Maybe I should face these seperately.
Objectivity. Someone show me something that is objectively true that does not require a subjective identification as objective. "A triangle has three sides." Who defines what triangle is? You? Me? Who? How are they objective?
Reasoning. How many methods of reasoning are there? Who decides which ones are "proper" and which are not? Where is the precision to logic or anything else that is required to formulate a "truth"? Or is this the best we can do: All dogs have four legs, All dogs bark, A mammal with no ability to bark with any other number than four legs is not a dog?
I know, that was weak, but meant purely as an example. Of course there are non-barking dogs and dogs with fewer than four legs. We are reduced to uncertainty about this and everything else.
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There are no square circles (objectively true). All bachelors are unmarried men (this is always true, and thus objectively true).
ReplyDeleteIf all the premises in the following argument is true, then the conclusion HAS TO BE:
1. All men are mortal
2. Socrates is a man
C. Thus, Socrates is mortal
IF premise 1 and 2 WERE true, THEN C. MUST be. The truth is forced upon us. Take the following example:
1. All fish have four legs
2. You are a fish
C. Thus, you have four legs.
This argument is valid, but not sound (because you are not a fish, and fish don't have legs). However, IF you WERE a fish (which makes 2 true), AND all fish had four legs (making 1 true), THEN you would HAVE TO HAVE FOUR LEGS.
Good reasoning doesn't have to claim truth outright. It claims a conditional that says "well, on the condition that... or Suppose for the sake of argument this were truth... , THEN logically this HAS to be." :)
All this being said, I don't know what "Objective reasoning" is. There is only subjective reasoning about objective things. We can talk hypothetically about being "objective" in the sense that we are attempting to be unbiased. But it seems evident that there is objective truth. Why? Because we can only view the world as it IS and not as we wish it to be. I am constrained by my perspective of the world. I have to walk around walls, travel by walking or driving, when I have inaccurate beliefs about something (that the world is flat), the world contradicts me.
My problem is that I cannot ever know what your experience of "red" is.
ReplyDeleteI know that sounds odd, but think about it. How do I know that your perception and my perception are telling us the same thing about our "objective" reality? Without that knowledge, how can I be assured that I am objectively correct in any of my experiences?
To me, there must be an "objective" reasoning or perhaps logic. A standard set, well, objectively. Otherwise we are all just hoping we are understanding each other as we mean for each other to. I mentioned elsewhere that a square circle could exist, if the meaning of square or circle were somehow different. Like if "square" were not a shape in this context but a value of acceptability.
Or am I being just as square as a circle again?
I empathize with what you're asking. In the branch of philosophy known as "Philosophy of Mind" this problem of color (red), is called the problem of perception.
ReplyDeleteBut while you cannot know what my experience of red is (because this might look to me what green looks like to you, and yet we both define it the same from birth - so we agree we are seeing a red object), you can know that I have to walk around walls and not through them, that I cannot fly, and we both equally experience this constraint by physical laws. From this, we can reasonably infer other things about the world and how it operates.
As for the square circle argument, this is not valid. The meaning of a circle is different from the meaning of a square. That meaning, whatever we assign to it constrains it to a logical function. Right now we both understand that "a square has four equal sides," because the predicate "has four equal sides" is contained in the subject "square." It is true in virtue of its meaning. If we change the meaning of what a square is, then that new meaning will also be constrained by the function of logic. Because we both understand what a circle is defined as, we know there cannot be a square circle (so long as it retains this meaning). Also, the meaning functions in reality and is useful. It refers to an actual geometric concept (circle & square), and we can derive mathematical functions from these. Thus, redefining it would fail, and be rejected.
My understanding of this is to say that the "meaning" of a word is what matters. It is what it is. Thus, there are as many square circles as there are cold-blooded mammals.
ReplyDeleteTherein lies my problem. If I am a cold-blooded murderer am I no longer mammal? How about baldness? At what point does a person become bald? The perfection of a geometric shape, whether it be a circle or a square or whatever, aren't these all things that we have been taught to experience through our perceptions from birth without any real question?
Consider the o. o's are circles, correct? As a circle there is no point on it which can be a straight line, correct? Please take a close look at an o, the one on your screen is a perfect example. Now, is it a circle? If not, is it an o?
Your problem is that you're looking at truth as something that exists in the world as apposed to something that exists in lanuage. or as PD states, a function of logic.
ReplyDeleteWhat? So truth only exists in language? Through the use of logic and applied language we can find truth? I really don't understand.
ReplyDeleteMy understanding has been thus:
If anything exists, that which exists is to be considered "true".
If nothing exists, then that non-existence must be considered "true".
"True" is therefore a subjective function and not applicable.
Where have I gone wrong?
Let me ask you this Ham, is a wallet true? Is a car true? is a tree true?
ReplyDeleteGood question. If they exist, then they are true, aren't they? If they don't, then their non-existence is true, isn't it?
ReplyDeleteI sense a paradox in this, but I don't see a way out of it.
If they exist then they are true?
ReplyDeleteWell then, you've just created a proposition. "A wallet exists." "That car is red" "The tree is tall."
The difference between CAR=TRUE and That car is red=TRUE, is that it's only propositions in language that have the property of being true. In other words, things in themselves are not true - it's only what we say about them that have the potential to be true.
Further, that "a car is red" is a true statement, or a potential true statement, stands in relation to the language practice it takes place in - that is, it's contingent.
So, to say that if something exists it is true is a little off the mark. If a car exists you don't say that the car is true (that doesn't make any sense) but you might say that the car exists. Whether or not it's true is irrelevent to the fact that we've created a proposition which we recognize as having a truth potential. Once again, the paradox you're seeing, I'd suggest, is that of thinking that truth exists in the world - again, the "WORLD" is not true.
You seem to be conflating truth with exist as well.
ReplyDeleteTruth is *about* something. It isn't the thing itself.
ReplyDeleteSo "true" is a pure function of language, correct? How is "exist" different? Is one more "provable" than the other? How?
ReplyDelete