What's stopping us from seeing the truth?

[Arising_uk]

I understood cs as making a joke?

[creativesoul]

Making a joke regarding the similarity between unknowable/hidden 'T'ruth and the vestiges of religion that usually accompany such a belief.

Intonation and repetoire being absent, jokes are lost. Hence, I usually do not make them.

Ah well.

[Satyr]

Dangerous Knowledge

The cup is on the table.

History is full of examples of douche-bags who know, with certainty, what they merely have faith in.
Religion is built upon the unknown...it is the unknown pretending to be known by mostly ignoramuses who cannot accept the parts they cannot see, and it scares the shit out of them.

All men construct a version of reality that serves their purposes, or they simply adopt one, but only the imbecile would claim to know the absolute truth about anything outside his mind.
And it is these very imbeciles who are more likely than not to die and to kill so as to defend the totalitarianism of their absolute convictions.

To him who at the very least knows that Truth exists...somewhere, out there....calling this Truth God would be a overkill...is a comforting idea, as in ignorance it presents knowledge awaiting the "pious" man.
Does not the faithful man consider the absurdity of his beliefs an indication of his commitment to His God?
The entire world might contradict him, but he holds fast...awaiting his salvation...somewhere out there.

Now, the imbecile will resort to the other extreme, to defend his certitude, and call it "radical skepticism" or a self-doubt that might freeze the individual, but this is nothing more than staring into the abyss...some freeze, while others do not.
Of course to a fat man the notion of asceticism has to be ridiculed, to excuse his own failings, and so he will resort to imagining asceticism as an extreme self-denial....when it is nothing of the sort.

Unfortunately, the world is governed by such douche-bags, and by those who have settled on thinking about thoughts with little regard for what passes before their eyes.
To talk about philosophy is like talking about art...the one doing so thinks he is indulging in artistic expression when he is simply discussing another person's artistic expression, or positioning himself behind it.

So, the cup IS on the table...and nothing else needs to be said.
Perhaps all philosophy can be ended with a trite sentence:
"I exist"

• The struggle is always the same, but in its details it differs in between ages. There was a time when it was mainly a combat between the natural instincts of the individual and his yearning to get into Heaven. That was an unhealthy time, for throttling the instincts is almost as deleterious as breathing bad air: it makes for an unpleasant clamminess. The Age of Faith, seen in retrospect, looks somehow pale and puffy: one admires its saints and anchorites without being conscious of any very active desire to shake hands with them and smell them. Today the yearning to get into Heaven is in abeyance, at least among the vast majority of mankind, and so the ancient struggle takes a new form. In the main, it is a struggle of man with society – a conflict between his desire to be respected and his impulse to follow his own bent. Society usually wins. There are to be sure, free spirits in the world, but their freedom, in the last analysis, is not much greater than that of a canary in a cage. They may leap from perch to perch; they may bathe and guzzle at their will; they may flap their wings and sing. But they are still in the cage, and soon or late it conquers them. What was once a great itch for long flights and the open spaces is gradually converted into a fading memory and nostalgia, sometimes stimulating, but more often merely bashful. The free man, made in God’s image, is converted into a Freudian case. Democracy produces swarms of such men, and their secret shames and sorrows, I believe, are largely responsible for the generally depressing tone of democratic society. Old Feud, living in a more urbane and civilized world, paid too little heed to that sort of repression. He assumed fatuously that what was repressed was always, or nearly always, something intrinsically wicked, or, at all events, anti-social – for example, the natural impulse to drag a pretty woman behind the barn, regardless of her husband’s protests. But under democracy that is only half the story. The democrat with a yearning to shine before his fellows must not only repress all common varieties of natural sin; he must also repress many of the varieties of natural decency. His impulse to tell the truth as he sees it, to speak his mind freely, to be his own man, comes into early and painful collision with the democratic dogma that such things are not nice – that the most worthy and laudable citizen is that one who is most like all the rest. In youth, as everyone knows, this dogma is frequently challenged and sometimes with great asperity, but the rebellion, taking one case with another, is not of long duration. The campus Nietzsche, at thirty, begins to feel the suction of Rotary.

• Astronomers and physicists, dealing habitually with objects and quantities far beyond the reach of the senses, even with the aid of the most powerful aids that ingenuity has been able to devise, tend almost inevitably to fall into the ways of thinking of men dealing with objects and quantities that do not exist at all, e.g., theologians and metaphysicians. Thus their speculations tend almost inevitably to depart from the field of true science, which is that of precise observation, and to become mere soaring in the empyrean. The process works backward, too. That is to say, their reports of what they pretend actually to see are often very unreliable. It is thus no wonder that, of all men of science, they are the most given to flirting with theology. Nor is it remarkable that, in the popular belief, most astronomers end by losing their minds.

• The effort to reconcile science and religion is almost always made, not by theologians, but by scientists unable to shake off altogether the piety absorbed with their mother's milk.

• [The] erroneous assumption is to the effect that the aim of public education is to fill the young of the species with knowledge and awaken their intelligence, and so make them fit to discharge the duties of citizenship in an enlightened and independent manner. Nothing could be further from the truth. The aim of public education is not to spread enlightenment at all; it is simply to reduce as many individuals as possible to the same safe level, to breed and train a standardised citizenry, to put down dissent and originality.

• No democratic delusion is more fatuous than that which holds that all men are capable of reason, and hence susceptible to conversion by evidence. If religions depended upon evidence for their prolongation, then all of them would collapse. it is not only that the actual evidence they offer is extremely dubious; it is mainly that the great majority of the men they seek to reach are quite incapable of comprehending any evidence, good or bad. They must get at such men through their feelings or resign getting at them altogether.

Ta, Ta,

[creativesoul]

Zat it?

[Mark Question]

I was being sarcastic chaz. It seems that we agree on the uselessness of claiming that 1. God's will is unknowable 2. God's will is the Truth.

agree you will. happy you are. use the force to think like the other side:
1. we dont know gods hairstyle or his other sons count or names he has been hiding all these years. latest gossips about his lifestyle and all are so last century! 2. do what you have been told and dont argue! sorry, my mother came to my computer while i was in toilet, thinking about arising uk and greece too.

Truth has nothing to do with the concept of God, other than it's being necessarily presupposed within such a belief.

such a pretty belief still, about the concept of god. good thinking, keep it!

claim to know the absolute truth

logically speaking, sounds like some one believes in absolute?
like non-absolutist would claim to know the non-absolute truth?
coherent or what?

Does not the faithful man consider the absurdity of his beliefs an indication of his commitment to His God?

others bad is others good? like word absurdity in absurdism or holocaust in nazism? like atheist and teist could both say: hell no!

call it "radical skepticism" or a self-doubt

would it be too radical to doubt those labels too?

Perhaps all philosophy can be ended with a trite sentence:
"I exist"

perhaps? sounds good question to start another new philosophical thread?
by the schoolway, that was what i didnt get at all. why the hell the teacher was bothering us if he knew what is 1+1!? idiot! Antediluvian bulldozer! Arabian Nightmare! Balkan Beetle! Breathalyser! Cushion footed quadruped! Duck-billed platypus! Freshwater pirate! Guano gatherer! Hydrocarbon! Jellied eel! Lily-livered landlubber! Miserable molecule of mildew! Nanny Goat!..

[Satyr]

claim to know the absolute truth

logically speaking, sounds like some one believes in absolute?
like non-absolutist would claim to know the non-absolute truth?
coherent or what?

Youngling, you remind me of Christians who, in their desperate haste to defend their absurdities and to redirect the absence of evidence or arguments, they accuse the ones rejecting their absurdities of being like them: blind believers.

The onus is upon the one proposing a positive assertion...if this assertion happens to claim to be absolute then an absolute argument or absolutely irrefutable evidence is required to match the assertion.
The one rejecting the notions proposed need not prove his negation, otherwise one must prove a negative, making any absurdity rational unless proven otherwise.

Youngling, the rejection of God or the absolute is a rejection of all assertions of it.
I need not prove the non-existence of a unicorn to satisfy the retard who claims that such creatures exist.

One does not begin with a presumption, like the Truth, and then work backwards.
One begins with a perpetuation of ignorance, of weakness, and then build upwards, never placing there what is unnecessary.

But here you are repeating the argument I explained earlier.
The notion that the sentence "The truth is there is no truth" or "There is absolutely no absolute" is based on semantics which projects and presupposes what is nowhere in evidence except in the mind and in the symbols the mind uses to express its abstractions.

To even asset God or truth is nonsensical and to contradict it one must lower one's self to nonsensical or counter-intuitive counter-arguments.

Any retard who sues the term "truth" and means anything but his own convictions or abstractions or opinions, is not only arrogant but a total moron.

by the schoolway, that was what i didnt get at all. why the hell the teacher was bothering us if he knew what is 1+1!? idiot! Antediluvian bulldozer! Arabian Nightmare! Balkan Beetle!

He didn't but he was passing on the communal narrative so that you fucks can get along and find jobs and gt laid.

Once upon a time the common narrative, the common absolute truth, included flat-earth and God in heaven and women as witches.
Every age has its mythologies, its common "truths".

Did you not watch the documentary I linked you to?

[Satyr]

claim to know the absolute truth

logically speaking, sounds like some one believes in absolute?
like non-absolutist would claim to know the non-absolute truth?
coherent or what?

Youngling, you remind me of Christians who, in their desperate haste to defend their absurdities and to redirect the absence of evidence or arguments, they accuse the ones rejecting their absurdities of being like them: blind believers.

The onus is upon the one proposing a positive assertion...if this assertion happens to claim to be absolute then an absolute argument or absolutely irrefutable evidence is required to match the assertion.
The one rejecting the notions proposed need not prove his negation, otherwise one must prove a negative, making any absurdity rational unless proven otherwise.

Youngling, the rejection of God or the absolute is a rejection of all assertions of it.
I need not prove the non-existence of a unicorn to satisfy the retard who claims that such creatures exist.

One does not begin with a presumption, like the Truth, and then work backwards.
One begins with a perpetuation of ignorance, of weakness, and then build upwards, never placing there what is unnecessary.

But here you are repeating the argument I explained earlier.
The notion that the sentence "The truth is there is no truth" or "There is absolutely no absolute" is based on semantics which projects and presupposes what is nowhere in evidence except in the mind and in the symbols the mind uses to express its abstractions.

To even asset God or truth is nonsensical and to contradict it one must lower one's self to nonsensical or counter-intuitive counter-arguments.

Any retard who sues the term "truth" and means anything but his own convictions or abstractions or opinions, is not only arrogant but a total moron.

by the schoolway, that was what i didnt get at all. why the hell the teacher was bothering us if he knew what is 1+1!? idiot! Antediluvian bulldozer! Arabian Nightmare! Balkan Beetle!

He didn't but he was passing on the communal narrative so that you fucks can get along and find jobs and gt laid.

Once upon a time the common narrative, the common absolute truth, included flat-earth and God in heaven and women as witches.
Every age has its mythologies, its common "truths".

Did you not watch the documentary I linked you to?

[Mark Question]

But here you are repeating the argument I explained earlier.

where is your here? what is your argument? when is your earlier? can you be more precise? i believe that you can and you are not daydreaming or delusional. i believe.

[Satyr]

But here you are repeating the argument I explained earlier.

where is your here? what is your argument? when is your earlier? can you be more precise? i believe that you can and you are not daydreaming or delusional. i believe.

Youngling, you are now using Socratic dialogues to merely point out that all human conceptions are flimsy and inaccurate...yet you demand accuracy, as if I am pretending to be a god rather than one offering a superior vantage point.

First, you must extricate your head from your arse, unlike creativesoul, and then perhaps dare to let go of your testicles, for a while anyways.
What is offered here is not an absolute, as the absolute is denied, but more precision, in relation to less precision...so your "accuracy" dear yongling is up to you, YOU, to decide.
I could care less, either way, to be honest, as I do not have to live under the full results of your final judgment...and I say "full" because under this dreaded democracy and this Globalization that follows, I am forced, one way or another, to endure the repercussions of your and your cohorts judgments.

Now, dear youngling, let us proceed further with your trite and boring attempts to impose and to imply, your will, over me.

"Here", dear boy, is always referent to a generalized, simplified conception of time/place...or the space/time continuum.
Humans, being human, to one degree or another, are limited in this regard, and so the matter is not of absolute distinctions but of superior or inferior ones.

If, dear boy, you seek certitude, then you best follow the douche-bag all the ay to God, that offer you the illusion of them, otherwise, dear boy, when it comes to me, we are always dealing, even when not stipulated, with degrees, levels....get it?
I can sit here and adjust my language to make a simpleton feel comfortable by offering an endless tirade of disclaimers, but given the medium, that of language, I doubt it will have much of an effect....since it has had none.

I take the past seriously, dear boy, and given your past, I doubt that wasting my time will amount to anything worth my while.
You see, boy, unlike those you cavort with, the past is always present for me. It is nothing I dismiss, off hand, or deny, just because it suits me, or forget and forgive to meet your moral values.
Frankly, and I am so just because the medium offers the safety of distance, I could care less about you, as your reactions and responses thus far have already exposed you and your qualities, as these have already been formed by your past.
You see, boy, unlike the douche-bag, I do not forget, selectively, what precedes the present. It informs me about the possible future, without being an oracle.

How well, or how accurately, I integrate what I perceive about you, your performance, your activities, and how well I integrate then into a cohesive, harmonious model to project forward into the unknown future, will determine how well I know you....or how well I understand you.
In all this duplicity has to be factored in...of course...but this is quickly uncovered with consistency.

So, the ball is in your court, boy.

I simply enjoy playing.

[Mark Question]

But here you are repeating the argument I explained earlier.

thanks! that answer of yours shed some degrees of light on what you was thinking when you wrote that sentence, right? it seemed to me that you argue that i have argued something, or am i looking it wrong? what argument i was repeating in your mind or shall we say opinion? whos argument you have explained earlier? can you raise a little bit your degree of precision about that quite a mystical sounding argument after these long posts? always joy to read your educational stories.

[Satyr]

Word games are fun...but not for long.

thanks! that answer of yours shed some degrees of light on what you was thinking when you wrote that sentence, right?

Why, was it in the dark before?

it seemed to me that you argue that i have argued something, or am i looking it wrong?

Are you; have you?

what argument i was repeating in your mind or shall we say opinion?

It seems reading more than one sentence is difficult.
Here it is:

But here you are repeating the argument I explained earlier.
The notion that the sentence "The truth is there is no truth" or "There is absolutely no absolute" is based on semantics which projects and presupposes what is nowhere in evidence except in the mind and in the symbols the mind uses to express its abstractions.

whos argument you have explained earlier?

The person who made it.

can you raise a little bit your degree of precision about that quite a mystical sounding argument after these long posts?

Definitely.

always joy to read your educational stories.

I know...and if you continue in this vain you might challenge the princess in who can pose the most questions in a single post and who can drive someone mad first.

You, and she, are like many females extraordinarily gifted at saying nothing.

[creativesoul]

One does not begin with a presumption, like the Truth, and then work backwards. One begins with a perpetuation of ignorance, of weakness, and then build upwards, never placing there what is unnecessary.

Odd expressions here, Satyr. You're inverting history. Truth with a capital "T" was presupposed in the classical bottom up approaches. You know, by the likes of Hume and Spinoza. Of course, the 'God' concept played a major role in the thinking, Berkeley's Idealism had forcably instilled doubt in our access to reality, and as a result Truth was largely held to be a matter of only coherence(just like your 'superior' viewpoint holds). Those approaches used self-evident truths(Axioms) and build upwards, not downwards(just like your 'superior' viewpoint holds). It was only after correspondence to fact/reality took hold that we began to climb out of the dark-ages that your 'superior' viewpoint still dwells in, unbeknownst to you.

Odd indeed.

[Arising_uk]

Not if you make the guess that its only the Greeks and Germans, followed by the doolally French and psychotherapists that base his thought.

Might prove me wrong tho'.

[creativesoul]

I would not dare argue against the psychotherapeutic notion. That much is more than obvious. Dasein gone awry.

[chaz wyman]

I would not dare argue against the psychotherapeutic notion. That much is more than obvious. Dasein gone awry.

Warning - someone has dropped the Dasein word!!!