Am I Thinking Gribberish?

[Grytorm]

I've started to take a philosophy class on Theories of Knowledge. And I am trying to describe what I think is the meaning of truth because that is what we discussed on the first day. So I want to know if what I am saying is nonsensical or if it sounds at least somewhat reasonable.

Human knowledge is separated from any objective value of truth because knowledge is ultimately a subjective view of reality and any judgements of truth and falsehood we can make on our knowledge is unrelated to an objective truth.

[warty goblin]

What you have is more a view on the accessibility of truth than the meaning of truth.

I also don't think it sensible to go so far as to claim that any judgement about truth or falsehood is unrelated to objective truth. A judgement can be subjective and incorrect in some sense, but still be close enough to the truth to produce useful results that are demonstrably near true. I don't need to know how gravity works to understand that if I drop a lead weight, it'll fall to the ground. If I know a little bit about how gravity works, I can make some quite accurate statements about how fast it will be going when it reaches the ground.

[Mando Knight]

Human knowledge is separated from any objective value of truth because knowledge is ultimately a subjective view of reality and any judgements of truth and falsehood we can make on our knowledge is unrelated to an objective truth.

This kind of truth-relativism is why modern philosophy is denigrated by most students of hard sciences. I'd elaborate, but then I'd be ranting.

It should suffice to say that I think that objective truth exists and is searchable because the technologies our society relies upon exist.

[Aedilred]

Human knowledge is separated from any objective value of truth because knowledge is ultimately a subjective view of reality and any judgements of truth and falsehood we can make on our knowledge is unrelated to an objective truth.
I think it's possible to over-generalise here, although I think I see what you're getting at. I imagine that the principle is that there is a difference between objective and subjective truth and since the entirety of human experience is processed through a subjective filter (senses, memory, prejudice, etc.) it is virtually impossible for an individual human to report the objective truth.

However, when we start expanding that to "human knowledge" I think we run into slightly thornier territory, since the sum of human knowledge may well include items that are objectively true, especially in the realms of maths, science and the like.

It should also be possible for subjective truth and objective truth to overlap, especially when dealing with simple facts. For instance, if I were to place a spoon on a table and then ask you "is there a spoon on the table?" your answer of "yes" would be both subjectively true (even allowing for subjective bias) and objectively true (unless we break up the question in such a way as to make it impossible to attain truth within the bounds of ordinary language, but that'd be different again)

[The Extinguisher]

Personally, I think trying to find objective truth is a little bit silly and ultimately pointless, and is most certainly not what science as a method is trying to achieve.

But we can easily come up with situations where we can agree on what's happening, and call it truth if we can make it happen again and again and still agree. But that's a long ways away from objective truth, and is easily disputed by a single example where we don't agree or it isn't replicable.*

Our perception is a bias we cannot correct for, because even if we think we have, we might just be fooling ourselves into believing we have. Which is even more dangerous then just the bias itself.

I'm kinda rambling here. There's probably an objective truth about everything. I don't think it's describable or discoverable, and that's okay. Because at the end of the day, our approximations of objective truth are imperfect, and in that imperfection we can fill it with our own subjective reality and create something more than what there is.

[the_druid_droid]

But we can easily come up with situations where we can agree on what's happening, and call it truth if we can make it happen again and again and still agree. But that's a long ways away from objective truth, and is easily disputed by a single example where we don't agree or it isn't replicable.*

Actually, to nitpick a little here, this example concerns something which has been replicated, since we've repeated the result over and over and presumably gotten the same value out. If it wasn't replicable, we wouldn't put much stock in it in the first place.

In situations like this, the usual course of action is either to double and triple check the observation that's been made and stands in disagreement to see if anyone goofed during measurement or calculations (recall that whole neutrinos-moving-faster-than-light thing the media seized on a year or so ago), and if that all holds water, we go on to look for details we've missed along the way. The latter is of course how scientific theories of the world expand and grow, with Relativity and Quantum Mechanics being relatively recent and prime examples of such a process.


Our perception is a bias we cannot correct for, because even if we think we have, we might just be fooling ourselves into believing we have. Which is even more dangerous then just the bias itself.

At the same time, some aspect of 'Truth' which is completely imperceptible - even in an idealized case of perfect instruments and allowing for observation of indirect as well as direct consequences of its existence - doesn't really strike me as something which has much meaning to humanity or its universe. After all, if it really is imperceptible and intangible to such a degree, it's effectively a cipher and can neither influence nor be influenced by us or anything we might hope to know.

[warty goblin]

As a statistician I have a very straightforwards approach to truth. Even if it exists you don't get to see it outside of a simulation study, so stop asking useless questions. Ask whether what you're doing is justifiable and works. Worrying about unanswerables is for folks who don't have to get actual useful results.

Now some may point out that justifiable in the statistical sense often depends on a theoretical mathematical framework. My response to this is basically the same; I don't know if the math represents reality - in some cases I'm pretty certain it's all made up in fact - but it doesn't matter because what I'm doing never matches the math perfectly. The question is whether the discrepancy is large enough to cause problems in application. In the case of the measure theoretic justifications for statistical theory any such discrepancies appear to be very small.

[Grinner]

In situations like this, the usual course of action is either to double and triple check the observation that's been made and stands in disagreement to see if anyone goofed during measurement or calculations (recall that whole neutrinos-moving-faster-than-light thing the media seized on a year or so ago), and if that all holds water, we go on to look for details we've missed along the way. The latter is of course how scientific theories of the world expand and grow, with Relativity and Quantum Mechanics being relatively recent and prime examples of such a process.

I think this is what happens in a perfect world. I think, in reality, it's a long, bloody road paved with public humiliation.

But that's just me.


At the same time, some aspect of 'Truth' which is completely imperceptible - even in an idealized case of perfect instruments and allowing for observation of indirect as well as direct consequences of its existence - doesn't really strike me as something which has much meaning to humanity or its universe. After all, if it really is imperceptible and intangible to such a degree, it's effectively a cipher and can neither influence nor be influenced by us or anything we might hope to know.

So a practical definition of truth lies within its utility to us?

[GolemsVoice]

I think it is very much possible to find objective truth, or something close enough to be considered objective for our purposes, in small questions, and questions regarding to hard sciences.

As somebody else said, if there is a spoon lying on the table, then we can recognize that and point it out, and that would be a pretty objective truth. There's only one variable, namely whether or not the spoon is on the table.

Now, the bigger our scope gets, and the more variables we involve, the harder it becomes to find objective truth, especially if that truth should be universal. "Lead falls to the ground if dropped without disturbances" is a very objective truth, since it's true everywhere on earth (barring special circumstances). But as soon as you leave earth, this won't be true anymore. If your aim is to find truths that are objectively true everywhere in the universe, it would be impossible, for the simple fact that there are a LOT of places you haven't looked yet.

As soon as judgements get involved, objective truth ceases to be meaningful. That doesn't mean that there are no good answers, but their worth is solely defined by how we judge them.

Is the spoon on the table is a question that all who see the same spoon would answer the same way, depending on the spoon being on the table or not.
Is a spoon on the table a good thing is a question that would produce many answers, depending on the values of the answering person.


So a practical definition of truth lies within its utility to us?

If something doesn't affect us and we don't know of it's existence, we have no reason to care about it, or more importantly, NOBODY has a reason to care about it.

[the_druid_droid]

I think this is what happens in a perfect world. I think, in reality, it's a long, bloody road paved with public humiliation.

But that's just me.

I think it's important to note that the whole blood and public shame thing happens significantly less in recent decades than in, say, the 1400s. And it's true that the process is idealized, but the framework is there and the people involved agree on the rules. If you're really sure your neutrinos can beat light speed, you need to show that your measurements are competent and replicable, and then start coming up with something that will fill relativity's shoes because the current version is out the window.

My point was that just because we get a weird reading somewhere, we're not suddenly throwing everything to the wolves, which is where I saw the earlier quote heading.


So a practical definition of truth lies within its utility to us?

Not exactly, because I hate the term 'utility', but I would argue that a practical definition of truth lies in exactly that - its practicality. If some numinous Truth exists out there entirely apart from us, imperceptible and thus presumably unknowable and unconnected to us in any meaningful way, I certainly find myself asking what good it would be to worry about it.

To clarify, I'm not talking about something difficult to get at, or even something with which we can interface indirectly - after all there are lots of examples of such things which we already believe to exist and can make measurements of a kind on all day. My issue is that when the limitations of perception get brought into this kind of discussion, the elephant in the room always seems to be that there is some ineffable Truth out there which is entirely slippery and yet somehow still important, just because.

In my view of things, truth needs to be connected to something - us, the world we live in, our universe, bacteria, trees, behavior, ghosts, magnets, the Loch Ness monster, but something which we might stand some chance of actually knowing at some point in time, even if it's by inference or absence. If we can't even do that, I'm inclined to think that such a Truth is just a philosophical hypothetical since it presumably can't do much if it can't even interact with the world enough to leave a mark.

[inexorabletruth]

I've started to take a philosophy class on Theories of Knowledge. And I am trying to describe what I think is the meaning of truth because that is what we discussed on the first day. So I want to know if what I am saying is nonsensical or if it sounds at least somewhat reasonable.

Human knowledge is separated from any objective value of truth because knowledge is ultimately a subjective view of reality and any judgements of truth and falsehood we can make on our knowledge is unrelated to an objective truth.

You have a fair argument here, even if you slipped off topic. After all, if you do not believe that truth actually exists, than it would be a bit difficult to define.

However, if you're going to branch off the source topic (defining truth) and go with this approach, you might want to stand on the shoulders of precedence. Your premise is not entirely unlike Lee Atwater's commonly referenced, rarely cited, phrase "Perception is reality."

Reality, being similar to truth, and subjective view begin similar to perception in definition, could present a strong parallel to your case.

But just remember. Some teachers don't like smart-allecs. If a teacher tells you to define "spoon," it can be risky to say "there is no spoon." Some teachers will respect you for it, but most will just scowl and give you an F. Your risk, your call.

http://www.fakesteve.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/photo_movieMatrix-quoteSpoon.jpeg

[Mx.Silver]

This kind of truth-relativism is why modern philosophy is denigrated by most students of hard sciences.
I thought it was because students of hard sciences denigrate everything that isn't hard sciences. Or more specifically, everything that isn't the specific hard science they're studying (or, in the case of physics undergrads, mathematics) :smalltongue:

[warty goblin]

I thought it was because students of hard sciences denigrate everything that isn't hard sciences. Or more specifically, everything that isn't the specific hard science they're studying (or, in the case of physics undergrads, mathematics) :smalltongue:

What I tend to find interesting is that I can frequently talk about humanities with people in math or science with some level of depth and complexity. When I try to talk about math or science with a humanities person, they tell me they stopped taking math at algebra/calculus 1, and that it's either useless or too hard.

Mind I also encounter math/science people who are apparently emerging from the lab for the first time in half a decade, and probably should have stayed there.

[Aedilred]

What I tend to find interesting is that I can frequently talk about humanities with people in math or science with some level of depth and complexity. When I try to talk about math or science with a humanities person, they tell me they stopped taking math at algebra/calculus 1, and that it's either useless or too hard.
I don't know how much of a humanities background you have, but, as a humanities student myself I found myself frequently vexed that scientists would attempt to engage with me on what they clearly considered to be a level of reasonable depth and complexity but was actually still pretty superficial, and then take that conversation and my inability to reciprocate their subject as evidence that their subject was somehow more "worthy" than mine.

It is much easier to bluff in humanities subjects than sciences, especially when your interlocutor is similarly ignorant. But that also makes it harder to judge when you're out of your depth. Because most humanities subjects are conducted without large reams of specialised vocabulary or formulae there's no obvious tipping point where you realise you have no idea what's going on any more, as there is at a fairly early stage in most sciences. There's also a dangerous tendency to assume that those areas of a subject which are beyond personal understanding (and sometimes involve specialist vocabulary, formulae etc.) are overly complex, abstracted or specialist and therefore largely pointless.

Philosophy is one of the subjects which suffers the most from this sort of thing, I think.

[warty goblin]

I don't know how much of a humanities background you have, but, as a humanities student myself I found myself frequently vexed that scientists would attempt to engage with me on what they clearly considered to be a level of reasonable depth and complexity but was actually still pretty superficial, and then take that conversation and my inability to reciprocate their subject as evidence that their subject was somehow more "worthy" than mine.

I'm not a humanities major, but I think I did at least my due diligence in the area. At least half my college credits are in the humanities/social sciences, I'm pretty well read in the classics, and moderately so in a few areas of history. I readily accept that people who do advanced work in the field have an understanding that's in advance of my own, but I'm at least familiar with the areas I've studied at some level, and can appreciate them as being valuable.

I spent half a semester tutoring a history major through real analysis before he finally flamed out about the time we hit sequences of functions. Only time I've ever seen a non math/physics student in a math class over 200 level, and the only time I've seen a humanities student in a math class who was there voluntarily. I think the only humanities/social science class I took without another math person in it was the 7 person senior seminar in feminist political science.

Which was the point I was trying to make. When it comes to the classic liberal arts education, I know quite a few people in math who did the whole nine yards. I don't know anybody in the humanities who can say the same. And at least at the college I attended, the statistics pretty strongly demonstrate that this is in fact the trend.

[Aurenthal]

IIRC, the definition my philosophy teacher gave us in high school for truth was something like: "Truth is when perception matches reality."

[Lord Raziere]

This kind of truth-relativism is why modern philosophy is denigrated by most students of hard sciences. I'd elaborate, but then I'd be ranting.

It should suffice to say that I think that objective truth exists and is searchable because the technologies our society relies upon exist.

as a student who likes philosophy? I wholeheartedly agree with you.

I really dislike the truth-relativism thing. its just so...pessimistic. and bleak. I do not ascribe to it.

Edit: as for math? Dude, the last math class I took, I got a C. and thats because I worked for it, kay? kept myself on my toes and learned it as best I could, barely got any of it. I'm actually surprised I got to college with my weird thing towards math, math is like thinking sideways. heck, I once forgot what a certain basic symbol thing did....in fact I can't remember exactly what it does now, was it the thing the division thing or the square root thing? looked kinda like an upside down flipped L. I know the other division sign, but not the other one.

but then again, the math thing might be more of a code/linguistics thing. I was told I'm good at math, just can't get the symbols and language thing of it. beyond the basic stuff at least. I don't know how you people get that sort of thing.

[AKA_Bait]

I'm also going to point out that there's a little bit of a self-reference problem here. In other words, if all "human truths" are relative and therefore unrelated to "objective truth" then the proposition "all 'human truths' are relative and therefore unrelated to 'objective truth'" is itself a statement with no relationship to objective truth.

I think the OP might do well to look into William James and Charles Sanders Peirce, the founders of American Pragmatism, for a cogent approach to this epistemological problem that accords with science.

[Benthesquid]

Broadly, here's my outlook.

Point One: The idea of objective truth is ridiculous. Any allegedly self evident truths depend on all parties accepting the same basic symbolic references, which have no inherent relations to the things they describe. If I say "The chair is brown," this is true only so long as all parties accept the same definitions of "chair," and "brown." Neither the word chair nor the word brown is intrinsically linked the 'chairness' or 'brownness.' Likewise, even if you go down to mathamatics. There's no objective reason that pi is any more of valid representation for the ratio of a circle's circumference to its diameter than say, mu, or 56, or a picture of a potato.

Point Two: The above conclusion doesn't really lead us anywhere useful, whereas having an arbitrarily agreed upon symbol for pi (or one, or chair) is enormously useful, so it's best just not to think too hard about Point One.

[Grinner]

If something doesn't affect us and we don't know of it's existence, we have no reason to care about it, or more importantly, NOBODY has a reason to care about it.


Not exactly, because I hate the term 'utility', but I would argue that a practical definition of truth lies in exactly that - its practicality. If some numinous Truth exists out there entirely apart from us, imperceptible and thus presumably unknowable and unconnected to us in any meaningful way, I certainly find myself asking what good it would be to worry about it.

To clarify, I'm not talking about something difficult to get at, or even something with which we can interface indirectly - after all there are lots of examples of such things which we already believe to exist and can make measurements of a kind on all day. My issue is that when the limitations of perception get brought into this kind of discussion, the elephant in the room always seems to be that there is some ineffable Truth out there which is entirely slippery and yet somehow still important, just because.

I understand the dislike of the truth-relativism conceit, since it's like saying "We have no objective referent from which we can determine objective truths. Therefore, there's little point to this waste of breath. Class dismissed."

On the other end of the spectrum, you end up ignoring these lines of questioning simply because they're clearly within the purview of loons and conspiracy theorists.


In my view of things, truth needs to be connected to something - us, the world we live in, our universe, bacteria, trees, behavior, ghosts, magnets, the Loch Ness monster, but something which we might stand some chance of actually knowing at some point in time, even if it's by inference or absence. If we can't even do that, I'm inclined to think that such a Truth is just a philosophical hypothetical since it presumably can't do much if it can't even interact with the world enough to leave a mark.

Perhaps. I'm inclined to think that we just haven't tried hard enough.


Edit: as for math? Dude, the last math class I took, I got a C. and thats because I worked for it, kay? kept myself on my toes and learned it as best I could, barely got any of it. I'm actually surprised I got to college with my weird thing towards math, math is like thinking sideways. heck, I once forgot what a certain basic symbol thing did....in fact I can't remember exactly what it does now, was it the thing the division thing or the square root thing? looked kinda like an upside down flipped L. I know the other division sign, but not the other one.

I can think of a couple like that. I believe you're speaking of the division symbol; the square root symbol has another line jutting out from the shorter leg.


I'm also going to point out that there's a little bit of a self-reference problem here. In other words, if all "human truths" are relative and therefore unrelated to "objective truth" then the proposition "all 'human truths' are relative and therefore unrelated to 'objective truth'" is itself a statement with no relationship to objective truth.

You clever bastard. :smalltongue:

[Mx.Silver]

What I tend to find interesting is that I can frequently talk about humanities with people in math or science with some level of depth and complexity. When I try to talk about math or science with a humanities person, they tell me they stopped taking math at algebra/calculus 1, and that it's either useless or too hard.

Mind I also encounter math/science people who are apparently emerging from the lab for the first time in half a decade, and probably should have stayed there.

Eh, there's likely a fair amount of differences in samples between us on this one. From my own uni years, I learned to dread the moment when a Physics undergrad discovered the person they were speaking to was a student of notPhysics/Mathematics, as it would turn into an almost surreal display of the Dunning-Kruger effect, with the former individual making assuredly confident statements about this other subject they'd clearly never actually developed any real understanding of. Along with supreme confidence that they didn't need to understand because it was notPhysics and they were studying Physics so therefore had all the insight they ever needed.
'Highlights' from these encounters included one person stating that Psychology was obviously garbage because various mental illnesses couldn't be cured with 100% efficiency. And also copious references to xkcd strips.
I did also know one person who's immediate reaction to this was to ask the not-physicist how it felt to be a useless drain on social resources rather than someone relevant - a person who did at one point wave a kitchen knife in my face to illustrate the fact he took issue with the concept of universal scepticism.

The Maths undergads, by contrast, never seemed to display this sort of behaviour. Possible because most of them seemed to be of the opinion that their own degrees had very little practical value outside of pure academia.
Post-grads also seemed to be less obnoxious about things too.


In regards to the being able to talk about the subject with non-students, Philosophy occupies something of odd middle-ground. It's not a hard science, but on the other hand trying to discuss formal logic with humanities students unlikely to be more successful than trying to discuss mathematics with them.

[Grytorm]

Broadly, here's my outlook.

Point One: The idea of objective truth is ridiculous. Any allegedly self evident truths depend on all parties accepting the same basic symbolic references, which have no inherent relations to the things they describe. If I say "The chair is brown," this is true only so long as all parties accept the same definitions of "chair," and "brown." Neither the word chair nor the word brown is intrinsically linked the 'chairness' or 'brownness.' Likewise, even if you go down to mathamatics. There's no objective reason that pi is any more of valid representation for the ratio of a circle's circumference to its diameter than say, mu, or 56, or a picture of a potato.

Point Two: The above conclusion doesn't really lead us anywhere useful, whereas having an arbitrarily agreed upon symbol for pi (or one, or chair) is enormously useful, so it's best just not to think too hard about Point One.

Kind of the idea that I tried to express in the initial post. Currently I am thinking about dropping the course because of the fairly dismissive nature the instructor has to relativism. Thinking about it more in some ways objective reality somewhat does make some sense, but many phenomena only exist as what we describe them as. While saying a cat is on a chair does in some ways make sense as an objective fact the collection of shapes and images that consist of the chair in our minds is ultimately a chair because we consider it to be a chair.

Edit: And now I have dropped the course I have begun to think of arguments in the support of relativism. "My first objection to the presented correspondence theory is the lack of a recognition of perception. Statements of beliefs that are checked against reality in the correspondence system are not actually checked against reality but our perceptions of reality and our subjective value judgements of the traits of the world around us. My second objection is the focus of the theory on physical examples in order to construct the model to be used to examine topics that cannot actually be referenced to any objective real world model but under this objective definition of truth will still be claimed as an objectively true statement. My final objection is that many topics discussed will have to be qualified to strip them from subjective elements in order to judge them on as an objectively true or false statement.

[GolemsVoice]

[QUOTE]I understand the dislike of the truth-relativism conceit, since it's like saying "We have no objective referent from which we can determine objective truths. Therefore, there's little point to this waste of breath. Class dismissed."

No, no, you misunderstood me. I'd be the first to say that not every science or discovery has to have some kind of "practical" effect. After all, asking what we can truly know is one of the oldest question of philosophy.

[KuReshtin]

If the truth can be told so as to be understood, it will be believed. -Terence McKenna

[Pie Guy]

Psh, all you people talking about physics feeling superior when, really, engineers have a superiority complex.

(I am an engineering student. I am going to double major in math, though.)

[Mando Knight]

Psh, all you people talking about physics feeling superior when, really, engineers have a superiority complex.

Well, obviously, since engineers actually make something useful with what they know. :smalltongue:

[Telonius]

I've started to take a philosophy class on Theories of Knowledge. And I am trying to describe what I think is the meaning of truth because that is what we discussed on the first day. So I want to know if what I am saying is nonsensical or if it sounds at least somewhat reasonable.

Human knowledge is separated from any objective value of truth because knowledge is ultimately a subjective view of reality and any judgements of truth and falsehood we can make on our knowledge is unrelated to an objective truth.

I think what's most controversial is to what degree human knowledge is separated from objective truth. "Separated from" and "unrelated to" are not the same thing.

For example, say you have a line on a piece of paper, and you want to know how long it is. If you take a ruler and measure how long something is, it will come out to 3cm. But "3cm" is not identical to the objective reality; your ruler is probably only going to be accurate to the cm. Because I'm making up the example, I get to say that the reality is that the line is exactly 3.00003678cm. The ruler isn't perfect, but you'd have to be squinting pretty hard to say that 3cm is completely unrelated to 3.00003678cm.

There are probably cases where the difference is going to matter. When those cases crop up, we don't throw up our hands and say that it's impossible to get a true representation of external reality. We invent a better ruler.

[Zrak]

I don't know how much of a humanities background you have, but, as a humanities student myself I found myself frequently vexed that scientists would attempt to engage with me on what they clearly considered to be a level of reasonable depth and complexity but was actually still pretty superficial, and then take that conversation and my inability to reciprocate their subject as evidence that their subject was somehow more "worthy" than mine.
One of the major reasons I became a humanities major in undergrad was because I couldn't stand the grandiloquent ignorance of so many of my peers in the hard sciences. It's especially frustrating that so many dismiss anything they encounter that is out of their depth on the basis that anything they can't understand must be gibberish.


Which was the point I was trying to make. When it comes to the classic liberal arts education, I know quite a few people in math who did the whole nine yards. I don't know anybody in the humanities who can say the same. And at least at the college I attended, the statistics pretty strongly demonstrate that this is in fact the trend.

I think part of this is that math and science classes tend to be more sequential and thus more strict about prerequisites. As such, there's usually a lot more "hassle" involved for a humanities student who wants to learn about a particular topic in mathematics than for a mathematics student to take a class on a particular topic in the humanities. Moreover, math and sciences classes tend to be large lectures, or at least often aren't particularly discussion-focused. In other words, there's really no reason for me to learn about a math topic I'm interested in by listening to a guy read the textbook at a specific time every Tuesday and Thursday when I could just read my the same textbook on my own time.
Finally, if you do meet the prerequisites for a small, discussion-based mathematics or science class, you're now the lone humanities student in a room full of hard science majors. They won't all be hostile, dismissive, or condescending, but there's a good chance that enough of them will be that it's just not worth it. Like I said earlier in the post, I started out as a science major, so I actually met prerequisites fairly often. I still had trouble finding classes I wanted to take, even if I found the subject interesting, because they were unappealing as classes. Even still, I managed to find a class or two a year to shop, but I never ended up making it through shopping period after I switched majors.


There are probably cases where the difference is going to matter. When those cases crop up, we don't throw up our hands and say that it's impossible to get a true representation of external reality. We invent a better ruler.

Then, some of us go around telling everyone on the internet that ruler is perfect because it is accurate in the cases where the difference matters, so its measurements must be objectively true. Until one day it isn't accurate enough, then we make an even better ruler. Then, a new generation emits telepathic waves to inform everyone that, really this time, this ruler is perfect. Until, well, one day. . . :smallwink:

[Eldariel]

Which was the point I was trying to make. When it comes to the classic liberal arts education, I know quite a few people in math who did the whole nine yards. I don't know anybody in the humanities who can say the same. And at least at the college I attended, the statistics pretty strongly demonstrate that this is in fact the trend.

I major in general linguistics in the Faculty of Arts of the University of Helsinki; computational linguistics is a parallel subject in our faculty, and between those two subjects some good 20% of our students and even lecturers have a mathematical background (I studied theoretical physics in this very same university for a year). In the side of my studies I've been teaching math on high school level. We might be an unusual subject (I suppose it might help that computational linguistics is inherently tied to information technology and linguistics themselves make heavy use of logic), but I'd still like to think the split between mathematical subjects and humanities is not an entirely one-sided split.

[Mando Knight]

I think what's most controversial is to what degree human knowledge is separated from objective truth. "Separated from" and "unrelated to" are not the same thing.
Exactly. I'll concede that we'll probably never fully know the entire objective truth, but saying that human knowledge is unrelated to objective truth because there's subjective error is, to me, like saying that the works of Newton and Kepler don't adequately describe any motion in gravitational fields.

I major in general linguistics in the Faculty of Arts of the University of Helsinki; computational linguistics is a parallel subject in our faculty, and between those two subjects some good 20% of our students and even lecturers have a mathematical background (I studied theoretical physics in this very same university for a year). In the side of my studies I've been teaching math on high school level. We might be an unusual subject (I suppose it might help that computational linguistics is inherently tied to information technology and linguistics themselves make heavy use of logic), but I'd still like to think the split between mathematical subjects and humanities is not an entirely one-sided split.
The renowned men of the Renaissance were similarly often both artists and inventors. I think it may even have been only relatively recently when in order to specialize in their fields, people dropped "unrelated" studies, so philosophers became less skilled with mathematics, engineers with linguistics (try finding a thesis or dissertation from a hard science discipline that isn't drier than the heart of the Sahara), and so on.

[Zrak]

Exactly. I'll concede that we'll probably never fully know the entire objective truth, but saying that human knowledge is unrelated to objective truth because there's subjective error is, to me, like saying that the works of Newton and Kepler don't adequately describe any motion in gravitational fields.
I don't think that's a particularly justifiable reading of the statement. The argument that there is a hard separation between human knowledge and objective truth does not imply that any given piece of human knowledge is an inadequate description of the reality we observe and with which we interact, but rather that our observations and interactions are fundamentally separate from a more transcendent truth. In other words, arguing that scientific knowledge does not represent Objective Truth does not argue that technology based on that science should not function, or that scientific knowledge does not describe our experience of reality, merely that there is no basis for assuming our experience of reality reflects the objective truth thereof.
In other words, Telonius's view posits that, metaphorically speaking, human knowledge is separated from objective truth by distance; just as there is a literal distance between the place on the inexact ruler we observe and the place where the line actually ends, there is a distance between the truth we can observe, measure, and know, and objective reality. A view that posits the two are "unrelated" instead argues that human knowledge is separated from objective truth as though by a wall; rather than a gap that can be closed through superior observation, there is a barrier that absolutely separates our observations from the objective truth. In this view, not only is the length of the line at issue, but so is the very existence of the line, the paper on which it's drawn, and the ruler with which it's measured.

[Telonius]

The renowned men of the Renaissance were similarly often both artists and inventors. I think it may even have been only relatively recently when in order to specialize in their fields, people dropped "unrelated" studies, so philosophers became less skilled with mathematics, engineers with linguistics (try finding a thesis or dissertation from a hard science discipline that isn't drier than the heart of the Sahara), and so on.

It's still pretty true of the very top scientists that they're well-rounded. There's a 2008 study here (http://www.psychologytoday.com/files/attachments/1035/arts-foster-scientific-success.pdf) (PDF file) that suggest NAS members, Royal Society members, and Nobel laureates were all more involved in the arts than the general US public (and all four groups were more involved than the average Sigma Xi member).

[shawnhcorey]

Human knowledge is separated from any objective value of truth because knowledge is ultimately a subjective view of reality and any judgements of truth and falsehood we can make on our knowledge is unrelated to an objective truth.

But how do you know objective truth exists if all you have is subjective truth? You're assuming that everyone lives in the same universe even though Relativity states that everyone is at the centre of the universe and Quantum Mechanics state that everyone measures a different universe. You are making an assumption about a meta-truth: that there exists an objective truth.

[Telonius]

But how do you know objective truth exists if all you have is subjective truth? You're assuming that everyone lives in the same universe even though Relativity states that everyone is at the centre of the universe and Quantum Mechanics state that everyone measures a different universe. You are making an assumption about a meta-truth: that there exists an objective truth.

Would the belief that there is only subjective truth, be a subjective truth in itself? "All truth is subjective (except this one)," seems kind of stretching it.

[Mando Knight]

But how do you know objective truth exists if all you have is subjective truth? You're assuming that everyone lives in the same universe even though Relativity states that everyone is at the centre of the universe and Quantum Mechanics state that everyone measures a different universe. You are making an assumption about a meta-truth: that there exists an objective truth.

Repeatability and verifiability. If objective truth exists, then there is something that we can find that appears to not be influenced by subjective experience, or at the least, the variance in subjective experience can be quantized. Things like the motion of the celestial bodies, or the principle of relativity. If human knowledge is related to the objective truths, then we would be able to describe the phenomena to a degree of accuracy similar to our degree of relation to the objective truths.

Similarly, the opposite assumption, that objective truth does not exist, is a statement that constructs a self-contradictory logic. If objective truth does not exist, then its non-existence must be subjective... which means that it must also be subjectively true... which is false, since objective truth cannot be "only" subjectively true.

[shawnhcorey]

Repeatability and verifiability. If objective truth exists, then there is something that we can find that appears to not be influenced by subjective experience, or at the least, the variance in subjective experience can be quantized. Things like the motion of the celestial bodies, or the principle of relativity. If human knowledge is related to the objective truths, then we would be able to describe the phenomena to a degree of accuracy similar to our degree of relation to the objective truths.

But how can you say your measurements are objective when only you can make them? Quantum Mechanics states that any measurement will influence the phenomenon being measured. In other words, a phenomenon can only be measured once. Even if you make the same measurement in the exact same way, you will be measuring something else. Is that objective?


Similarly, the opposite assumption, that objective truth does not exist, is a statement that constructs a self-contradictory logic. If objective truth does not exist, then its non-existence must be subjective... which means that it must also be subjectively true... which is false, since objective truth cannot be "only" subjectively true.

You're assuming there's only one truth, the objective one. Physics clearly states that there are many truths, depending on how they are measured.

[Mando Knight]

But how can you say your measurements are objective when only you can make them? Quantum Mechanics states that any measurement will influence the phenomenon being measured. In other words, a phenomenon can only be measured once. Even if you make the same measurement in the exact same way, you will be measuring something else. Is that objective?
The Quantum Mechanics issue is one of scale: one does not change the orbit of Jupiter by any measurable amount by receiving the photons reflected off of it, any more than letting the photons strike bare Earth. At the quantum scale, however, any measurement at all is like finding the location of a moving ball on a pool table by skimming the surface of the table with a heavy-caliber machine gun.

The exact phenomenon can only be measured once in space-time, but if you have a way of causing a sufficiently similar phenomenon to occur, you can measure it in a sufficiently similar manner. From the multitude of subjective occurrences, you can calculate non-subjective results.

You're assuming there's only one truth, the objective one. Physics clearly states that there are many truths, depending on how they are measured.
You misunderstand. The "meta truth" that there is an objective truth is an objective statement itself. If there are any objective truths at all, that statement must also be true, as that is what it postulates. However, if there are no objective truths, then the antithesis of the statement, which is also an objective statement itself, is in a state of contradiction.

[shawnhcorey]

You misunderstand. The "meta truth" that there is an objective truth is an objective statement itself. If there are any objective truths at all, that statement must also be true, as that is what it postulates. However, if there are no objective truths, then the antithesis of the statement, which is also an objective statement itself, is in a state of contradiction.

No, you misunderstand. You are saying: there can only be one smell to the colour nine. Just because you can string words together, doesn't mean they make sense.

If there is no objective truth, then there are no objective statements about objective truth. It doesn't matter if they're true or false, they don't exist.

[Murska]

I think I've a pretty good definition for truth.

Within my mind, I have a mental 'map' of the world. This 'map' corresponds to some extent with the 'territory' - that is, the actual reality - but there are flaws on the map. There are no flaws in the territory, but there are things I don't know and beliefs I hold that are false, and those are contained in the map, not the territory.

So, when my map says that there's a town in point A, this means I expect to find a town when I look at point A. This could be any expectation. For example, I could expect, based on my mental model of the world, that when I drop a stone it will fall down. Now, because my mental model is pretty good when it comes to everyday things for the reason that I have plenty of evidence for most of my everyday beliefs and they are likely to correspond to the territory very well, most of the time I will find that when the actual event happens, the result will be as I expected. My belief has made a correct prediction of what will happen, and thus there is more evidence that said belief is true.

But sometimes, there's no town in point A. I expected something to happen, but something else happened. I was surprised. This means my mental map is not an accurate representation of the territory of reality. And this, in turn, means that my 'map' is not the 'territory' - just a model of it. So there is a territory, an objective reality, somewhere out there.

Reality, in short, is what causes the disrepancy between what I believe will happen and what actually happens. And truth is a belief that corresponds to reality.

[Mando Knight]

You are saying: there can only be one smell to the colour nine. Just because you can string words together, doesn't mean they make sense.
I am not!

If there is no objective truth, then there are no objective statements about objective truth. It doesn't matter if they're true or false, they don't exist.
If "There is no objective truth" is subjectively true, then it is also subjectively true that objective truth exists, as otherwise the statement "There is no objective truth" would be self-contradictory (an objective truth that states that there is no objective truth). However, an only-subjective objective truth is also a contradiction in terms, which means that the statement "There is no objective truth" cannot be true.

[shawnhcorey]

If "There is no objective truth" is subjectively true, then it is also subjectively true that objective truth exists, as otherwise the statement "There is no objective truth" would be self-contradictory (an objective truth that states that there is no objective truth). However, an only-subjective objective truth is also a contradiction in terms, which means that the statement "There is no objective truth" cannot be true.

If there is no objective truth, then logic is not objective. Using the fact that logic is objective to prove there must be objective truth is using a statement to prove itself. Logic is subjective, and doesn't always reach the same conclusion.

[Telonius]

If there is no objective truth, then logic is not objective. Using the fact that logic is objective to prove there must be objective truth is using a statement to prove itself. Logic is subjective, and doesn't always reach the same conclusion.
... so therefore, I win the argument, since my conclusion is different from yours! :smallbiggrin:

(There was a similar story told way back in my high school debate class. The first debater got his opponent to admit that he couldn't prove to the judge that he existed. The first debater asked the judge to declare him the winner by default, since his opponent was not present; and that if the judge determined that his opponent was, in fact, present, that it meant the judge must agree that it's possible to determine an objective reality).

[Zrak]

Repeatability and verifiability. If objective truth exists, then there is something that we can find that appears to not be influenced by subjective experience, or at the least, the variance in subjective experience can be quantized.
The problem with this line of thinking is that there really isn't a "we," in this situation; one has only one's own subjective experience, from which there is no escape. In other words, you do not have access to the subjective experiences of others from which to gain an actual measurement of the variance; instead, you have only your own subjective experience of their expression of their experiences to go on. The notion that you can quantize the variance in subjective experience relies on the notion that your own experiences are not fundamentally subjective.

Trite-but-classic tl;dr: How do you know other people see the same "blue" you see?

For the record, I am not saying I hold to any of the views of objective truth I mention in this thread, I'm just trying to clarify them when I believe they're being misapprehended.


The exact phenomenon can only be measured once in space-time, but if you have a way of causing a sufficiently similar phenomenon to occur, you can measure it in a sufficiently similar manner. From the multitude of subjective occurrences, you can calculate non-subjective results.
I'm not sure you understand what is meant by "Objective," here. Objective does not mean "with a functional degree of accuracy," it means absolute, inviolable, transcendent, universal, infallible. There is no "sufficiently similar" in Objective Truth. Never. No, not even then.


However, if there are no objective truths, then the antithesis of the statement, which is also an objective statement itself, is in a state of contradiction.
Not really. That statement reflects a subjective belief about the nature of reality. Since the lack of objective truths is a premise of the statement, all claims made in the statement must be assumed to be subjective.


(There was a similar story told way back in my high school debate class. The first debater got his opponent to admit that he couldn't prove to the judge that he existed. The first debater asked the judge to declare him the winner by default, since his opponent was not present; and that if the judge determined that his opponent was, in fact, present, that it meant the judge must agree that it's possible to determine an objective reality).

Personally, I wouldn't accept that argument. The judge could declare the opponent the winner based on the subjective belief that he's there, since the judge's conclusions are a subjective judgment, anyway; saying "I think he's here," isn't really any different than saying "I think he won."

[Murska]

I would like to ask a question from the people engaged in this debate.

In the hypothetical case that there is an objective truth, as opposed to the hypothetical case that there is not. What experience do you predict differently?

That is to say - what sort of an answer would definitively solve this question one way or another? How does the world look different to you depending on the answer?

If you, as I, cannot think of such a difference, then what is being debated is a 'wrong question'. It is an artifact of our brain, where our intuition runs foul of reality. The concepts are shorthand for experiences - they do not actually exist. And once the criterion for that concept (the experiences) are fulfilled, nothing more remains. A real question might be "Why do we think this way?" - that question will always have an answer.

EDIT: Just noticed something. Eldariel - if you're still reading this thread - I'm currently studying physics in that very same university. :)

[shawnhcorey]

Well, that is the first lesson of philosophy: how do you know what you know is real? And, after thinking about it a long, long time, you realize you can't answer the question. Then, it gets complicated. :smallbiggrin:

[Mando Knight]

The problem with this line of thinking is that there really isn't a "we," in this situation; one has only one's own subjective experience, from which there is no escape. In other words, you do not have access to the subjective experiences of others from which to gain an actual measurement of the variance; instead, you have only your own subjective experience of their expression of their experiences to go on. The notion that you can quantize the variance in subjective experience relies on the notion that your own experiences are not fundamentally subjective.
When you take lots of data, you can begin to approximate the variance of the subjective experience, even if you do not know the original "objectively true" values beforehand. That's how science does things.

Trite-but-classic tl;dr: How do you know other people see the same "blue" you see?
You don't know if they see blue the same way you do (and they probably don't, given the variance in human physiology), but by showing the same materials under the same lighting conditions, you can begin to develop a language that says that (for example) the color corresponding to EM radiation with a frequency of 645 THz at least falls within the range accepted as "blue."

The objective truth isn't that it's blue, though. It's that the object is reflecting EM radiation that has a frequency of 645 THz, and that produces a phenomenon in the human eye such that a descriptive term for the object in the English language circa 2014 is "blue."

I'm not sure you understand what is meant by "Objective," here. Objective does not mean "with a functional degree of accuracy," it means absolute, inviolable, transcendent, universal, infallible. There is no "sufficiently similar" in Objective Truth. Never. No, not even then.
shawnhcorey had made the argument from the perspective of quantum mechanics. By "sufficiently similar," I meant that while every occurrence is unique (dropping a ball now is not the same as dropping the same ball in exactly the same manner five seconds later, and dropping the ball in the exact same manner is difficult in and of itself), information can be extracted from each experience to find the underlying principle.

The experience itself is not the objective truth, but the subjective experience of the application of the underlying laws which are the objective truths that can be approximated. We might never know those laws to their truest forms, but the postulation that they exist is supported by the fact that they can be approximated to some degree.

[Tvtyrant]

I like William James' take on the subject. There may indeed be a discoverable objective truth out there. Unfortunately we do not have the capacity to recognize this truth when we find it, as there is no magic bell that goes off when you stumble across it. There is a bell that goes off when something matches our expectations, so we will always be tripped up by what we want to be true.

[the_druid_droid]

Not really. That statement reflects a subjective belief about the nature of reality. Since the lack of objective truths is a premise of the statement, all claims made in the statement must be assumed to be subjective.

I think this actually borders on one of the real issues in the discussion - what does a truth being subjective mean? In particular, how would objective truth differ from subjective truth?

Because if subjective means 'different from some speculative ideal Truth located somewhere, but still applicable across different human perspectives' then that statement is fine. But if subjective is taken to mean 'I have my truth and you have your truth and even though they refer to the same thing, they can be diametrically opposed without either being wrong' we get into some tricky territory, since my subjective truth may be that there is an objective truth and how exactly do we resolve that apparent contradiction?

Perhaps more directly phrased, can statements about one person's subjective truths be proven wrong by another?

To give a more concrete example of the thought process here, consider a bridge with a weight limit, say 5 tons. If my friend wants to drive his 6 ton load across it, and I warn him that things will end badly, it matters (at least conceptually) which side we take. In case A, although I don't understand the Truth of what's going on perfectly, I (and the engineers who built and tested the bridge) have a good enough model that he's a fool not to take it seriously. In case B though, what really happens? Is it that in my subjective universe he crashes through in an untimely accident, while in his he passes safely across based entirely on the strength of his conviction or ignorance?

While it's certainly not possible to disprove the scenario in case B, it's also not possible to provide proof positive of it either, nor does it make much difference which is which at the end of the day. My friend is dead to me either way, and that's essentially my point from earlier - the practical aspect of this is that our own approximations to truth are what we have to live with and act on, and while speculation is interesting as an academic exercise, I have trouble seeing it as being fruitful beyond that.

EDIT: Actually, TVTyrant, the history of discovery is full of examples of things dramatically failing to be what we expect them to be, and those are the instances we learn the most from, so I'm going to have to disagree with Mr. James.

[Zrak]

When you take lots of data, you can begin to approximate the variance of the subjective experience, even if you do not know the original "objectively true" values beforehand. That's how science does things.
You're missing the central point of the argument: you have no data outside of your subject experience because you cannot have data outside of your subjective experience. If you "take lots of data" of others' experiences, you are experiencing this information subjectively. You have only your own subjective experience. You can know nothing outside of this experience.


You don't know if they see blue the same way you do (and they probably don't, given the variance in human physiology), but by showing the same materials under the same lighting conditions, you can begin to develop a language that says that (for example) the color corresponding to EM radiation with a frequency of 645 THz at least falls within the range accepted as "blue."

The objective truth isn't that it's blue, though. It's that the object is reflecting EM radiation that has a frequency of 645 THz, and that produces a phenomenon in the human eye such that a descriptive term for the object in the English language circa 2014 is "blue."
The problem here is that there is no more objective basis for saying the object "is reflecting EM radiation that has a frequency of 645 THz" than there is for saying it's "blue," or even for saying that there is a discrete object there in the first place. All of these terms represent constructs we have created based upon our subjective perceptions and which can thus only reflect and describe those perceptions. No-matter what tools and terms you use, no-matter how exacting their measurements and precise their definitions, you cannot escape subjective experience.


shawnhcorey had made the argument from the perspective of quantum mechanics. By "sufficiently similar," I meant that while every occurrence is unique (dropping a ball now is not the same as dropping the same ball in exactly the same manner five seconds later, and dropping the ball in the exact same manner is difficult in and of itself), information can be extracted from each experience to find the underlying principle.
I understand what you meant, I was just saying that it isn't relevant to most ideas of Objective Truth. There is no similarity that can be sufficient, there is no room for any inexactitude or approximation. None.


We might never know those laws to their truest forms, but the postulation that they exist is supported by the fact that they can be approximated to some degree.
There is no "fact" that they can be approximated which does not presuppose that they exist; the reasoning is circular. How are we to discern that we are approximating an Objective Truth instead of a pattern that manifests in our subjective experience?

[warty goblin]

There is no "fact" that they can be approximated which does not presuppose that they exist; the reasoning is circular. How are we to discern that we are approximating an Objective Truth instead of a pattern that manifests in our subjective experience?

Why would I care about the difference?

[Zrak]

That I couldn't tell you. Like I said, I'm clarifying arguments I believe are being misunderstood, not advocating their positions. This whole debate is predicated on assumptions I don't really accept from a philosophical tradition to which I generally do not subscribe, but with which I am familiar enough and for which I have enough respect that I feel I can and should explain misapprehensions of its terms and arguments by those who would refute them.

[Asta Kask]

But how can you say your measurements are objective when only you can make them? Quantum Mechanics states that any measurement will influence the phenomenon being measured. In other words, a phenomenon can only be measured once. Even if you make the same measurement in the exact same way, you will be measuring something else. Is that objective?

You are talking about QM as if it's objective when you also must claim that the results are subjective for you and for every scientist to be consistent. You are in fact contradicting yourself, although it's a subtle contradiction. Maybe to me your statement is not true.

In fact, if you are right then I might be writing this as an essay on knitting, and you just reading it as a statement on objectivity.

[Murska]

I feel like I've been ignored here, so I'll try one more time.

Let's assume there is an answer to the question 'is reality subjective or objective?'. What experience can differentiate between these two? What experiment can you make, that gives you evidence one way or another? In what way is the world different depending on the answer?

If there is no difference, then there is no question. It does not exist. The concepts do not fit reality, they do not describe any part of reality, they are just artifacts of how your brain processes things. It is like associating roundness, redness, lightness, softness and the ability to glow in the dark with a concept called 'Rall', testing an object and finding it to be round, red, light, soft and glowing in the dark, but still asking 'is this 'Rall'?'. You are making the mistake of thinking that the concept is an attribute, that it actually exists in reality instead of your map, your mental model of reality.

[shawnhcorey]

Let's assume there is an answer to the question 'is reality subjective or objective?'. What experience can differentiate between these two? What experiment can you make, that gives you evidence one way or another? In what way is the world different depending on the answer?

If there is no difference, then there is no question. It does not exist.

It's not there's no difference but there's no experiment that can determine if any difference exists. That's one of the first lessons of philosophy: you have to make assumptions about what is knowable.

[Murska]

It's not there's no difference but there's no experiment that can determine if any difference exists. That's one of the first lessons of philosophy: you have to make assumptions about what is knowable.

If there is no experiment that can determine any difference, then there is no experience you can attain that would distinguish between the two possibilities. And in that case, there is only one possibility. The question is wrong. You are trying to determine what the concept, that exists only in your mind as a part of your mental model of reality, is like as if it were part of reality. It is not part of the territory, it is a part of your map, your beliefs about the territory.

[shawnhcorey]

If there is no experiment that can determine any difference, then there is no experience you can attain that would distinguish between the two possibilities. And in that case, there is only one possibility. The question is wrong. You are trying to determine what the concept, that exists only in your mind as a part of your mental model of reality, is like as if it were part of reality. It is not part of the territory, it is a part of your map, your beliefs about the territory.

Exactly. :smallsmile:

[Asta Kask]

“Excellently observed", answered Candide; "but let us cultivate our garden.”