. It was/is a crock.

After a few years as a student of these questions. I came to the tentative conclusion that most ethical systems are created after the fact to justify doing whatever the hell one wants to do.

But spreading ones genetic code as far and wide as possible, is not the only human (or animal) logic. What about the desire to have fun? Live a life of leisure and pleasure? Replicate ones identity via the dispersal of cultural and political values to as much of the rest of society as possible? In other words, to be right and prove that anyone that disagrees with you is wrong? To reduce all to the desire to attract as many sexual mates as possible ... we're a little more complex than simply that.

Mykil, What the F*^# are you getting at?!!

Lorrie, Je suis hereuse que nous t'amuse!

(Et pour le'monde francophonique, pardones moi pour mon Francais degoulas. Je'ete l'abas pour cinque mois seulement, et je parle pas francaise, je parle franglais, le grammaire anglais avec le (la?) vocabulaire Francais.)

Folks, this is what you get from several consecutive nights of about four hours sleep each. The ramblings of a fuzzy memory in a state of hallucinatory exhaustion.

Zut!

"Mad" Miles

:burngrnbounce:

Willie Lumplump

11-29-2007, 10:48 PM

Rational seems to imply a degree of agreement, as does standards. Morals has the same implication for me, as in agreed upon. We have not reached consensus in our relatively small bb community about anything as far as I can recall, and our population is more similar than dis. Morals change.....divorce, dress, abortion, women voting, blacks in the back of the bus and not in the pool are examples. There were those who would have screamed about the immorality of bared ankles on a woman. So it returns to the questions of whose morals, who's rationale and who does the applying? What exactly is cheating? fudging on those illegal irs deductions? Lusting after thine neighbor's wife in thought and/or deed? There is no common sense. There are as many slants as there are perceivers at least.....
The fact that morals change is in no way an argument against the plausibility of developing a rational or biological system moral absolutes. Just as the U.S. Constitution doesn't prescribe speed limits in school zones or numbers of burning permits, a set of absolute moral principles wouldn't prescribe all allowable behaviors down to women's dress lengths or trimester limits of abortions. All that's needed is a set of moral principles and a body of legal precedents based on those principles. This basic concept would have been well understood by the founding fathers who were both products of and creators of the Enlightenment. After all, the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, as well as the French Declaration of the Rights of Man, were a long step in the right direction. In my opinion, your disbelief in the possibility of developing universal moral principles is a sign of how far we have devolved since the time of the founding fathers. However short they may fallen of their ideals, they had a good sense of the grandness of their mission and the potential it held for the entire human race. We have lost that vision because it's incompatible with designs of the power elite who have seized control of all major institutions and who daily confirm us in our roles as commodity-consuming robots ready to be manipulated to whatever ends our masters choose.

Willie Lumplump

11-29-2007, 11:35 PM

Clearly you do, as you noted, need some sleep. Nevertheless, I will attempt to respond to a couple of your points

So what do we do when the "cheaters" are also the ones in charge of deciding what is the "rational basis for standards of moral behavior that should be applied to all"?
I doubt that we can get there from here because the present system is too corrupt. We'll have to start from scratch, and I do believe that we'll have that chance when the present system comes tumbling down.

one of the big questions seems to be, "Is reality/truth a concrete objective phenomenon subject to eternal, immutable natural law?" (Whatever the source of those laws, God, the accidental nature of things, or some combination of both) OR "Is all that we know as reality/truth the result of complex social/psychological processes and events which are fundamentally embedded in the human psyche, both individual and collective?"
After you've gotten a good night's sleep, I think that you'll see that you've proposed a set of false alternatives. Your first question is about objective reality, whereas your second is about perceptions of reality.

What about the ability of conscious humans to recognize their genetic and behavioral legacy (baggage?) and make choices to adapt and overcome the limits of "survival and seminal dispersal" in favor of adopted values and goals which are not reducible to the basic logic of sociobiology?
The ability that you describe was not instilled by God, nor did it just appear randomly out of thin air as a virtual quantum particle might. The ability was evolved, and like all such abilities was subject to evolutionary constraints. An ancestral tribe that adopted social values having negative survival value would produce fewer offspring than a tribe that adopted social values having positive survival value and would soon become extinct. We--I mean all of us, the whole human race--are descended from the former kind of tribes, and that fact gives us the ability to understand each other. It also provides a potential basis for developing a set of universal moral principles.

Utilitarianism, in the Marxist interpretation of it, was an expression of the growing English Industrial Revolutionary Middle Class who needed to justify; their overthrow of traditional feudal Christian values, their new-found wealth and leisure at the expense of the masses of rural and urban industrial laboring poor.
This strikes me as a bizarre statement considering that Marx was German, not English, and lived with his whole family in grinding poverty, kept alive only by the grace of his friend, Frederick Engels.

But spreading ones genetic code as far and wide as possible, is not the only human (or animal) logic. What about the desire to have fun? Live a life of leisure and pleasure?
Again, all of our human capacities and inclinations exist now because at one time they had survival value (or conferred sexual desirability, but that's another story). That's the only rational explanation for their existence. As for other animals, yes, spreading the genetic code is the only logic. The only test of Darwinian fitness is the number and quality of offspring.

To reduce all to the desire to attract as many sexual mates as possible ... we're a little more complex than simply that.
It's doubtful that any of our ancestors did this, and to the extent that such behavior exists today it is because of cultural overlays. I've already described what appears to be the natural state of humans, and attracting as many sexual mates as possible is not part of the picture; that would require unacceptable reproductive trade-offs.

Mykil, What the F*^# are you getting at?!!
Give the guy a break. He's figuring it out a little at a time.

Je suis hereuse que nous t'amuse!
On dirait plutot, "Je suis hereux que nous t'amusons." But you were close.

Folks, this is what you get from several consecutive nights of about four hours sleep each. The ramblings of a fuzzy memory in a state of hallucinatory exhaustion.
Nighty-night.

mykil

11-30-2007, 09:40 AM

Ok a different approach to enlighten Mykil<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /><o:p></o:p>
<o:p></o:p>
Lets use Christine and Willie<o:p></o:p>
<o:p></o:p>
On one hand we have Willie the atheist, <o:p></o:p>
on the other hand we have Christine the psychic<o:p></o:p>
<o:p></o:p>
If everyone was catching what was going on in a n earlier thread, Christine believes she can predict certain parts of the future, While Willie sayz there is no way in hell any one can do that ! Willie is pretty firm on this and believes he is telling the truth. Christine knows for a fact that she has psychic abilities and thinks Willie is way off track, [I was going to say ole coot but…]. Now someone has to be telling a lie right? They both cannot be telling the truth there fore one on the thought patterns is a down right lie!<o:p></o:p>
<o:p></o:p>
WHO is telling the truth?<o:p></o:p>

Willie Lumplump

11-30-2007, 10:25 AM

ChristineL

11-30-2007, 11:09 AM

Both of us believe that we're telling the truth, therefore neither of us is lying.

I completely agree...

Christine

Valley Oak

11-30-2007, 01:36 PM

This critical observation is precisely one of the areas I wanted to explore when I started this thread, "What is a lie?"

Thank you, thank you, and thank you,

Edward

I completely agree...

Christine

mykil

11-30-2007, 10:32 PM

So it comes down to there really be no truth, yes? If this is the way it is then there can be no truth ever, if Willie is right and Christine is right, than the only truth of the matter is a compromise of sorts. Even with them both persisting on their truth they have come to a stalemate and split the pot. Thus instead of arguing anymore and trying to figure out what is the truth the game has came to an end and both parties are telling the truth. There is a truth there is no truth what’s the difference eh? Both factions evolve around some sort of pacific and really are in there own little world. Atheists on one hand are arrogant in the fact that they say no way there is nothing, you are all a bunch of fruitcakes. When on the other hand the believers are just as plainly arrogant and insist there really is a mystical presence around us all.
<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /><o:p></o:p>
The problem I am seeing with this is when dear ole Edward decides to put up a new question and boom hot and cold again you guyz seem to be agreeing upon agreeing that both parties are in the right, both parties believe in their side of the story so BOTH PARTIES ARE RIGHT. Both parties speak the truth, then what in the hell was all the mumbo jumbo about in the first place. How can we have truth in two totally fashions and everyone is happy with this. If the question was, and still is by the way, is there such thing as the sprit world then both Christine and Willie would be all over it with no gloves, yet when you ask it in a different fashion both parties are telling the truth. Hhhmmmmmmm, having your cake and eating it too?
<o:p></o:p>
This is the same thing and both particulars have totally reevaluated their circumstances at the same time just to be able to adjust their own attitudes toward life and not call one another a liar yes? Both fashions have made their minds up so quickly on this subject that either took the time to even try to speak their own truths. One believes one does not, they argue to the point of exhaustion, yet when you reverse the question it has a different outcome, why? How can yoy argue something so strongly ion ones own mind and then back down sooo quicky when the question is the same just in a different frame of mind?

Sonomamark

11-30-2007, 11:44 PM

Or a delusion.

An untruth spoken by a person who knows he's not telling the truth.

A mistake.

Rucira

12-01-2007, 02:04 AM

a LIE is a deliberate misrepresentation of facts, regardless of purpose or intent. an untruth told when the person honestly believes it is factual is a misconception or deviance from accuracy due to inadvertant misinformation.:Yinyangv::2cents:

MsTerry

12-01-2007, 08:09 AM

willie is delusional(can't face the facts) and Christine is Enlightened (uses her abilities)

Ok a different approach to enlighten Mykil<o:p></o:p>
<o:p></o:p>
Lets use Christine and Willie<o:p></o:p>
<o:p></o:p>
On one hand we have Willie the atheist, <o:p></o:p>
on the other hand we have Christine the psychic<o:p></o:p>
<o:p></o:p>
If everyone was catching what was going on in a n earlier thread, Christine believes she can predict certain parts of the future, While Willie sayz there is no way in hell any one can do that ! Willie is pretty firm on this and believes he is telling the truth. Christine knows for a fact that she has psychic abilities and thinks Willie is way off track, [I was going to say ole coot but…]. Now someone has to be telling a lie right? They both cannot be telling the truth there fore one on the thought patterns is a down right lie!<o:p></o:p>
<o:p></o:p>
WHO is telling the truth?<o:p></o:p>

Sonomamark

12-01-2007, 03:43 PM

MsTerry, this is what is known as an ad hominem attack: an insult. Saying this makes no case for your position--it just insults the person you disagree with. It's fallacious and doesn't contribute to arrival at truth.

Mark

willie is delusional(can't face the facts) and Christine is Enlightened (uses her abilities)

Sonomamark

12-01-2007, 03:56 PM

It has come to my attention that MsTerry is ThePhiant. Looks like my Ignore list just got longer--in fact, doubled in size.

M

MsTerry, this is what is known as an ad hominem attack: an insult. Saying this makes no case for your position--it just insults the person you disagree with. It's fallacious and doesn't contribute to arrival at truth.

Mark

Tinque

12-01-2007, 11:57 PM

Lie- To utter falsehood with an intention to deceive. To occupy a horizontal or nearly horizontal position. To be present or contained. To rest untouched and un-noticed. An intentional violation of truth .. Websters Dictionary 1941

I ,for one ,detest lies and will never be able to be contained ! An Oxymoron ? You all tell me.. Not that anyone has an opinion here ! I want to hear it !:heart:

MsTerry

12-02-2007, 09:12 AM

Christine's truth is based on her own experiences and the testimonials of people she has helped. this is a truth based in fact.

I agree with you that Willie's belief system is an ad hominem attack.
he has no studies to back up his claim, he has no data to show the validity of his statement, he has no personal experience with the kind of things Christine is able to do, i.e. he has no clue how she does it
his belief that people who think differently, are therefore wrong is a false truth,
an artificial supposition designed to attack people who are using their abilities to help others
and since it is meant to harm people, I believe we can call his statements
a concealed lie

MsTerry, this is what is known as an ad hominem attack: an insult. Saying this makes no case for your position--it just insults the person you disagree with. It's fallacious and doesn't contribute to arrival at truth.

Mark

mykil

12-02-2007, 11:33 AM

Oh now miss Terry; I don’t believe that anyone is telling a lie, I just believe that the assumption that they are both telling the truth is just out there! LMAO! I mean all in all they both cannot be telling the truth!
<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /><o:p></o:p>
Arguments usually arise out of pure ego and there is nothing you may do to outwit or even out smart an individual that is destine to really have their way be “THE TRUTH”. EGO is the way of the world and to protect it you really are not lying in your mind when you have nothing to do but project this. Your Ego takes over and really becomes the truth. How can you argue with ones ego? When this has taken over and the one becomes an individual outside of the collective. The ego makes one selfish, temped in wayz that become more of a lie than they would normally give way to. they have to be through absorbing each of us into their own worlds, there can be no compromise. This is their truth and they are stuck with it. In many wayz their way is the truth, for it is THEIR TRUTH, not necessarily the truth but…
<o:p></o:p>
How can one even conceder a compromise with this sort of power trip? What can one say to try and get the one to join the collective once again and become our truth? How does one get through to one like this? How on this earth has not used their ego to provoke such a scenario? A lie is a lie and that is that you cannot have guilt if you don’t know it is there. If one’s ego doesn’t acknowledge it to be a lie that is it a lie? I am pretty sure it is but that is one mans opinion!
<o:p></o:p>
We should work on solutions and not arguments, dwelling on egoz makes for just more argument and nothing gets done. We are all over the argument of the situation, but none of us even vary much from our own egoz. Thus the argument continues and so do the lies! Hhmmmm just my morning thoughts, peace love and I am alwayz right!!!! My ego tells me soooooooo!!!

Christine's truth is based on her own experiences and the testimonials of people she has helped. this is a truth based in fact.

I agree with you that Willie's belief system is an ad hominem attack.
he has no studies to back up his claim, he has no data to show the validity of his statement, he has no personal experience with the kind of things Christine is able to do, i.e. he has no clue how she does it
his belief that people who think differently, are therefore wrong is a false truth,
an artificial supposition designed to attack people who are using their abilities to help others
and since it is meant to harm people, I believe we can call his statements
a concealed lie

Willie Lumplump

12-02-2007, 12:05 PM

So it comes down to there really be no truth, yes? If this is the way it is then there can be no truth ever, if Willie is right and Christine is right, than the only truth of the matter is a compromise of sorts. Even with them both persisting on their truth they have come to a stalemate and split the pot.
You say that 2+2=4, while I say that 2+2=5. Since there can be no truth ever, then the only possible truth is a compromise. Therefore we should agree that 2+2=4.5.

Thus instead of arguing anymore and trying to figure out what is the truth the game has came to an end and both parties are telling the truth.
This violates a cardinal priniciple of logic, that a proposition and its contradiction cannot both be true. Besides, if you're talking about the conflict between Christine and me, as far as I'm concerned the most important issue was whether or not a person claiming to be a psychic can be sincere. In that disagreement, Christine was clearly the winner, because I've totally recognized her sincerity, and by implication there must be many other self-proclaimed psychics who are equally sincere.

Atheists on one hand are arrogant in the fact that they say no way there is nothing
Atheists say that "there is nothing"? I believe that this philosophy is called "solipsism," and I don't know any atheists who are solipsists. Anyway, the atheists I know would be perfectly willing to adopt a theist point of view if they ever saw sufficient supporting evidence.

The problem I am seeing with this is when dear ole Edward decides to put up a new question and boom hot and cold again you guyz seem to be agreeing upon agreeing that both parties are in the right, both parties believe in their side of the story so BOTH PARTIES ARE RIGHT. Both parties speak the truth, then what in the hell was all the mumbo jumbo about in the first place.
I see two possible issues: (1) Which parties are speaking the truth? and (2) Which parties are speaking sincerely? You seem to have conflated these two issues in your mind, and you don't seem to have understood any of the repeated attempts to explain the difference.

How can yoy [sic] argue something so strongly ion [sic] ones [sic] own mind and then back down sooo quicky when the question is the same just in a different frame of mind?
As Winston Churchill said, "My views are subject to a harmonious process that keeps them in relation to current reality."

Willie Lumplump

12-02-2007, 12:15 PM

willie is delusional(can't face the facts) and Christine is Enlightened (uses her abilities)
I find it curious that a person defending enlightenment would chose the name Ms Terry (=mys tery, get it?). And the only mysteries here are (1) why anyone would doubt that ThePhiant and Ms Terry are the same person, and (2) why Barry would tolerate this violation of his policy that each member must register under only one name.

Willie Lumplump

12-02-2007, 12:26 PM

Arguments usually arise out of pure ego
Perhaps in your world, but in mine arguments are usually about substantive issues.

and there is nothing you may do to outwit or even out smart an individual that is destine to really have their way be “THE TRUTH”
I am always ready to be convinced by new evidence that meets some tests of relevance, logic, and consilience. But if you can present no such evidence, you shouldn't be surprised when I present counter-arguments based on evidence that I consider valid. Does that make me egotistical in your eyes, the fact that the strength of my beliefs is proportional to the strength of the evidence supporting them?

Barry

12-02-2007, 01:03 PM

... (2) why Barry would tolerate this violation of his policy that each member must register under only one name.I allow people to change their usernames (preferably just once). The username ThePhiant hasn't been used in 3 weeks. I have already posted that it is fine with me if lulu uses MsTerry instead of ThePhiant. I see it has a username change. I am granting "her" the blessing of a new identity, without the baggage of TP, in hopes that "she" will choose to participate in a more constructive manner. Although her recent ad hominem attack (https://www.waccobb.net/forums/showthread.php?p=43650#post43650) doesn't bode well. Again, I hope she will post what she thinks, and not attack others for what they think.

MsTerry

12-02-2007, 01:59 PM

1) this is an ad hominem attack
2) you are not addressing the issue
3) if TP and MsTerry are one (as you claim) what does that make you?

I find it curious that a person defending enlightenment would chose the name Ms Terry (=mys tery, get it?). And the only mysteries here are (1) why anyone would doubt that ThePhiant and Ms Terry are the same person, and (2) why Barry would tolerate this violation of his policy that each member must register under only one name.

Zeno Swijtink

12-02-2007, 02:18 PM

I find it curious that a person defending enlightenment would chose the name Ms Terry (=mys tery, get it?). And the only mysteries here are (1) why anyone would doubt that ThePhiant and Ms Terry are the same person, and (2) why Barry would tolerate this violation of his policy that each member must register under only one name.

I for one am not convinced that MsTerry and ThePhiant are the same person: ThePhiant's writing was sharper, funnier than anything I have seen MsTerry post.

MsTerry may be a student of ThePhiant, still using learning wheels.

MsTerry

12-02-2007, 02:23 PM

Barry ,

I am flattered that you consider me The Phiant.
but as long as you think that everyone with the same IP is one person, there is no "the blessing of a new identity, without the baggage", quite the contrary I might say.
and it remains a mystery to me why no one has picked up on Roble's involvement in all of this.
who started the thread
<table class="tborder" id="threadslist" align="center" border="0" cellpadding="6" cellspacing="1" width="100%"><tbody><tr><td class="alt1" align="left" nowrap="nowrap">
</td>  <td class="alt1" id="td_threadtitle_28169" title="I have heard rumors that the Phiant has disappeared somewhere. This is of great concern since he/she has been one of the most colorful characters here in the Wacco Kingdom. I propose that we organize a search party, at least an electronic one, to...">   Search party for the Phiant (https://www.waccobb.net/forums/showthread.php?t=28169)
</td></tr></tbody></table> who restarted the Poll: Trolls: vote who is a troll on Wacco (https://www.waccobb.net/forums/showthread.php?t=25776)
and as the final coup de grace who started this thread
<table class="tborder" id="threadslist" align="center" border="0" cellpadding="6" cellspacing="1" width="100%"><tbody><tr><td class="alt1" align="left" nowrap="nowrap">
</td>  <td class="alt1" id="td_threadtitle_28804" title="What is a lie? Please give your understanding of what a lie is, keeping in mind the fact that there are different kinds of lies (white, etc) and situations in life (work, duty, family, religious faith, politics, etc). For example, if a person says...">  What is a lie? (https://www.waccobb.net/forums/showthread.php?t=28804)
</td></tr></tbody></table>and what was his REAL motivation
give me a break, all you Sleuth finders, but you are barking up the wrong tree

I allow people to change their usernames (preferably just once). The username ThePhiant hasn't been used in 3 weeks. I have already posted that it is fine with me if lulu uses MsTerry instead of ThePhiant. I see it has a username change. I am granting "her" the blessing of a new identity, without the baggage of TP, in hopes that "she" will choose to participate in a more constructive manner. Although her recent ad hominem attack (https://www.waccobb.net/forums/showthread.php?p=43650#post43650) doesn't bode well. Again, I hope she will post what she thinks, and not attack others for what they think.

Barry

12-02-2007, 02:50 PM

...
but as long as you think that everyone with the same IP is one person, there is no "the blessing of a new identity, without the baggage", quite the contrary I might say.It's not about IP addresses as it is about the content/style of the posts. The matching IP addresses merely confirms it. And IP addresses can be masked, as we know...

and it remains a mystery to me why no one has picked up on Roble's involvement in all of this.At least Roble's posts (generally) have not been attacking anybody (on this board, that is).

It doesn't really matter if you are in fact the same person as ThePhiant or not. What matters is that your posts so far appear to be completely in line with those of ThePhiant. And in time, they will be met with the same reaction as those of ThePhiant.

While readers of this protracted thread will be tipped off to the postulated nexus of ThePhiant and MsTerry, if you appear elsewhere readers will need to do some research to find the connection. However, MsTerry is already accumulating it's own dossier.

Tinque

12-02-2007, 02:54 PM

The interesting thing I have found is that when one is subject to lying, one tends to believe in their lies and eventually they really believe in their statements..

Willie Lumplump

12-02-2007, 06:33 PM

I allow people to change their usernames (preferably just once). The username ThePhiant hasn't been used in 3 weeks. I have already posted that it is fine with me if lulu uses MsTerry instead of ThePhiant. I see it has a username change. I am granting "her" the blessing of a new identity, without the baggage of TP, in hopes that "she" will choose to participate in a more constructive manner. Although her recent ad hominem attack (https://www.waccobb.net/forums/showthread.php?p=43650#post43650) doesn't bode well. Again, I hope she will post what she thinks, and not attack others for what they think.
Oh, good! The universal order is preserved.

Willie Lumplump

12-02-2007, 06:50 PM

The interesting thing I have found is that when one is subject to lying, one tends to believe in their lies and eventually they really believe in their statements..
I think this is really an excellent point. I've certainly had the experience of lying to myself and believing my own lie more and more as time goes by. Maybe that's what Shakespeare had in mind when he wrote, "To thine own self be true."

In really pathological cases, such as the administration of George W. Bush, the distinction between truth and lies becomes so unimportant that the whole notion of truth is lost. I'm sure that when Bush and his scurvy crew sit down at a policy session, they don't ask themselves, "Now, is this true?" What they ask themselves is, "Will people believe this?" The question of how true something is never even comes up.

Willie Lumplump

12-02-2007, 06:59 PM

MsTerry

12-02-2007, 10:23 PM

Yes!
besides being Roble, I am also Mykil and Rucira (see posts 26, 47, 53)
LuLu used to sing;
Lumpity-lump-lump, Lumpity-lump-lump, look at Willie go!
(from Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer)

I think if we identify all wacco members who don't know that sentences begin with a capital letter and end with a period, we may yet uncover the truth. Or, to put it another way: i think if we identify all wacco members who don't know that sentences begin with a capital letter and end with a period, we may yet uncover the truth

Lorrie

12-03-2007, 09:15 AM

Miles! Dude~ No parlayvu France-a:

I don't know what you said, and so I went to Google to have em translate it, this is what it says you said Ha ha ha

And le'monde Francophone, pardones me for my French degoulas. Je'ete the abas for five months, and I spoke no French, I speak franglais, English grammar with (the) French vocabulary.)

I still don't get it~

According to Webster's though this is what a lie is...:

<DD class=hwrd><SUP>1</SUP>lie <DT class=pron>Pronunciation: <DD class=pron>\lī\ <DT class=func>Function: <DD class=func>intransitive verb <DT class=inf>Inflected Form(s): <DD class=inf>lay \lā\; lain \lān\; ly·ing \lī-iŋ\ <DT class=ety>Etymology: <DD class=ety>Middle English, from Old English licgan; akin to Old High German ligen to lie, Latin lectus bed, Greek lechos <DT class=date>Date: <DD class=date>before 12th century 1 a: to be or to stay at rest in a horizontal position : be prostrate : rest (https://www.m-w.com/dictionary/rest), recline (https://www.m-w.com/dictionary/recline) <lie motionless> <lie asleep> b: to assume a horizontal position —often used with down carchaic : to reside temporarily : stay for the night : lodge (https://www.m-w.com/dictionary/lodge) d: to have sexual intercourse —used with with e: to remain inactive (as in concealment) <lie in wait>

Ha ha Just Kidding:

<DT class=hwrd>Main Entry: <DD class=hwrd><SUP>3</SUP>lie <DT class=func>Function: <DD class=func>verb <DT class=inf>Inflected Form(s): <DD class=inf>lied; ly·ing <DT class=ety>Etymology: <DD class=ety>Middle English, from Old English lēogan; akin to Old High German liogan to lie, Old Church Slavic lŭgati <DT class=date>Date: <DD class=date>before 12th century intransitive verb 1 : to make an untrue statement with intent to deceive 2 : to create a false or misleading impression transitive verb : to bring about by telling lies <lied his way out of trouble>
synonyms lie (https://www.m-w.com/dictionary/lie), prevaricate (https://www.m-w.com/dictionary/prevaricate), equivocate (https://www.m-w.com/dictionary/equivocate), palter (https://www.m-w.com/dictionary/palter), fib (https://www.m-w.com/dictionary/fib) mean to tell an untruth. lie (https://www.m-w.com/dictionary/lie) is the blunt term, imputing dishonesty <lied about where he had been>. prevaricate (https://www.m-w.com/dictionary/prevaricate) softens the bluntness of lie (https://www.m-w.com/dictionary/lie) by implying quibbling or confusing the issue <DURING prevaricate>. equivocate (https://www.m-w.com/dictionary/equivocate) implies using words having more than one sense so as to seem to say one thing but intend another <equivocated endlessly in an attempt to mislead her inquisitors>. palter (https://www.m-w.com/dictionary/palter) implies making unreliable statements of fact or intention or insincere promises fib (https://www.m-w.com/dictionary/fib) applies to a telling of a trivial untruth <fibbed about the price of the new suit>.
Encyclopedia on line says:

A lie is a type of deception (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deception) in the form of an untruthful statement with the intention to deceive, often with the further intention to maintain a secret or reputation, or to avoid punishment (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Punishment). To lie is to state something one believes is false (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False) with the intention that it be taken for the truth (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truth) by someone else. A liar (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liar) is a person who is lying, who has lied, or who lies repeatedly.
Lying is typically used to refer to deceptions in oral or written communication. Other forms of deception, such as disguises or forgeries, are generally not considered lies, though the underlying intent may be the same; however, even a true statement can be considered a lie if the person making that statement is doing so to deceive. In this situation, it is the intent of being untruthful rather than the truthfulness of the statement itself that is considered.

These are the types of lies there are according to the Online Encyclopedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lie#Types_of_lies
Ok?
-------------------------------------------------------

Lorrie, Je suis hereuse que nous t'amuse!

(Et pour le'monde francophonique, pardones moi pour mon Francais degoulas. Je'ete l'abas pour cinque mois seulement, et je parle pas francaise, je parle franglais, le grammaire anglais avec le (la?) vocabulaire Francais.)

Folks, this is what you get from several consecutive nights of about four hours sleep each. The ramblings of a fuzzy memory in a state of hallucinatory exhaustion.

Zut!

"Mad" Miles

:burngrnbounce:

</DD>

"Mad" Miles

12-03-2007, 06:09 PM

Willie Lumplump

12-03-2007, 07:21 PM

Valley Oak

12-03-2007, 07:43 PM

Yes, it's true! Ms. Terry has finally found me out! I really am up to something here, ladies and gentleman. It is insidious, calculating, unscrupulous, cold, sinister, and a long list of other adjectives (feel free to ad a few of your own if you think I missed some really crucial ones).

I must confess to my devious ways because Ms Terry taught the blood hounds their craft! You can't pull one over her (him?) and while I can fool everyone including the president (which actually is not that hard to do) I cannot pull the wool over Ms Terry's eyes. She's just too sharp and you have to get up REALLY early in the morning to fool her razor sharp sense and eagle eyes.

I am waving the white flag here folks. With Ms Terry around, I feel like Professor Moriarty being defeated by Sherlock Holmes' superior talent and altruistic virtues. My mere self is no match for her visionary wit, charm, humor, and x-ray perception, which transcend by leaps and bounds all others in the Wacco Kingdom.

I have been exposed for what I truly am. Darn, Ms. Terry, have you no mercy ???

Edward

Barry ,

I am flattered that you consider me The Phiant.
but as long as you think that everyone with the same IP is one person, there is no "the blessing of a new identity, without the baggage", quite the contrary I might say.
and it remains a mystery to me why no one has picked up on Roble's involvement in all of this.
who started the thread
<table class="tborder" id="threadslist" align="center" border="0" cellpadding="6" cellspacing="1" width="100%"><tbody><tr><td class="alt1" align="left" nowrap="nowrap">
</td>  <td class="alt1" id="td_threadtitle_28169" title="I have heard rumors that the Phiant has disappeared somewhere. This is of great concern since he/she has been one of the most colorful characters here in the Wacco Kingdom. I propose that we organize a search party, at least an electronic one, to...">   Search party for the Phiant (https://www.waccobb.net/forums/showthread.php?t=28169)
</td></tr></tbody></table> who restarted the Poll: Trolls: vote who is a troll on Wacco (https://www.waccobb.net/forums/showthread.php?t=25776)
and as the final coup de grace who started this thread
<table class="tborder" id="threadslist" align="center" border="0" cellpadding="6" cellspacing="1" width="100%"><tbody><tr><td class="alt1" align="left" nowrap="nowrap">
</td>  <td class="alt1" id="td_threadtitle_28804" title="What is a lie? Please give your understanding of what a lie is, keeping in mind the fact that there are different kinds of lies (white, etc) and situations in life (work, duty, family, religious faith, politics, etc). For example, if a person says...">  What is a lie? (https://www.waccobb.net/forums/showthread.php?t=28804)
</td></tr></tbody></table>and what was his REAL motivation
give me a break, all you Sleuth finders, but you are barking up the wrong tree

mykil

12-03-2007, 08:24 PM

WoW ; the more I re-read this the more I think we all need to be medicated!!!!

Willie Lumplump

12-04-2007, 10:25 PM

WoW ; the more I re-read this the more I think we all need to be medicated!!!!
No, not you. Anybody who writes such a mouthwatering recipe for preparing a goose has already spiritually evolved far past the need for any sort of medication. I doff my hat to you :tiphat: (the highest compliment that I'm capable of).

Frederick M. Dolan

12-26-2007, 06:45 PM

But to return to your original point, do you still hold to your agument that truth is always relative to people's perceptions? If so, when your house is 20 feet under water, you'll have no problem. Just alter your perceptions a little so that the water only covers your front steps.

If by "truth" you mean "true statements," then truth is relative to at least one thing, namely language. There can be no truth, i.e. no true statements, without language, that is a medium in which the true statements are expressed. Since language is a human capacity, it follows further that truth is relative to human beings or, to put it differently, there can be no truths (true statements) but for the existence of human beings who can formulate them and to whom they make a difference.

Of course, none of that implies that truth is relative to the personal, private perceptions and utterances of any given individual. So the reductio ad absurdum argument that if truth were relative we could change material reality by changing our perceptions doesn't apply. No, we can't change material reality by changing our perceptions but yes, truth is relative (to language, cognition, perception, etc.).

However, an important implication of the fact that truth is relative to language is that we can change our assessment of the VALUE of reality (or aspects of it) by changing our INTERPRETATION of that reality.

(It is true that there are instances where "truth" seems to refer to things rather than statements about things, e.g. "true gold" as opposed to fake. But that's unusual usage and in any case doesn't seem to be what's at stake in this argument.)

Willie Lumplump

12-26-2007, 06:58 PM

There can be no truth, i.e. no true statements, without language, that is a medium in which the true statements are expressed.Of course there wouldn't be any statements without language, but that's only a tautology. And since true statements are a category of statements, true statements can't exist without language. But surely truth must exist independently of our statements about it. The world would still be round even if all people suddenly disappeared leaving no one to make statements.

Zeno Swijtink

12-26-2007, 07:03 PM

This is all well, as far as it goes, but do you see these remarks applying to anything that went on in this conversation you are rekindling?

If by "truth" you mean "true statements," then truth is relative to at least one thing, namely language. There can be no truth, i.e. no true statements, without language, that is a medium in which the true statements are expressed. Since language is a human capacity, it follows further that truth is relative to human beings or, to put it differently, there can be no truths (true statements) but for the existence of human beings who can formulate them and to whom they make a difference.

Of course, none of that implies that truth is relative to the personal, private perceptions and utterances of any given individual. So the reductio ad absurdum argument that if truth were relative we could change material reality by changing our perceptions doesn't apply. No, we can't change material reality by changing our perceptions but yes, truth is relative (to language, cognition, perception, etc.).

However, an important implication of the fact that truth is relative to language is that we can change our assessment of the VALUE of reality (or aspects of it) by changing our INTERPRETATION of that reality.

(It is true that there are instances where "truth" seems to refer to things rather than statements about things, e.g. "true gold" as opposed to fake. But that's unusual usage and in any case doesn't seem to be what's at stake in this argument.)

Zeno Swijtink

12-26-2007, 07:37 PM

Of course there wouldn't be any statements without language, but that's only a tautology. And since true statements are a category of statements, true statements can't exist without language. But surely truth must exist independently of our statements about it. The world would still be flat even if all people suddenly disappeared leaving no one to make statements.

The world is everything that is the case. (Wittgenstein I)
The world is a text. (Derrida)

Frederick M. Dolan

12-26-2007, 09:12 PM

If truth = true statements, then no, truth doesn't exist independently of statements. If there were no people left, there would be no descriptions, hence no true descriptions, hence no truths. "The earth is flat" is a statement, an assertion. It exists, has meaning, only for those who speak the relevant language. Unless you want to say that truth is a property of things and not statements about things, which would yield the odd idea that there are true and false THINGS rather than true and false claims about things. Truth exists only in a world of contending descriptions of things. Take away the descriptions, and the people who communicate them, and you take away the truth.

Of course there wouldn't be any statements without language, but that's only a tautology. And since true statements are a category of statements, true statements can't exist without language. But surely truth must exist independently of our statements about it. The world would still be flat even if all people suddenly disappeared leaving no one to make statements.

Frederick M. Dolan

12-26-2007, 09:20 PM

Excellent question! The implication is that the nature of lying is to be found by exploring, to use a terminological barbarism, inter-subjectivity. It's about sincerity, trust, and mutually acknowledged and accepted commitments, not some idea about a correct linguistic picture. To tell the truth is to be willing to give an account of the grounds on which I assert X that is satisfying to my interlocutor. Truthfulness is a social practice, a relationship between individuals.

This is all well, as far as it goes, but do you see these remarks applying to anything that went on in this conversation you are rekindling?

Frederick M. Dolan

12-26-2007, 09:25 PM

Meaning is use. (Wittgenstein II)
What is the use of truth? (Nietzsche)

The world is everything that is the case. (Wittgenstein I)
The world is a text. (Derrida)

Willie Lumplump

12-27-2007, 12:47 PM

If truth = true statements, then no, truth doesn't exist independently of statements. If there were no people left, there would be no descriptions, hence no true descriptions, hence no truths.Setting aside the issue of my "senior moment" description of the world as flat, there seems to be some semantic confusion over truth versus reality. I'm using the words pretty much interchangeably. If they can't be used interchangeably, what are we to make of the statement, "The truth is that the world is round"? Suppose that somebody (like me) says that and then everybody disappears. Would it still be true that the world is round? Or would it be untrue that the world is round but correct to say that in reality the world is round?

Frederick M. Dolan

12-27-2007, 02:57 PM

The truth/reality conflation may indeed be a source of misunderstanding for me, because the two terms have very different meanings in my eyes.

I think your question pertains to the relationship between statements and the things statements are about. Some people argue that this relationship is one of reference: statements refer to things. However, a statement might refer to a thing without being true, as when I say that “The cat is on the mat” when in fact the cat is in the bathtub. So the relationship between true statements and the things they are about isn’t captured by the idea of reference. So you could say that in the case of true statements about things, the statement CORRESPONDS to the thing. To say that “The cat is on the mat” is true is to say that the statement “The cat is on the mat” corresponds to the cat in question in that it is indeed on the mat.

Now if one accepts this picture of things, then what you are expressing about truth and reality fits seamlessly: if what makes “The world is round” true is its correspondence to the state of affairs it describes, then clearly it would be correct to say that in reality the world is round even if all the people who could assert the world’s roundness were to disappear, in which case, however, it would be just as clearly wrong to say that anybody was in possession of the truth that the world is round. This “realist” perspective seems to capture the view that many scientists are attached to, that science describes what reality (i.e., the natural world) is like independently of human beings, their minds, capacities, desires, etc.

The problem is that although the correspondence theory of truth (or realism) has a long and respectable list of defenders, there are even more who reject it. Their idea is not so much that the thesis that science gives us knowledge of the world as it is independently of us is untrue, but rather that it simply doesn’t make sense. There are many versions of this argument, the most influential being Donald Davidson’s. For Davidson, acquiring truths or beliefs about things, interacting with things, and competently speaking or thinking in one’s language are all inextricably connected with one another.

The essence of this picture is that to acquire any given individual true belief, you must first have acquired the whole mass of interrelated practices that constitutes a language, which you will have done while also interacting with things. That means that you are never in a position to acquire a belief about things that is not already conditioned by your linguistic practices, nor are you ever in a position to isolate a linguistic practice (or other human activity) from the non-human world of things. For this reason, the very idea of “reality as it is independently of us” makes no sense.

Of course as a practical matter there is no harm in playing the language-game of science and speaking in evidentiary terms about entities that were here before we were and will be here after we’re gone, such as atoms, gravitational fields, etc. But given the Davidsonian anti-realist account, one would have to say such things somewhat ironically, knowing that in fact the idea of things as they are in themselves is incoherent.

Setting aside the issue of my "senior moment" description of the world as flat, there seems to be some semantic confusion over truth versus reality. I'm using the words pretty much interchangeably. If they can't be used interchangeably, what are we to make of the statement, "The truth is that the world is round"? Suppose that somebody (like me) says that and then everybody disappears. Would it still be true that the world is round? Or would it be untrue that the world is round but correct to say that in reality the world is round?

Willie Lumplump

12-27-2007, 05:17 PM

The truth/reality conflation may indeed be a source of misunderstanding for me, because the two terms have very different meanings in my eyes. Etc., etc., etc.I'm not sure how much of all that I understood, but anyway a complication that I find troublesome is that we have no way of experiencing reality directly. What we think of as reality is a model that our brain constructs based on sensory input and some interpretations based on our past experience with models. On the other hand, what are we to make of "realities" that our brain can't model, like dark matter for instance? Since no one knows what dark matter is, our brains must not be able to model it. But then, when you think about it, much of what we know about the universe is invisible to all our senses--quarks, atoms, and so forth. Certainly we model things on a macro scale, like trains and chickens and pin heads, but is it correct to say that we model things that are detectable only through a long chain of inferences that starts with observable phenomena? This kind of thing really makes my head ache.

And then, the ultimate headache is the classic interpretation of quantum mechanics, the Copenhagen School interpretation. Quantum phenomena don't have a real existence (unless you call a state of superposition "real") until they are observed, so in some sense the mind creates reality, an idea that all scientists find terribly noxious (though perhaps true). I'm reminded again of why I like insects so much.

Frederick M. Dolan

12-27-2007, 05:55 PM

Not to be too glib about it, but if we accept Davidson's argument that the very idea of "reality independent of us" is incoherent, then we are experiencing reality directly -- in the sense that reality consists of inextricably entwined human practices and things in which each is conditioned by the other. Our experience of that is as direct as anything could be; nothing comes between us and it. We can only imagine that we are not experiencing reality directly, and be troubled by that, if we suppose that reality = that which is independent of us and our practices. On Davidson's view, there's just no place for a concept of "reality independent of us" in our inquiries. What we're doing is proposing models and trying to come up with models that work, as defined by the practices of our communities of inquiry and their technologies, etc. We're in as direct contact with that as we can be -- and that's all we need.

I'm not sure how much of all that I understood, but anyway a complication that I find troublesome is that we have no way of experiencing reality directly. What we think of as reality is a model that our brain constructs based on sensory input and some interpretations based on our past experience with models. On the other hand, what are we to make of "realities" that our brain can't model, like dark matter for instance? Since no one knows what dark matter is, our brains must not be able to model it. But then, when you think about it, much of what we know about the universe is invisible to all our senses--quarks, atoms, and so forth. Certainly we model things on a macro scale, like trains and chickens and pin heads, but is it correct to say that we model things that are detectable only through a long chain of inferences that starts with observable phenomena? This kind of thing really makes my head ache.

And then, the ultimate headache is the classic interpretation of quantum mechanics, the Copenhagen School interpretation. Quantum phenomena don't have a real existence (unless you call a state of superposition "real") until they are observed, so in some sense the mind creates reality, an idea that all scientists find terribly noxious (though perhaps true). I'm reminded again of why I like insects so much.

"Mad" Miles

12-27-2007, 07:01 PM

But Willie,

Your conclusion leads me to ask, do insects like you? Or is your love of them unrequited?

Waccobb.net Subscribers,

Particularly active participants in the "intellectual" badinage that frequents this board,

For the purposes of full disclosure I wish to declaim that Fred Dolan has been my good friend for over thirty-two years.

No, I didn't force, beg or plead for him to join us Waccies, but I have referred to our discussions, and to others' and my own occasional contributions/interventions, over the last five years, during his and my conversations. It could be argued that I suckered him in. I'm sure he'd deny it. But the case could be made.

Fred and I do not always agree. And I stopped actively reading Political and Social Philosophy circa 1987, while Fred is a professional academic and accomplished Philosopher. I've always enjoyed our conversations, and most of our arguments, over the years.

So it is with a certain pride, and a great deal of affection, that I welcome him to our little share of alternate reality, here in cyberspace, and what I often refer to as, my online community.

I've resisted any impetus to defend Fred against the attacks of the last few days, even though I've felt the urge, because: He's a "Big Boy" and can handle himself better than most when it comes to intellectual debate/discussion, Most everybody on this board is a lightweight compared to him, And in spite of his kind and reasonable approach to intellectual pursuits, he's got Mad Skills (redundant claim I know, but this bears repeating).

To use the most trenchant metaphor that comes to mind (Fred, forgive me for the following) all those seeking to rationally or emotionally wound my friend had best beware, he'll take your (theoretical) eye out before you can blink. Just because he doesn't, doesn't mean he couldn't with the sauvest of ease.

In an exparte email communication with Fred a couple of evenings ago, I warned him of the dangers of jumping into this social swamp with both feet and splashing around, before learning the lay of the land. In spite of his eagerness, I think he has handled himself ably.

(I loved the "charity principle" of intellectual debate! Didn't hear that back when I was a bit player in the academic game.)

But the metaphor that came to my mind last night, apropos the recent discussions of our evolutionary / anthroplogical past here on waccobb, is that some new "buff" male has shown up on the savannah, and all the comfortable and settled Alphas sense a threat to their dominance, so they are huffing and puffing and beating their chests, to impress the resident females lest they (the females) stray from the harem.

A flawed metaphor, I know, who's in whose harem is a mystery to me. (Although Mykil seems to be cleaning up by playing the "Happy Idiot". Pace Jackson Browne, and Mykil)

This is all to say that, Fire Away! Braggi/Jeff, SonomaMark, et al. But you might want to observe how Willie and Zeno defend the home turf for examples of a "Gentleman's Discussion", and Fred too of course.

He's been an intellectual example to me over the years, even when we didn't agree, which occurs frequently.

And just to underscore my point, I've been in the rhetorical trenches of the Left, both soft and hard, and can take a metaphorical eye out with the best and worst of them.

Let's leave my own experiences of physical mayhem aside for now. (SoCA Punk Rock scene '78-'84, used to break up fights in the Pit at the Whiskey on an ongoing and regular basis, etc.)

I'm writing about respectful communication, and it's opposite, here.

If Fred won't step up to vigorously defend himself when under egregious ad hominem attacks, I just want him, and everybody else listening and reading here in waccoland, to know that I have his/your back!

Guess I'm in a combative mood, even more than my usual.

Saw "Predator vs. Aliens: Requiem" yesterday. Saw "Charlie Wilson's War" this afternoon. I suppose my "blood is up...."

For a graphic description of my mood I refer you to the lyrics of "Steppin' Razor" by Peter Tosh:

https://www.lyricsdownload.com/peter-tosh-steppin-razor-lyrics.html (https://www.lyricsdownload.com/peter-tosh-steppin-razor-lyrics.html)

Watch My Eyes,

(Theoretically, Metaphorically and Figuratively speaking/writing here ONLY!!! No, I'm not Literally calling anyone out for physical combat!!!

Why I need to include this proviso, is only because of the regular incidents here of the ironically challenged just not getting it. Call it the Precautionary Principle in action...)

"Mad" Miles

A Tactical, But Not A Philosophical, Pacifist

Both in the "Real World" (Whether Independent of Consciousness, or Socially Constructed) and in the world of Simulacra/Communication/Inter-Subjectivity, etc., etc., etc.,

:burngrnbounce:

P.S. Looks like y'all aren't the only ones beating his chest and huffing, init? (No, not a cheap drug reference, Jeez!). Now where did I put MY harem?! Girlz?

P.P.S. If you aren't too "'het up" by my bristling I suggest you carefully re-read Fred's recent efforts, and carefully read his future contributions. You might find that he's more sympathetic than some of you make him out to be. And certainly more interesting.

Yes, he's delivered a few intellectual body slams, but isn't that part of this process? Lower your defenses, you might find you like it in a world of nuance and sophistication. Obviously not where I dwell, at least not in this moment, but I do find it a pleasant place to visit once and a while.

P.P.P.S. The last mathematics I took in school was HS Senior year Advanced Math / Trigonometry, essentially Pre-Calculus. I have never studied The Calculus. (Why I didn't take Calculus my last year in HS is a long story, best kept for another day.)

In spite of my long-standing disenchantment with Mathematics, I've found the Math Thread interesting to read. I always liked the articles about new developments in Experimental and Theoretical Math when they were covered in the L.A. Times in the early eighties and in the NYT's in the mid eighties to late nineties.

Unfortunately the PD doesn't cover such subjects, and I only get the Sunday NYT's. If any news of major developments in Math comes out, please, do not hesitate to post it for us amateurs to try and understand.

That said, I do not think that a mathematical model is sufficient to describe and predict all natural, and certainly not all social/subjective/psychological, phenomenon.

Even though I was assured in 1984 by a fellow graduate student that such a mathematics did indeed, exist.

"M"M

Clancy

12-27-2007, 07:23 PM

I loved the "charity principle" of intellectual debate!

I do too, and IMO your friend is a welcome addition.

Zeno Swijtink

12-27-2007, 10:49 PM

(...) I've resisted any impetus to defend Fred against the attacks of the last few days, even though I've felt the urge, because: He's a "Big Boy" and can handle himself better than most when is comes to intellectual debate/discussion, Most everybody on this board is a lightweight compared to him, And in spite of his kind and reasonable approach to intellectual pursuits, he's got Mad Skills (redundant claim I know, but this bears repeating).

To use the most trenchant metaphor that comes to mind (Fred, forgive me for the following) all those seeking to rationally or emotionally wound my friend had best beware, he'll take your (theoretical) eye out before you can blink. Just because he doesn't, doesn't mean he couldn't with the sauvest of ease. (...)

Woow!! With a mother like this who needs enemies!

Frederick M. Dolan

12-27-2007, 11:47 PM

Miles, I'm blushing! Needless to say I have found debate and conversation and inquiry with you over the years enlightening, mind-expanding, and pleasurable. Whether or not we agreed had nothing to do with any of these valuable things. Agreement may be overrated; achieving understanding is more important.

But Willie,

Your conclusion leads me to ask, do insects like you? Or is your love of them unrequited?

Waccobb.net Subscribers,

Particularly active participants in the "intellectual" badinage that frequents this board,

For the purposes of full disclosure I wish to declaim that Fred Dolan has been my good friend for over thirty-two years.

No, I didn't force, beg or plead for him to join us Waccies, but I have referred to our discussions, and to others' and my own occasional contributions/interventions, over the last five years, during his and my conversations. It could be argued that I suckered him in. I'm sure he'd deny it. But the case could be made.

Fred and I do not always agree. And I stopped actively reading Political and Social Philosophy circa 1987, while Fred is a professional academic and accomplished Philosopher. I've always enjoyed our conversations, and most of our arguments, over the years.

So it is with a certain pride, and a great deal of affection, that I welcome him to our little share of alternate reality, here in cyberspace, and what I often refer to as, my online community.

I've resisted any impetus to defend Fred against the attacks of the last few days, even though I've felt the urge, because: He's a "Big Boy" and can handle himself better than most when is comes to intellectual debate/discussion, Most everybody on this board is a lightweight compared to him, And in spite of his kind and reasonable approach to intellectual pursuits, he's got Mad Skills (redundant claim I know, but this bears repeating).

To use the most trenchant metaphor that comes to mind (Fred, forgive me for the following) all those seeking to rationally or emotionally wound my friend had best beware, he'll take your (theoretical) eye out before you can blink. Just because he doesn't, doesn't mean he couldn't with the sauvest of ease.

In an exparte email communication with Fred a couple of evenings ago, I warned him of the dangers of jumping into this social swamp with both feet and splashing around, before learning the lay of the land. In spite of his eagerness, I think he has handled himself ably.

(I loved the "charity principle" of intellectual debate! Didn't hear that back when I was a bit player in the academic game.)

But the metaphor that came to my mind last night, apropos the recent discussions of our evolutionary / anthroplogical past here on waccobb, is that some new "buff" male has shown up on the savannah, and all the comfortable and settled Alphas sense a threat to their dominance, so they are huffing and puffing and beating their chests, to impress the resident females lest they (the females) stray from the harem.

A flawed metaphor, I know, who's in whose harem is a mystery to me. (Although Mykil seems to be cleaning up by playing the "Happy Idiot". Pace Jackson Browne, and Mykil)

This is all to say that, Fire Away! Braggi/Jeff, SonomaMark, et al. But you might want to observe how Willie and Zeno defend the home turf for examples of a "Gentleman's Discussion", and Fred too of course.

He's been an intellectual example to me over the years, even when we didn't agree, which occurs frequently.

And just to underscore my point, I've been in the rhetorical trenches of the Left, both soft and hard, and can take a metaphorical eye out with the best and worst of them.

Let's leave my own experiences of physical mayhem aside for now. (SoCA Punk Rock scene '78-'84, used to break up fights in the Pit at the Whiskey on an ongoing and regular basis, etc.)

I'm writing about respectful communication, and it's opposite, here.

If Fred won't step up to vigorously defend himself when under egregious ad hominem attacks, I just want him, and everybody else listening and reading here in waccoland, to know that I have his/your back!

Guess I'm in a combative mood, even more than my usual.

Saw "Predator vs. Aliens: Requiem" yesterday. Saw "Charlie Wilson's War" this afternoon. I suppose my "blood is up...."

For a graphic description of my mood I refer you to the lyrics of "Steppin' Razor" by Peter Tosh:

https://www.lyricsdownload.com/peter-tosh-steppin-razor-lyrics.html (https://www.lyricsdownload.com/peter-tosh-steppin-razor-lyrics.html)

Watch My Eyes,

(Theoretically, Metaphorically and Figuratively speaking/writing here ONLY!!! No, I'm not Literally calling anyone out for physical combat!!!

Why I need to include this proviso, is only because of the regular incidents here of the ironically challenged just not getting it. Call it the Precautionary Principle in action...)

"Mad" Miles

A Tactical, But Not A Philosophical, Pacifist

Both in the "Real World" (Whether Independent of Consciousness, or Socially Constructed) and in the world of Simulacra/Communication/Inter-Subjectivity, etc., etc., etc.,

:burngrnbounce:

P.S. Looks like y'all aren't the only ones beating his chest and huffing, init? (No, not a cheap drug reference, Jeez!). Now where did I put MY harem?! Girlz?

P.P.S. If you aren't too "'het up" by my bristling I suggest you carefully re-read Fred's recent efforts, and carefully read his future contributions. You might find that he's more sympathetic than some of you make him out to be. And certainly more interesting.

Yes, he's delivered a few intellectual body slams, but isn't that part of this process? Lower your defenses, you might find you like it in a world of nuance and sophistication. Obviously not where I dwell, at least not in this moment, but I do find it a pleasant place to visit once and a while.

P.P.P.S. The last mathematics I took in school was HS Senior year Advanced Math / Trigonometry, essentially Pre-Calculus. I have never studied The Calculus. (Why I didn't take Calculus my last year in HS is a long story, best kept for another day.)

In spite of my long-standing disenchantment with Mathematics, I've found the Math Thread interesting to read. I always liked the articles about new developments in Experimental and Theoretical Math when they were covered in the L.A. Times in the early eighties and in the NYT's in the mid eighties to late nineties.

Unfortunately the PD doesn't cover such subjects, and I only get the Sunday NYT's. If any news of major developments in Math comes out, please, do not hesitate to post it for us amateurs to try and understand.

That said, I do not think that a mathematical model is sufficient to describe and predict all natural, and certainly not all social/subjective/psychological, phenomenon.

Even though I was assured in 1984 by a fellow graduate student that such a mathematics did indeed, exist.

"M"M

Willie Lumplump

12-28-2007, 02:47 PM

if we accept Davidson's argument that the very idea of "reality independent of us" is incoherent, then we are experiencing reality directly -- in the sense that reality consists of inextricably entwined human practices and things in which each is conditioned by the other. Our experience of that is as direct as anything could be; nothing comes between us and it. We can only imagine that we are not experiencing reality directly, and be troubled by that, if we suppose that reality = that which is independent of us and our practices.It's hard for me to understand exactly what you're talking about, but to the extent that I understand you, I disagree. All of the sensations that we associate with reality--visual, auditory, olfactory, touch, and taste--are only constructs of our brain, and we assemble these constructs into an integrated model of reality. To take but one example, the color red has no existence outside our minds. Our eyes pick up electromagnetic radiation within a narrow range of wavelengths and transmit information to the brain in the form of electrical depolarizations of a nerve membrane. Our brain receives this stimulus and assigns a particular sensation to it, the sensation that we call red. We incorporate that sensation into our model, and then we say, "This stop-light is really red." What color is the sign really? It has no color at all, but it does emit electromagnetic radiation over a relatively broad range of frequencies from the far-infrared at least to frequencies in the radio part of the spectrum.

Willie Lumplump

12-28-2007, 02:54 PM

But Willie, Your conclusion leads me to ask, do insects like you? Or is your love of them unrequited?It's sure that many insects have experienced strong physical attraction to me. I remember spending a night in a quite decent-looking thatched roof hut in the Congolese city of Bunkeya. I awoke in the morning with many new close attachments that I had not had the night before. Such unsolicited intimacy is not a pleasant experience, however, and I soon put an end to the relationships.

Frederick M. Dolan

12-28-2007, 07:30 PM

There’s an aspect of the view that I’m defending that I didn’t discuss and that bears on your objection, namely, this view rejects the idea of an inner mind in which outer things are “represented.” The idea that knowledge, belief, etc. consist of mental representations is a legacy of the Cartesian tradition. It is only on the basis of some such conception of knowledge as this that the so-called skeptical question can be raised, i.e. how can we be certain that the “external world” exists? Descartes and Kant each try to “answer” the skeptic in different ways, but my point is that there is no need to answer the skeptic because the idea the idea of a mind that is separate from the world is incompatible with the view that human beings are able to acquire mental content only by putting to use the linguistic conventions of their community. To put it differently, beliefs, concepts, and the linguistic and other practices of a community all go together, mutually condition and inform one another, and can’t be treated in isolation from one another. And if “private” mental content can be acquired only by virtue of one’s participation in a very public or social linguistic community, there’s no room for a Cartesian mind that is so sealed off from other elements of the human condition (including our involvement with nature) that we are obliged to ask whether we can know that there is anything BUT mental content.

I guess what I’m trying to say is that if you’re a realist who wants a science that gives us true statements about things as they are independent of our practices, perceptions, language, etc., one GOOD thing about the position I’m defending is that it eliminates the skeptical problem – and it does so in a definitive manner, because whereas earlier philosophers had answered the skeptic by trying to show that we can be certain that there is indeed an external world (but failed), this view reveals that there is no need to answer the skeptic at all (and hence no need to worry about the fact that nobody has satisfactorily answered him).

But in return for not having to worry about mind/brain “constructs” and the paradoxical idea that nature was created by culture, the Davidsonian view requires that you put true statements about the natural world on the same level as everything else. The statement that the second law of thermodynamics operates independently of our perceptions of it can be accepted as true in the same sense that the statement that Lincoln was the sixteenth president can be accepted as true, namely that they have been satisfactorily substantiated by the relevant communities of physicists and historians. If pushed, though, you’d still be expected to admit that the idea of things existing independently of our ways of talking about and using things is just incoherent, and to settle for the view that “talking about things as they are independently of our talk about them” is just one way among others of “talking about things.”

Personally, I feel the attraction of realism as a kind of utopian intellectual dream, it just doesn’t strike me as intellectually sustainable. I can think of one or two ways of approaching the problem of trying to get an intellectually respectable version of it but that is probably TOO off-topic!

It's hard for me to understand exactly what you're talking about, but to the extent that I understand you, I disagree. All of the sensations that we associate with reality--visual, auditory, olfactory, touch, and taste--are only constructs of our brain, and we assemble these constructs into an integrated model of reality. To take but one example, the color red has no existence outside our minds. Our eyes pick up electromagnetic radiation within a narrow range of wavelengths and transmit information to the brain in the form of electrical depolarizations of a nerve membrane. Our brain receives this stimulus and assigns a particular sensation to it, the sensation that we call red. We incorporate that sensation into our model, and then we say, "This stop-light is really red." What color is the sign really? It has no color at all, but it does emit electromagnetic radiation over a relatively broad range of frequencies from the far-infrared at least to frequencies in the radio part of the spectrum.

"Mad" Miles

12-28-2007, 08:35 PM

It's sure that many insects have experienced strong physical attraction to me. ... Such unsolicited intimacy is not a pleasant experience, however, and I soon put an end to the relationships.

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Willie,

Surely you don't confuse predation with affection? Unless you reduce it to the affection I just felt for an Italian Sausage Sandwich from Andorno's?

Now in the case of egg laying insects who use mammalian hosts for incubation, I suppose you might have a point. But that's a kind of reproductive "Love" I can do without!

Fred,

Topic Schmopic! Don't be such a tease! What is a form of realism that is intellectually respectable? Putative realists are waiting with bated breath!!! And I provisionally include myself in their number...

"Mad" Miles

:burngrnbounce:

P.S. "The Great Debaters" kicks butt! Three film revue in the offing. Common theme? WAR!

Willie Lumplump

12-28-2007, 10:27 PM

There’s an aspect of the view that I’m defending that I didn’t discuss and that bears on your objection, namely, this view rejects the idea of an inner mind in which outer things are “represented.”I hardly think this is an arguable proposition. Surgical (including electrical stimulation) and chemical interventions can manipulate our model of reality quite convincingly. I bet there isn't a single neurophysiologist anywhere in the world who doesn't believe that the brain constructs a model of reality. This isn't a realm for philosophers, this is hard science. MRI techniques have even given some insight into which parts of the brain participate in constructing the model. And as far as the notion of an "inner mind" goes, that's a loaded term. When different parts of the brain cooperate in constructing a model of reality, they aren't doing it within some "inner mind." The cooperation of different parts of the brain is itself what we experience as mind.

Willie Lumplump

12-28-2007, 10:29 PM

Willie, Surely you don't confuse predation with affection?I think that at this point I should refer you to our resident expert, Mykil.

Frederick M. Dolan

12-28-2007, 11:21 PM

The sentence you quoted was both too categorical and too vague. I shouldn't have said anything about "rejecting" the idea of mind. My real concern was not to deny mental content, intentionality, representations, models, but rather to say that this (basically Cartesian) picture is misleading with respect to how we acquire knowledge and understanding (and what they are) on a fundamental level. A better starting point is to regard knowledge and understanding as practices and competencies that we acquire not at all on the level of mental content but simply by being socialized in a particular culture. Thus my knowledge of a hammer is not, originally, mental content but my capacity to grab it rather than a screwdriver when I need to drive a nail into a plank. My understanding of the hammer is "in" my practices in relation to the hammer, not my mind. Moreover, these practices also contain an interpretation of what it means to hammer that do not normally (and may never) get formulated as propositions, beliefs, concepts, etc. So, to take a different example, my ability to pour a cup of tea also contains an interpretation of what it means to be hospitable that is as alive and well as can be without ever having been consciously formulated by me or my guest.

None of this (to say more clearly than I did before) is meant to imply that we don't also articulate beliefs, concepts, models, etc. of such things. It is to say that the modeling we do is dependent upon, inextricably bound up in, our more fundamental practical and linguistic engagement with things and people. And that has implications for the question of whether we can make sense of the idea of "true statements about things as they are in themselves" (and whether we need to make such claims at all).

If neuroscientists find a concept of modeling of any use in the study of brain function, I would presume they are defining it in a way that doesn't raise these sorts of issues, or else that they have not been made aware of the problematic character of the Cartesian legacy (I know the latter has created immense confusion in cognitive science and linguistics).

I hardly think this is an arguable proposition. Surgical (including electrical stimulation) and chemical interventions can manipulate our model of reality quite convincingly. I bet there isn't a single neurophysiologist anywhere in the world who doesn't believe that the brain constructs a model of reality. This isn't a realm for philosophers, this is hard science. MRI techniques have even given some insight into which parts of the brain participate in constructing the model. And as far as the notion of an "inner mind" goes, that's a loaded term. When different parts of the brain cooperate in constructing a model of reality, they aren't doing it within some "inner mind." The cooperation of different parts of the brain is itself what we experience as mind.