Philosophy Now Forum

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Jun 15, 2023 6:47 pm

phyllo wrote: ↑Thu Jun 15, 2023 5:51 pm That covers situations where the statement cannot be evaluated as true/false because of lack of knowledge or a paradoxical nature of the statement.

That's an error of amphiboly, though.

It mistakes the term "what is known to be true" for the term "true." And they're not the same concept.

The former is merely epistemological (that is, a claim about what humans happen to know at a given moment in time), and the latter is ontological (i.e. a statement about what really IS, even when people don't know it.)

True and false are ontological terms, not epistemological terms. (The equivalent in epistemology to truth and falsehood would be "known" versus "unknown") A cliff will exist ontologically even if I, epistemologically, do not know it is there and step over it. So the claim, "There is a cliff there," is ontological, not epistemological.

'True' is inaccessible. There is only 'known to be true'.

Gary Childress wrote: ↑Thu Jun 15, 2023 6:50 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Jun 15, 2023 6:42 pm What shall we eliminate, and why?

My time on the Internet. I have work to do.

Okay.

phyllo wrote: ↑Thu Jun 15, 2023 6:52 pm 'True' is inaccessible. There is only 'known to be true'.

Really? Is that "true," or do you only "think it to be true"?

And when you say you "think it to be true," what, exactly are you thinking about it?

You see? Ontological truth reappears in your statement, even in your attempt to say..."it's not true."

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Jun 15, 2023 6:58 pm

phyllo wrote: ↑Thu Jun 15, 2023 6:52 pm 'True' is inaccessible. There is only 'known to be true'.

Really? Is that "true," or do you only "think it to be true"?

And when you say you "think it to be true," what, exactly are you thinking about it?

You see? Ontological truth reappears in your statement, even in your attempt to say..."it's not true."

I don't claim to be infallible.

How can I have an absolute evaluation which is unfiltered by my knowledge?

phyllo wrote: ↑Thu Jun 15, 2023 7:03 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Jun 15, 2023 6:58 pm

phyllo wrote: ↑Thu Jun 15, 2023 6:52 pm 'True' is inaccessible. There is only 'known to be true'.

Really? Is that "true," or do you only "think it to be true"?

And when you say you "think it to be true," what, exactly are you thinking about it?

You see? Ontological truth reappears in your statement, even in your attempt to say..."it's not true."

I don't claim to be infallible.

So you mean that you only think that truth may be inaccessible? You're not insisting on it?

Then we can ask, what makes you think so?

How can I have an absolute evaluation which is unfiltered by my knowledge?

A "filter" is actually a poor analogy for mental processes. After all, lots of things pass through a filter, with no harm done, and maybe even purification. Maybe you can refine that question and pose it again? I'm not sure I can grasp your point, there.

phyllo wrote: ↑Thu Jun 15, 2023 5:51 pm

commonsense wrote: ↑Thu Jun 15, 2023 5:37 pm At one point I wanted to add to these 3 claims,

1. Monotheism: there is only one God
2. Polytheism: there are many gods
3. Atheism: there are not any God nor gods

another claim,

4. Agnosticism: it is not possible to know which of the first 3 claims is true.

On further thought, I withdraw the above because 4 is not a genuine contradiction. 1, 2, or 3 could be correct and 4 could be correct at the same time. For example, there could be one God and it could be impossible to know that there is one God.

I am sitting on a limb here, wondering if anyone can saw it out from under me

Binary logic says that statements are true or false.

But many-valued logic has more cases.

For example 4 value logic has true, false, neither true nor false and both true and false.

That covers situations where the statement cannot be evaluated as true/false because of lack of knowledge or a paradoxical nature of the statement.

I think that statement 4 will always be true or false.

A "filter" is actually a poor analogy for mental processes. After all, lots of things pass through a filter, with no harm done, and maybe even purification. Maybe you can refine that question and pose it again? I'm not sure I can grasp your point, there.

Purification is an altering.Not passing things is an altering.

Perhaps access to 'truth' requires things not to be purified or for those things not to be trapped by the filter.

I would need access to unfiltered 'truth' in order to even decide if the filtering is bad or not.

But I'm stuck with only what reaches me.

I think that statement 4 will always be true or false.

One could evaluate each of the 3 statements as 'neither true nor false' because there is insufficient information to make a true/false evaluation.

That would be 'logical agnosticism' applied.

It makes more sense than saying 1,2,3 are either true or false.

If you're god, then you can say that's true, that's false. If you're human, you need more flexibility.

I think one of the problems with forum discussions, is that people are trying to squeeze everything into true and false categories. The result is messy.

phyllo wrote: ↑Thu Jun 15, 2023 8:00 pm

I think that statement 4 will always be true or false.

One could evaluate each of the 3 statements as 'neither true nor false' because there is insufficient information to make a true/false evaluation.

That would be 'logical agnosticism' applied.

It makes more sense than saying 1,2,3 are either true or false.

If you're god, then you can say that's true, that's false. If you're human, you need more flexibility.

I think one of the problems with forum discussions, is that people are trying to squeeze everything into true and false categories. The result is messy.

Either you know something or you don’t. Binary.

phyllo wrote: ↑Thu Jun 15, 2023 5:51 pm

commonsense wrote: ↑Thu Jun 15, 2023 5:37 pm At one point I wanted to add to these 3 claims,

1. Monotheism: there is only one God
2. Polytheism: there are many gods
3. Atheism: there are not any God nor gods

another claim,

4. Agnosticism: it is not possible to know which of the first 3 claims is true.

On further thought, I withdraw the above because 4 is not a genuine contradiction. 1, 2, or 3 could be correct and 4 could be correct at the same time. For example, there could be one God and it could be impossible to know that there is one God.

I am sitting on a limb here, wondering if anyone can saw it out from under me

Binary logic says that statements are true or false.

But many-valued logic has more cases.

For example 4 value logic has true, false, neither true nor false and both true and false.

That covers situations where the statement cannot be evaluated as true/false because of lack of knowledge or a paradoxical nature of the statement.

No matter what the values of 1,2, and 3 are, 4 is binary. They don’t have values that matter. As such, no matter what values are assigned to them, you’ll only either know which one is true or you won’t.

Either you know something or you don’t. Binary.

Or you think you know something.

You "know" and you're right.

You "know" and you're wrong.

And let's face it, "something" may be very simple or it may be very complex.

If it's complex, then you may be right about some of it, all of it or none of it.

Do you know all there is to know about something?

"I know about God, (or democracy, justice,etc )" ... that's a big complex subject.

You know.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Jun 15, 2023 6:42 pm

Gary Childress wrote: ↑Thu Jun 15, 2023 6:19 pmI get it.

Great.

The importance of all this is that we now realize that it's totally illogical for us to resort to relativism or universalism, when it comes to religions and ideologies. We should know, just by the laws of logic, that it is a confused belief when we imagine that all such ideologies are secretly on the same page.

We should also get over our squeamishnes about saying so, if we need to. It's just how things are: we need not apologize for that.

So now we're left with a whole bunch of religions and ideologies, each having different (and often contradictory) claims about God. What are we going to do?

We're going to have to sort them. That's obvious. And maybe we should begin by eliminating those that have no chance of being true. So let's take any of them that you have reason to believe are false, and let's cut them out, so we can narrow the field to whatever plausible options are left.

What shall we eliminate, and why?

Eliminate all that are contradictory within themselves, because they cannot be true.

phyllo wrote: ↑Thu Jun 15, 2023 8:36 pm

Either you know something or you don’t. Binary.

Or you think you know something.

You "know" and you're right.

You "know" and you're wrong.

And let's face it, "something" may be very simple or it may be very complex.

If it's complex, then you may be right about some of it, all of it or none of it.

Do you know all there is to know about something?

"I know about God, (or democracy, justice,etc )" ... that's a big complex subject.

You know.

Yes. It seems I should have used “think” or “imagine” or “guess” instead of “know”.

commonsense wrote: ↑Thu Jun 15, 2023 8:39 pm

What shall we eliminate, and why?

Eliminate all that are contradictory within themselves, because they cannot be true.

Excellent strategy. And it fits within the Law of Non-Contradiction, again. So we can stay in the field of pure logic and deduction for the moment.

Gary's left for greener pastures, it seems.

I find that when one makes the logical argument, one gets to about this point, and one of two things happens: either the person says, "You're right -- relativism in this area makes no sense," or he says, "You're ugly and stupid, and I'm leaving." So maybe Gary will be back to continue, and maybe not: we'll have to see.

How about we consider the big three groups: Polytheism, Monotheism, and Atheism? Maybe we can take out a whole group or cluster of possibilities relatively quickly.

Which shall we begin with?

phyllo wrote: ↑Thu Jun 15, 2023 7:45 pm

A "filter" is actually a poor analogy for mental processes. After all, lots of things pass through a filter, with no harm done, and maybe even purification. Maybe you can refine that question and pose it again? I'm not sure I can grasp your point, there.

Purification is an altering.

Yes, but for the better. My water comes through purer from my filter. If the analogy were apt, then passing through a mind would make the facts purer, not introduce pollution.

I would need access to unfiltered 'truth' in order to even decide if the filtering is bad or not.

What makes this an all-or-nothing proposition? I see no reason to suppose that.

A toddler has, to be sure, very little knowledge; but not none. Some of what she knows turns out to be right. Some turns out to be wrong. But if the mixing of the two made learning impossible, then toddlers would never get any smarter.

And I think we can see what it is. Ontological reality corrects epistemological errors. When the child throws a tantrum, with the expectation that it will get her ice cream, she fails. That is, the ontological phenomenon she was expecting does not arrive: no ice cream. A toddler that cannot learn either gives up or throws an endless succession of tantrums, all equally ineffective. But few toddlers are that foolish. Most will eventually decide to revise their strategy, in hopes of improving the outcome. Test plus result equals success: the toddler discovers that smiling and asking gets ice cream, when tantrums don't. The ontological phenomenon appears, and her epistemology is refined. Next time, she'll get ice cream right away.

So no, you're not "stuck." One can refine one's epistemology with reference to ontological phenomena, or one can choose not to learn. Either is a choice, so nobody's "stuck."