Truth and Language

Baffman, before answering my response to you, please read it again; it was edited.

Frank: Huh? right back to ya.

baffman

You are right, the question is fascinating (the first that put that question was Leibniz). But I think there is no philosophical answer to it.
Because we are already in existence. All the answers I know to that question, like the one of Leibniz, do not solve the problem. Leibniz says that "there are things instead of nothing" because God created things. But, with this answer he introduces another entity, another being, like God. That is not an acceptable answer, because before "things or nothing" you presume an existent thing - as entity - like God. That means something exists that decides between "things and nothing" what is absurd because that "being" is already an existant thing.
So, as I see it, with or without God, there is no possible answer.

Val, I agree. It IS an absurd (viz, unanswerable) question. To me this is so because, as I stated earlier, it falsely presumes the reality of absolute and static existents and non-existents, as opposed to the reality of process. But even if the presumption of statics were valid, your reference to the presumed pre-exiisting thingness of God renders the question equally absurd. Very good.

I must be missing something.

Here is what you wrote:



Either there are some words missing...or you had no point to make...because none was made.

Just looking for an explanation...not an argument.

Truth lies in the isomorphisms of the language as words are expressed by those that speak the language. Words in of themselves have no meaning. This point is validated by certain neurological problems that make it impossible for people to understand words logically while still entirely grasping meaning; they cannot be lied to.

Thalion, you are referring to an ontologically solid gap between reality and language? Please explain your last sentence.

There are people who have absolutely no understanding of what words logically mean but completely understand the emotional meaning behind the words as they come from the speaker. As opposed to being convinced by a lie, they can detect the inherent characteristics of the person's speach that indicate that he is lieing, although they have no idea what he is saying; the logical/grammatical meaning of the language means nothing to them, yet they understand better than most others and are not convinced by lies. The example is that a group of such patients in a medical ward began to laugh hysterically or grimace in disgust when they heard a president's speech, although they had no idea what he was actually saying; they just knew he was lieing and being a politician.

I don't want to get too involved here but it seems to me that the current discussion delineating "truth" and "reality" can be bypassed by an "interactionist" analysis involving "consensus" as "reality" and "truth" as situations of consensus testing and resolution. This consensus is essentially a "social phenomenon" including the internal conversations of "individuals with themselves".
The key issue is that language is "the currency of reality" but the status of "the gold reserves" does not bear close scrutiny !

fresco

The concept of reality can be a social phenomenon, althoughI think it is not only that. But the important is the fact that we are involved in sensorial reactions to external stimulus: that is, as a part of our experience, the presence of some level of reality, that is not the result of consensus.

Val,

In as much that we are are similar (i.e. same species) it may make sense to talk about "shared sensory experiences". However those "experiences" are still inevitably mediated by language since all evaluation/measurement starts from the nominal (naming) level. It is this fallacy of "observer independent data", whether at individual level or species level which gives rise to circuitous arguments about "objectivity".

Now it may be that "language" evolved from our intra species commonality of needs as a cooperative mechanism for satisfying those needs. The functionality of language seems to me to be central to this debate and if we interpret this anthropocentrically we are resorting to putting humans on some pseudo-theistic pedestal.

What is the "reality of process"? Positing the reality of process (i.e. cause & effect?) doesn't answer the question. It merely validates the question by saying there's is an origin for everything in the phyiscal universe. Either the universe had a beginning or it did not. How can you find such a question absurd? If you believe in the reality of process, you believe in a static existent (the reality of process). Do I understand you correctly?

Baffman

Bring me up to speed, Baffman...and assume I am not the sharpest tool in the shed while doing so.

Are you suggesting that the existence of a God...is more logical (and therefore more likely to be the REALITY) than suggesting that no gods exist?

Fresco, your last two posts are right on the mark, and very well put. " Language is 'the currency of reality'" corresponds to the notion I advanced that truth has to do with propositions, by means of language (verbal and/or mathematical) about the nature of a presumed Reality. We need only imagine ourselves in an nonsocial reality in which we have never learned a language or a social environment in which nobody agrees with any of our understandings about our experiences to appreciate the social prerequisite of all knowledge. Without society we have no (language informed) thinking and without social consensus we have no "truth." We ARE social animals to the core. The only awareness we have as private beings is mystical consciousness, and this is not knowledge as we know it; it is completely ineffable and beyond conceptualization. As such, we cannot even consider that awareness to have anything to do with truth; it is beyond truth.
Baffmam, by the phrase "the reality of process" I was referring to the processual nature of all things, as observed by many philosophers since Heraclitus. This process is more like a ephemeral flowing rather than a string of discreet causes and effects, starting at The Beginning and stopping with The Ending of Reality. Causation is a useful model for engineers and everyday problem solving, but a poor basis for an epistemology of knowing.

My Gawd. It's December already and no one has decided what truth and language is.

Found a funny site today called Zig Zag Zen. Now that was pretty straight forward.

Letty, you just insist on not letting us boys get too serious.

Well, JL. I follow along to see if there's any consensus. I suppose that the best that I have to contribute is that language is dynamic. Just got off the most interesting thread by someone named Michael who was discussing tone, pitch, and Chinese. Fascinating information.

and boys will be boys.

If I do not speak a language, is it any different to me than a bunch of randomly typed words? No, it isn't, both are completely meaningless. The real language is not true in of itself, because it does not make any more sense to me than random letters, and the random letters have no meaning; it only has meaning to those that understand it. Therefore, language is only meaningful in its comprehension by those that know the intended meaning; it has no meaning beyond that.

Thalion, I do not grasp your point.

JLNobody

The fact that truth has to do with propositions is not disputable, since truth is a concept. But the question is: how to establish that a proposition his true and another proposition is false? I think Fresco claims that the only criteria that allows us to consider as true one proposition, is the general consensus. Although I don't entirelly disagree with him, I cannot give up the criteria of adequation. If I did that I would have to reduce human experience to a linguistic level, and that, as I explained before, is unacceptable to me.

Letty, I don't think possible to reach a consensual decision. I don't even think it would be desirable.
Philosophie, to me, has to do with the discussion of arguments about very important questions that can't be decided by verification or experimental methods. It is not a question of finding the true answer, but instead learn how to understand and clarify the question itself, and answer it according to our personal vision of the world.
Excepting the case of logical mistakes or deficient arguments I don't see how anyone can "win" a philosophical debate. But the debate helps to develop the arguments, the theories. We learn - at least I do - how to improve our own ideas by being confronted with different points of view. To me, I repeat, this discussion is very intersting, not because I want the others to agree with me, but because I am being confronted with very different approaches of the topic, in special those of Fresco and Nobody.