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dv82matt
SFN Regular
760 Posts |
 Posted - 01/09/2005 : 20:14:35 [Permalink]
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Hello Isaiah.
I have been following this thread with interest and I think that you do make some interesting points.
quote:
Originally posted by Isaiah
Here's a statement with an existing truth value which I think has the possibility of changing with testing.
"My son trusts me."
The possibility of changing results from the meaning of the statement itself changing. That is, the statement "My son trusts me." really means "My son trusts me now." and now is a relative term which changes depending on when it is stated.
There are statements which do alter their own truth value, but the only ones I can think of are self-referencing absurdities like, "This statement is false."quote:
If your examination of skepticism made you conclude that a skeptical view of the world hindered your aesthetic and emotional appreciation of the world, how would you go about changing yourself?
I suppose that would depend on how high a value I placed on the particular aspect of emotions or aesthetics being hindered. In many cases it may be that hindering of emotions or aesthetics would be considered a good thing.
I think that this is an interesting question and worth exploring. |
| Edited by - dv82matt on 01/09/2005 20:16:50 |
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Dave W.
Info Junkie
USA
26020 Posts |
Posted - 01/09/2005 : 20:41:29 [Permalink]
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quote:
Originally posted by Isaiah
Okay, I have an example I'd like to put out there.
Here's a statement with an existing truth value which I think has the possibility of changing with testing.
"My son trusts me."
Well, I suggested the statements need to be well-defined, as well. This one is so poorly defined, its truth value can change on a day-to-day basis without any testing whatsoever. And so, one cannot tell whether the testing changes it, or it changes for other reasons.
And you wrote to Dude:quote:
I'm reluctant to enter into this with you, because of the vitriolic nature and dishonest discourse of your responses, which seem to be of a different level of vitriol than the other responses I'm receiving here...
How much "vitriol" do you think you're receiving in general (I mean aside from Dude's response)? |
- Dave W. (Private Msg, EMail)
Evidently, I rock!
Why not question something for a change?
Visit Dave's Psoriasis Info, too. |
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Dude
SFN Die Hard
USA
6891 Posts |
Posted - 01/10/2005 : 01:41:35 [Permalink]
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quote:
I'm reluctant to enter into this with you, because of the vitriolic nature and dishonest discourse of your responses, which seem to be of a different level of vitriol than the other responses I'm receiving here, but you may end up sparking either thoughts about or examples of my premise that a skeptical mindset has an effect on one's ability to respond aesthetically and emotionally.
Don't be such a pansy. You mistake plain speaking for "vitriol". If I claim you are ignorant, it means only that you are lacking in knowledge of a certain subject. If I was going to insult you it'd be much more flavorfull than simply stating that you lack knowledge.
Ignorant/ingorance are simple and concise words. The percived insult is entirely your subjective perception that the word is used in a negative connotation.
quote:
Having said that, you're taking my quote out of it's context and assuming I'm saying the converse of what I said. My statement was that "those things that are simple are discovered and examined and understood early in human history and those things that are complicated are understood later."
No, I'm not taking you out of context. I'm telling you that your statement is an unsupported assertion, and a rather absurd one at that. You conflate the continued growth of our (as a race) knowledge base with increased complexity. You assume, wrongly, that things we don't yet understand are complicated. You then go on to state that therfore Chi "must" be complex if it exists. You mistake incomplete understanding (in early human history) with simplicity of the subject. Your statement contains, as I said before, many unsupported premises. The failure to percieve them is yours.
As our knowledge increases, we observe complexity where it was not observed before, due to new tools and methods. New information builds upon the old, making our knowledge of things more complex, not the things themselves.
quote:
It is saying the converse: a complicated subject that depends upon previously discovered knowledge to understand it has to be understood after those a priori subjects are understood.
I'm not sure you understand what a priori means. The context within which you use it here is inaproptiate. Unless, of course, you are implying that "simple" subjects can be know a priori? In which case, you need to clarify your definition of "simple".
As a rather strict empiricist I disagree with the idea that any synthetic statement can be known a priori, and that any a priori propositions are limited to the analytic.
quote:
Your second dishonesty is to take my phrase "usually inhibited," which actually was a carefully chosen (though possibly incorrect) word and translating it as, "don't feel emotion and can't appreciate subjective aesthetics." To inhibit means to hold back, to restrain, to keep something in check so to speak, and implies that something is being suppressed or limited, not that it is being eliminated. I meant to imply only that aesthetic or emotional experiences exist that a non-skeptic appreciates more than a skeptic.
You failed to state the degree of inhibition you wanted to convey. The word can mean either limited restraint or complete restraint of the subject it is applied to. In the context you used, it seemed to imply the stronger meaning, as you applied no other modifiers to the word. Even with your clarification I still contend that you are mistaken. Your statement is nothing more than another unsupported assertion.
quote:
For one, I admitted it wasn't a good example so you don't have to try to jump up and down on it. Second, I only brought up Heisenberg in
response to the statement, "The effect of examining or measuring something has no effect on the thing being measured or examined," as you can see if you openly read the posts. I was, admittedly, tossing it around as an analogy for my set 2 of the original post, but just tossing it around. If I thought it was an actual example of a member of set 2 I would have used it as an example in the first place.
The indeterminancy principle is limited to the subatomic realm. If you also limit statements in your "set" to only statements about the subatomic, then you may freely use the uncertainty principle. You, however, made no such distinction. Which indicates ignorance of the subject on your part.
quote:
I am here because I think on the whole your group can help me think through my newly worded thoughts about skeptics. I'm sure you probably are quite capable of critical thought without ridicule, and I'm quite possibly wrong so you don't have to resort to dishonest tactics to prove it. I'd enjoy having you on board to help with the exploration, but if you've already made up your mind, that's your choice.
Stereotyping is a logical fallacy. You are guilty of it. You appear to have made up your mind about "skeptics" before your first post here.
I will point out that you are the one to offer insults with your claim(unsupported) that skeptics are somehow inhibited from feeling emotions and appreciating the aesthetic. You continued on, before my first post, with an insult to everyone who posted in this thread, by calling them a bunch of astrologers (a word with negative connotation to skeptics).
It is not my intent (yet) to give you any "vitriol". Maybe a little mockery, but defiitely no open hostility. If you percieved any hostility towards you, I apologize. I'm pretty far from PC, and sometimes speak my mind about things.
quote:
How much "vitriol" do you think you're receiving in general (I mean aside from Dude's response)?
You think I was being vitriolic? hrrrmmm.... I didn't think I was, really.
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Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong.
-- Thomas Jefferson
"god :: the last refuge of a man with no answers and no argument." - G. Carlin
Hope, n.
The handmaiden of desperation; the opiate of despair; the illegible signpost on the road to perdition. ~~ da filth |
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Dave W.
Info Junkie
USA
26020 Posts |
Posted - 01/10/2005 : 10:19:34 [Permalink]
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Dude wrote:quote:
You think I was being vitriolic? hrrrmmm.... I didn't think I was, really.
I didn't say that. Isaiah laid out the categories: (A) vitriol in your post, and (B) vitriol from everyone else. I was just trying to be crystal clear that I want to know, from him, how large he thinks category B is.
And while Isaiah's "Man... With the nature of the responses I'm receiving, I feel like a skeptic that was dropped into an astrologer's conference," could probably be considered the first virtiolic thing written in this thread, I wouldn't lump in his questioning of whether skeptics are "inhibited" or not in that category.
I have a feeling, though it is just that at the moment, that Isaiah is confusing 'skeptical' with 'cynical', a not-too-uncommon mistake. |
- Dave W. (Private Msg, EMail)
Evidently, I rock!
Why not question something for a change?
Visit Dave's Psoriasis Info, too. |
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Isaiah
Skeptic Friend
USA
83 Posts |
Posted - 01/10/2005 : 11:55:08 [Permalink]
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quote:
Originally posted by Dave W.
And you wrote to Dude:
quote:
I'm reluctant to enter into this with you, because of the vitriolic nature and dishonest discourse of your responses, which seem to be of a different level of vitriol than the other responses I'm receiving here...
How much "vitriol" do you think you're receiving in general (I mean aside from Dude's response)?
I would say that I misspoke in that I haven't perceived any of the other posters to be impolite or to be attempting to discourage the conversation through adopting an intimidating or domineering manner (i.e. bullying). So there's a different level only in that everyone else's vitriolic level is zero. Just Dude--in a class by himself. |
For Real Things I Know - http://solomonj.blogspot.com
"My point is, that you cannot use lack of evidence for one possibility as proof for another." - Dude
“I would rather delude myself with comforting fantasies than face a cold reality” - Isaiah, altered from astropin |
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BigPapaSmurf
SFN Die Hard
3192 Posts |
Posted - 01/10/2005 : 11:57:46 [Permalink]
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About who here is a skeptic and who here is not...
Verlch is the local "Nutjob" From 'all women are evil' to 'owl worshiping babylonians controlling the whitehouse.'
Storm is 100% pro-psi but "Trying to learn science"
TKster is just confusing us, formerly had a pro-creation website and now is gung-ho skeptic all the sudden.
Most of the other regular posters are pretty gung-ho skeptics. When in doubt check out the signatures. |
"...things I have neither seen nor experienced nor heard tell of from anybody else; things, what is more, that do not in fact exist and could not ever exist at all. So my readers must not believe a word I say." -Lucian on his book True History
"...They accept such things on faith alone, without any evidence. So if a fraudulent and cunning person who knows how to take advantage of a situation comes among them, he can make himself rich in a short time." -Lucian critical of early Christians c.166 AD From his book, De Morte Peregrini |
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Isaiah
Skeptic Friend
USA
83 Posts |
Posted - 01/10/2005 : 12:08:04 [Permalink]
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quote:
And while Isaiah's "Man... With the nature of the responses I'm receiving, I feel like a skeptic that was dropped into an astrologer's conference," could probably be considered the first virtiolic thing written in this thread, I wouldn't lump in his questioning of whether skeptics are "inhibited" or not in that category.
 I wasn't exactly trying to be insulting, although in retrospect I should have predicted that your attitude toward being compared to an astrologer had a larger meaning than I meant it to have.
I wrote that statement only because I had reread the thread and came across all of these sentences:
BigPapaSmurf:
there is no evidence that matter changes just because it is being observed.
Valiant Dancer:
The effect of examining or measuring something has no effect on the thing being measured or examined.
Valiant Dancer:
One cannot be skeptical of skepticism.
It doesn't hinder aesthetics or emotions.
Ricky:
Skepticism is not a view on the world.
I felt like I was bombarded with absolutes and wasn't receiving the open-minded questioning I had assumed would be received in a skeptics forum. So I felt like someone who has to convince people to try questioning something--which is how a skeptic would feel in an astrology conference.
I didn't come here to clash horns or to fight bull-headedness, but to use what I felt was the best group of people around to work through my thoughts... a group of people that would welcome it.
Isaiah |
For Real Things I Know - http://solomonj.blogspot.com
"My point is, that you cannot use lack of evidence for one possibility as proof for another." - Dude
“I would rather delude myself with comforting fantasies than face a cold reality” - Isaiah, altered from astropin |
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Isaiah
Skeptic Friend
USA
83 Posts |
Posted - 01/10/2005 : 12:31:20 [Permalink]
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quote:
Originally posted by Dave W.
I have a feeling, though it is just that at the moment, that Isaiah is confusing 'skeptical' with 'cynical', a not-too-uncommon mistake.
I guess it's possible, but I'm trying not to confuse the two. A cynic and a skeptic are both questioning, but for different reasons. A cynic questions things because she doubts the sincerity or integrity of humans, (which I think leads to a contemptuous or mocking attitute). A skeptic questions something because she doubts the claim itself rather than the integrity of the person making a claim (and has a specific methodology she uses to discover evidence); keeping an open mind to new evidence is also of utmost importance to the skeptic.
Is that a satisfying enough distinction? |
For Real Things I Know - http://solomonj.blogspot.com
"My point is, that you cannot use lack of evidence for one possibility as proof for another." - Dude
“I would rather delude myself with comforting fantasies than face a cold reality” - Isaiah, altered from astropin |
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BigPapaSmurf
SFN Die Hard
3192 Posts |
Posted - 01/10/2005 : 13:14:24 [Permalink]
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Hehe, Did you feel like you wanted to kill yourself because the magnatude of sheer idiocy and the gullibility of humans? Because thats how I would feel dropped into the middle of an astrology convention.
As I learned in my first few posts here, bring your guns loaded(data to back statements) or stay at home. |
"...things I have neither seen nor experienced nor heard tell of from anybody else; things, what is more, that do not in fact exist and could not ever exist at all. So my readers must not believe a word I say." -Lucian on his book True History
"...They accept such things on faith alone, without any evidence. So if a fraudulent and cunning person who knows how to take advantage of a situation comes among them, he can make himself rich in a short time." -Lucian critical of early Christians c.166 AD From his book, De Morte Peregrini |
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Valiant Dancer
Forum Goalie
USA
4826 Posts |
Posted - 01/10/2005 : 14:08:50 [Permalink]
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quote:
Originally posted by Isaiah
quote:
And while Isaiah's "Man... With the nature of the responses I'm receiving, I feel like a skeptic that was dropped into an astrologer's conference," could probably be considered the first virtiolic thing written in this thread, I wouldn't lump in his questioning of whether skeptics are "inhibited" or not in that category.
I wasn't exactly trying to be insulting, although in retrospect I should have predicted that your attitude toward being compared to an astrologer had a larger meaning than I meant it to have.
I wrote that statement only because I had reread the thread and came across all of these sentences:
BigPapaSmurf:
there is no evidence that matter changes just because it is being observed.
Valiant Dancer:
The effect of examining or measuring something has no effect on the thing being measured or examined.
Valiant Dancer:
One cannot be skeptical of skepticism.
It doesn't hinder aesthetics or emotions.
Ricky:
Skepticism is not a view on the world.
I felt like I was bombarded with absolutes and wasn't receiving the open-minded questioning I had assumed would be received in a skeptics forum. So I felt like someone who has to convince people to try questioning something--which is how a skeptic would feel in an astrology conference.
I didn't come here to clash horns or to fight bull-headedness, but to use what I felt was the best group of people around to work through my thoughts... a group of people that would welcome it.
Isaiah
You did miss one which I stated that one cannot analyze something in terms of itself. One cannot be skeptical of skepticism that would be analyzation of something in terms of itself.
The whole gist of your arguement concerning measuring something changing the nature of that object reeks of existentialism. You are saying that perception shapes reality. While that may be true in psychological circles concerning an individuals view of someone and the acts they do, it does not in the natural world. The natural world is incompletely understood in full as our ability to measure and analyze the natural world improves, our understanding improves.
Your inclusion of truth values further muddies the waters and several of us have interpreted that as "how we percieve things chnages the way that thing operates". The truth value of the nature of the object being studied does not change. We may change the attributes which we assign to those objects based on observation. In this case, reality changes our perceptions based on evidence.
About 300 years ago, medicine was convinced that evil spirits in the blood was cause for all disease. Later, humans discovered the myriad causes of disease. If we apply your posited statement (as it is interpreted), then 300 years ago diseases were actually caused by evil spirits in the blood. When microbes and vitimin deficeincies were discovered, magically, the cause transformed into the myriad causes today.
It took decades to shift the common perception around to this view, but it is based on observed phenomenon. The truth value never changed for what was actually causing the disease, what society as a whole believed caused disease changed.
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Cthulhu/Asmodeus when you're tired of voting for the lesser of two evils
Brother Cutlass of Reasoned Discussion |
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Wendy
SFN Regular
USA
614 Posts |
Posted - 01/10/2005 : 14:10:59 [Permalink]
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Welcome, Isaiah. Kil has written an excellent article About Skepticism you will find on the Home page. If you haven't already read it you should.
(Hey, everybody seems to be sucking up to Kil today - I'd hate to be left out.  ) |
Millions long for immortality who don't know what to do on a rainy afternoon.
-- Susan Ertz
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Kil
Evil Skeptic
USA
13476 Posts |
Posted - 01/10/2005 : 14:14:03 [Permalink]
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quote:
Originally posted by Wendy
(Hey, everybody seems to be sucking up to Kil today - I'd hate to be left out. )
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Uncertainty may make you uncomfortable. Certainty makes you ridiculous.
Why not question something for a change?
Genetic Literacy Project |
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Isaiah
Skeptic Friend
USA
83 Posts |
Posted - 01/10/2005 : 14:33:54 [Permalink]
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quote:
Originally posted by Wendy
Welcome, Isaiah. Kil has written an excellent article About Skepticism you will find on the Home page. If you haven't already read it you should.
(Hey, everybody seems to be sucking up to Kil today - I'd hate to be left out. )
Thanks. I did read that before I started posting here. I just reread it. I don't think I've disagreed with anything in there.
Isaiah |
For Real Things I Know - http://solomonj.blogspot.com
"My point is, that you cannot use lack of evidence for one possibility as proof for another." - Dude
“I would rather delude myself with comforting fantasies than face a cold reality” - Isaiah, altered from astropin |
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Isaiah
Skeptic Friend
USA
83 Posts |
Posted - 01/10/2005 : 14:50:19 [Permalink]
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quote:
Originally posted by Valiant Dancer
The whole gist of your arguement concerning measuring something changing the nature of that object reeks of existentialism. You are saying that perception shapes reality. While that may be true in psychological circles concerning an individuals view of someone and the acts they do, it does not in the natural world. The natural world is incompletely understood in full as our ability to measure and analyze the natural world improves, our understanding improves.
Your inclusion of truth values further muddies the waters and several of us have interpreted that as "how we percieve things chnages the way that thing operates". The truth value of the nature of the object being studied does not change. We may change the attributes which we assign to those objects based on observation. In this case, reality changes our perceptions based on evidence.
I appreciate this patient retelling of your interpretation of my statements because it's helping me understand some of the responses I'm receiving and the inadequacy or incompleteness of my original words. I certainly didn't mean that perception or measurement was changing truth values in set 2 but that the very act of questioning or desire to test in the first place was invalidating the test. |
For Real Things I Know - http://solomonj.blogspot.com
"My point is, that you cannot use lack of evidence for one possibility as proof for another." - Dude
“I would rather delude myself with comforting fantasies than face a cold reality” - Isaiah, altered from astropin |
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Isaiah
Skeptic Friend
USA
83 Posts |
Posted - 01/10/2005 : 15:04:22 [Permalink]
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quote:
Originally posted by BigPapaSmurf
Hehe, Did you feel like you wanted to kill yourself because the magnatude of sheer idiocy and the gullibility of humans? Because thats how I would feel dropped into the middle of an astrology convention.
As I learned in my first few posts here, bring your guns loaded(data to back statements) or stay at home.
No, I didn't, although I can see that that was the interpretation of my statement.
I can see that one is expected to bring loaded guns here, but I often need to talk something out before I really understand what I think or believe about something. I may intuitively or inductively understand my position, but haven't reasoned it out concretely. But I don't plan on staying home either.
Isaiah |
For Real Things I Know - http://solomonj.blogspot.com
"My point is, that you cannot use lack of evidence for one possibility as proof for another." - Dude
“I would rather delude myself with comforting fantasies than face a cold reality” - Isaiah, altered from astropin |
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