Is truth subjective or objective?

fresco wrote:

yitwail,

Note that people have died of heart attacks when threatened with "blanks" and the legal definition of "assault" includes the threat of violence. I bring this in (together with anthropological reports of the effectiveness of "curses") in defense of the concept of "social realty".

But as you correctly identified what was implied earlier is neither idealism nor materialism. "Social" stresses the nature of the level of structure in which "reality" is significant. The currency of such reality is language, a medium for social exchange, yet a currency without a "gold standard". It is the futile search for such a standard that gives rise to the idea of an "ultimate reality", or "objective truth".

Or at least...that is your guess.

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Question to Taliesin,

Do you "know" you "exist" in dreamless sleep ?
Surely "you" or "your body" would only be in existence for others !
To "exist" is "to interact". Our so-called "knowledge of reality" is a set of expectancies about such interactions.

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fresco wrote:

yitwail,

Note that people have died of heart attacks when threatened with "blanks" and the legal definition of "assault" includes the threat of violence. I bring this in (together with anthropological reports of the effectiveness of "curses") in defense of the concept of "social realty".

fresco, i admire your ingenuity, but your example doesn't suffice, because death by gunshot usually looks quite different from death by heart failure.

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Frank,

Come on now, don't you think this tired old game of chanting "silly guess" is at bit inappropriate when we are discussing "the nature of truth". ? What are you actually trying to say here ? ....that we should ditch "philosophy" and stick with "common sense" ?

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yitwail,

I'm not denying that different potential realities exist with or without "blanks". I'm pointing out that your original "potential picture" involving "no death" is subject to negotiation. Your equivocation of "blank" with "harmless" is exactly the point made in the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis about language determining thought. BTW I think it was Bateson who said "We exist in language".

After the event, we can agree that "your gun caused his death" or " you were defending yourself against an intruder" or "you had a bad childhood"....etc etc....but each "reality" including the existence of "guns" is or was subject to social negotiation.

So lets move on to the scenario where X, a native of some distant island, is killed by a lightening bolt. How do we "know" of this "event" unless we involved in some social relationship which defines it as such. Otherwise it is a non-event...it has no reality unless it attuned directly or indirectly to our awareness.

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fresco: That's a pretty good question. On the one hand, since I'm unconscious, I would not be aware of my body...but on the other hand, there is still unconscious awareness, which is, IMO, much stronger than conscious realization, so in that respect...I would be aware, so I would still exist. Even "dreamless sleep" has brainwaves, so there's still thought, and thus existence.
Thanks for making me think. :wink:

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Yitwail, your point is taken, i.e., "fresco.. death by gunshot usually looks quite different from death by heart failure." Nevertheless the social symbolic dimension can apply to both threats with blanks as well as the "justification" to shoot with bullets. Some empirical support for the above: I lived in a small rural community in Mexico for a couple of years. During that time people died from the "knowledge" that they had been cursed by witchcraft and/or sorcery. They live in a world where common sense (actually,cultural sense) acknowledges the effectiveness of supernatural "technology" with the consequence that their bodies react lethally to the belief that they have been cursed. Also, during that time, people were shot to death as punishment for the alleged practice of sorcery or for being witches. When the latter happens the killers are protected from the police with the understanding that their acts served to protect their community.

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Are you guys still debating this stuff? Barf.

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SC, what is it you think we are debating? I've lost track.

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SC, it's either this, or trying to think of a clever phrase that starts with the word "it" for the WHAT'S NEXT trivia game.

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Taliesin

...."there is still unconscious awareness" ...... Laughing

.....I'll let Frank sort that one out !

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If Freud is right that there are unconscious intentions, would that not suggest awareness at various levels?

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Quote:

If Freud is right that there are unconscious intentions, would that not suggest awareness at various levels?

Freud believed that there's the conscious and the sub-conscious. The former must control the latter (?).

I don't think this suggest a level of awareness.

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If I may, I recommend two works from two philosophers:

Ludwig Wittgenstein; Tractatus Logico Philosophicus

A. J. Ayer; Language, Truth, and Logic

These works revolve around language, logic, and mathematics, but their insights into the notion of truth are astounding. Well worth the money.

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NobleCon

Wittgenstein's last work, "Philosophischen Untersuchungen" is not inferior to the Tractatus. In some ways it's a refutation of it.
The principal aspect of his last book is the refutation of the traditional concept of "essence". He applies that, even to language, showing that word definitions depend on the use we make of those words. He raises, in my opinion, a serious problem, not only to metaphysics but also to science.
In this case truth would be nothing but general consensus, as our friend Fresco has claimed - much better than me - in all these months of discussion.

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fresco wrote:

Frank,

Come on now, don't you think this tired old game of chanting "silly guess" is at bit inappropriate when we are discussing "the nature of truth". ? What are you actually trying to say here ? ....that we should ditch "philosophy" and stick with "common sense" ?

No, Fresco...that is not what I said.

You wrote:

Quote:

Note that people have died of heart attacks when threatened with "blanks" and the legal definition of "assault" includes the threat of violence. I bring this in (together with anthropological reports of the effectiveness of "curses") in defense of the concept of "social realty".

But as you correctly identified what was implied earlier is neither idealism nor materialism. "Social" stresses the nature of the level of structure in which "reality" is significant. The currency of such reality is language, a medium for social exchange, yet a currency without a "gold standard". It is the futile search for such a standard that gives rise to the idea of an "ultimate reality", or "objective truth".

And I responded...

"Or at least, that is your guess."

Nearly as I can tell...it is nothing more than a guess. Yet you present it as though it is a revelation from On High.

It is...as information goes...as much bullshyt as the theistic guesses about REALITY...and as the atheistic guesses about REALITY.

I, personally, do not know the nature of REALITY. I do not see anywhere near enough unambiguous evidence upon which to base meaningful guesses.

I don't see enough for you and JL and Twyvel to base your guesses either...and for you to present them as more than guesses is so underhanded, you really shouldn't be lecturing others about ethics and tactics.

I hope that answers your question.

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val wrote:

NobleCon

Wittgenstein's last work, "Philosophischen Untersuchungen" is not inferior to the Tractatus. In some ways it's a refutation of it.
The principal aspect of his last book is the refutation of the traditional concept of "essence". He applies that, even to language, showing that word definitions depend on the use we make of those words. He raises, in my opinion, a serious problem, not only to metaphysics but also to science.
In this case truth would be nothing but general consensus, as our friend Fresco has claimed - much better than me - in all these months of discussion.

i'm going to tackle Philosophical Investigations, in an English translation, as soon as i finish Hume's "Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion." i get involved in theological discussions from time to time, also. can you suggest something readable and illuminating on the basis of morality in the absence of religious belief? ethics is the third area of philosophy that interests me, besides metaphysics & religion. these topics happen to be interrelated somewhat, which is another reason i find them all of interest.

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fresco

Quote:

Do you "know" you "exist" in dreamless sleep ?
Surely "you" or "your body" would only be in existence for others !
To "exist" is "to interact". Our so-called "knowledge of reality" is a set of expectancies about such interactions.

To >exist< may be more then ?'to interact'.

Apparently there can be awareness in deep dreamless sleep, in fact some sages, such as Ramana have said that being awake (or enlightenment ) is to be in a state of deep sleep while awake.

There is said to be a fourth state of consciousness, besides, being awake, dream-sleep, and dreamless sleep, called turiya.

Here's a note:

turiya

In early Hindu philosophy, turiya (also called caturtha) is a state of Pure Consciousness, or the experience of ultimate reality and truth. It is a fourth state of consciousness that underlies and at the same time transcends three common states of consciousness: (i) the state of waking consciousness, (ii) the state of dreaming, (iii) and dreamless sleep.

The first two states are defective as experiences of reality and truth because of their flawed dualistic natures of subject and object, self and not-self, ego and non-ego. The third state, dreamless sleep, is a type of non-consciousness because it has no subject and object distinctions, and is therefore nearer to the Hindu concept of unity with Brahman, or ?'World Soul.' Dreamless sleep is still not complete union with Brahman, however, because in deep dreamless sleep there is no sense of self or the world. Conversely, turiya is the experience of self and world in their pure essences unified with Brahman.

The Mandukya Upanishad defines turiya as follows,

"The fourth state is not that which is conscious of the subjective, nor that which is conscious of the objective, nor that which is conscious of both, nor that which is simple consciousness, nor that which is all-sentient mass, nor that which is all darkness. It is unseen, transcendent, the sole essence of the consciousness of self, the completion of the world."

Turiya emerges from full union with Brahman-Atman, and results in the attainment of moksha, which is the release from the cycle of rebirth known as samsara.

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What is there about the air in the subcontinent that causes them to suppose their guesses about the unknown are better than the guesses of people elsewhere?

And why, oh why, do people tout the guesses of the subcontinent's people as though they were revealing great truths?

And finally, when will people finally understand the value to themselves and to humanity of simply acknowledging that the unknown is just that...unknown...

...and that the clues we have to the REALITY are not up to the job of making reasonable guesses about it?

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twyvel,

Thanks for that reference.

I am familiar with the "no-self" aspect of "higher states of consciousness" but this would also transcend the dynamic interactional model I have proposed earlier and attain a timeless serenity beyond the flux. "Truth" at that level would be with a capital "T" and would be beyond discussion. It may be that clinical destruction of the simplistic dualism of subjectivity-objectivity prepares the way for a consideration of such levels.

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Is truth subjective or objective?

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