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Dude
SFN Die Hard
USA
6891 Posts |
 Posted - 11/13/2007 : 14:42:15 [Permalink]
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bngbuck said:
| ....is perhaps suggestive, but not definitive of your thesis. If you anticipate future discoveries in particle physics as capable of demonstrating that what has not yet happened actually has already happened in every instance, then at that time, Zeus willing, I will agree with your premise! |
My thesis is simple; there is enough uncertainty to make the concept of unknowable, as it has been stated in certain terms, implausible. The default position must therefore be that things we don't know are unknown. The claim of unknowable rests on an entirely unevidenced and logically unsupportable premise, that you know enough about some thing to conclude it has an inherently unknowable nature.
Might there actually be something out there with an inherently unknowable nature? Sure, and Ricky might also be able to shit out an SUV. As the saying goes, show me some evidence.
| I yearn for the formal proof that that which is inherently unknowable to human experience is not also impossible as impossibility is perceived by human cognition! Fulfil me! |
And I yearn for some winning lotto numbers, a home based business that will actually let me earn a million dollars a year working less than 20 hours a week, an otc pill that actually delivers its promise of weightloss without diet or excercise, or to inherit enough money to drop work for the next couple or years so I can complete a degree in biology and get started on graduate work.
Sadly, none of those things are likely to be forthcomming.
Now, if you switch your sentence around to reflect what I was actually saying, that impossible (in terms of logically mutually exclusive propositions) does not mean unknowable... then I think the veracity of my statement is fairly self evident.
| But what gives absolute certainty to the guess that these variables will not change? And if they do, you have to couch your statement in a conventional past-present-future time line! |
Absolute certainty? There is no such thing outside of religion, and I'd certainly never offer such certainty in the face of future predictions. But it isn't required either, to negate the concept of unknowable.
Now, if you want to shift context and discuss things in terms of pragmatism, then we may be able to agree that some things are (at the moment) in effect unknowable. But that is a different can of worms, and I'd probably still insist that the logical default is still to consider them unknown.
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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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bngbuck
SFN Addict
USA
2437 Posts |
Posted - 11/13/2007 : 15:54:59 [Permalink]
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Dude.....
You state:| Now, if you switch your sentence around to reflect what I was actually saying, that impossible (in terms of logically mutually exclusive propositions) does not mean unknowable... then I think the veracity of my statement is fairly self evident. |
| You said today on another forum:[quote]A point I have repeatedly tried to make on these forums recently; definitions are what give language it's communicative power. Without them we'd just be making noise, and we certainly can't have a discussion (especially in a forum of this "nature") unless we agree to use the same definition of the words key to our debate. |
1. Dude, please define "impossible"
2. Also, please define "unknowable" |
| Edited by - bngbuck on 11/13/2007 18:57:10 |
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Dave W.
Info Junkie
USA
26021 Posts |
Posted - 11/13/2007 : 18:02:46 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by bngbuck
I yearn for the formal proof that that which is inherently unknowable to human experience is not also impossible as impossibility is perceived by human cognition! Fulfil me! |
That an objective reality exists is inherently unknowable (see my previous post), but if one exists, then it's obviously possible. Indeed, most people act as if there is no other possibility. |
- 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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bngbuck
SFN Addict
USA
2437 Posts |
Posted - 11/13/2007 : 19:43:45 [Permalink]
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Dave.....
With respect to:| That an objective reality exists is inherently unknowable (see my previous post), but if one exists, then it's obviously possible. Indeed, most people act as if there is no other possibility. |
If you are in agreement with Dude's statement on another forum:| A point I have repeatedly tried to make on these forums recently; definitions are what give language it's communicative power. Without them we'd just be making noise, and we certainly can't have a discussion (especially in a forum of this "nature") unless we agree to use the same definition of the words key to our debate. |
..... I would like to ask you for a definition of "reality" before answering your post! |
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Dave W.
Info Junkie
USA
26021 Posts |
Posted - 11/13/2007 : 20:11:36 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by bngbuck
..... I would like to ask you for a definition of "reality" before answering your post! |
You don't want that defined, you want the term "objective reality" defined. Defining "reality" alone won't help you when there are subjective realities, too.
An objective reality is where things actually exist and interact according to some set of physical laws, independent of all classical observers or egos.
Are you just being cautious, bngbuck, or are you treading new philosophical ground here? |
- 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 - 11/13/2007 : 20:47:40 [Permalink]
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Impossible:
| incapable of being or of occurring : not within the realm of the possible : contrary to the nature of reality |
Unknowable:
| not knowable : of a kind that cannot be comprehended |
These are not words that have a lot of variation in definition with different context, so this semantics negotiation will (I hope) be short.
Unknowable implies impossible only with regard to what can or cannot be known.
Impossible does not, in any way, necessarrily imply unknowable.
That make any sense?
If some thing were unknowable then it is impossible to know that thing. The converse is not true.
And if it is impossible to know an unknowable thing, then how would you know it is unknowable in the first place? That implies knowledge of the thing in question.
So the word itself represents two mutually exclusive propositions.
Now pardon me while I sit down, I think I sprained a neuron.
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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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Valiant Dancer
Forum Goalie
USA
4826 Posts |
Posted - 11/13/2007 : 21:03:17 [Permalink]
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OK. I think I may just have one.
Skepticism is a methodology for testing and evaluating arguments and evidence.
Religion is a belief system predicated on the existance of hitherto scientifically unknown and currently unmeasurable forces which are purported to have an effect on the material world. These forces are controlled either directly or indirectly through prescribed rituals.
In this case, however, Buddhism ceases to be a religion and becomes a philosophy and Metaphysics becomes a religion.
I'm not sure that isn't a valid reclassification.
jes my $.02 worth (now US and Canadian) |
Cthulhu/Asmodeus when you're tired of voting for the lesser of two evils
Brother Cutlass of Reasoned Discussion |
| Edited by - Valiant Dancer on 11/13/2007 21:05:14 |
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marfknox
SFN Die Hard
USA
3739 Posts |
Posted - 11/13/2007 : 21:34:25 [Permalink]
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Dave, sorry I'm taking so long to get back to this part of the thread, but I didn't want to misunderstand you again because I'm reading too fast and not absorbing or confusing what you say with what others have said.
| Well, there's the problem, right there: how can we define religious faith without first having answered the question in the title, "What is religion?" |
This ends up being a problem actually since I typically define "religious faith" as faith about supernatural or mystical claims, while I define "religion" as being about religious faith, an particular type of practice, and/or particular type of social institution (not necessarily all three).
| "Religious" is an adjective that depends upon the meaning of "religion" for its own meaning, after all. |
Didn't we say exactly the opposite in the other thread which inspired this one? We talked about someone who practices skepticism (or any other activity) religiously, but then agreed that this can be true while not meaning that the activity being practice is a religion or even part of one. (Edited to add: "we" meaning me and other people on SFN, not you necessarily, although I don't remember you objecting.)
| I am talking about any sort of faith that creates a foundation for a broad philosophy or worldview. Under my distinction, Humanism would be a religion because (as you say) it includes articles of faith. Simple as that. |
Okay, then I agree with you.
| I don't find much of a distinction between the faith that the Four Noble Truths are an accurate distillation of the human condition and the faith that Jesus died for our sins. It's a matter of degree, not a matter of kind. |
I find it to be very much a matter of kind. It is like the difference between a moral truth and a claim of fact. Jesus didn't die for our sins. He didn't rise from the dead. He didn't ascend into heaven. Most Christians regard these things as factually true. The claim of the Four Noble Truths are a rather poetic and simplified way of describing essentials of the human condition, along with the foundation for a philosophy for making choices about how we respond to life situations.
| Adherents are asked to believe something for which the evidence is scant or for which some tortured logic is required (or both) to say, "this is truth." Faith, to me, is nothing more than a firm belief in the undemonstrable. (Perhaps next is a thread on the definition of "faith.") |
That could be cool. Once my schedule clears up a little, maybe I'll start one. Or someone else can.
| I knew you were talking about a narrower definition of faith, which is why I kept trying to tell you that I wasn't talking about belief in God or the supernatural. |
*sheepish shrug* Sorry.
| At several points through the years, marf, it has seemed clear that you want Humanism to be recognized as a religion by other skeptics here. |
Naw. Not Humanism. Hell, my own fellow Humanists here in Philly mostly don't regard our organization as a religious one. The word "religion" has seriously fallen out of fashion with Humanists (which, again, looking at the history I think is a direct response to fundamentalists, and I find it rath |
"Too much certainty and clarity could lead to cruel intolerance" -Karen Armstrong
Check out my art store: http://www.marfknox.etsy.com
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marfknox
SFN Die Hard
USA
3739 Posts |
Posted - 11/13/2007 : 21:38:00 [Permalink]
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Valiant Dancer wrote: In this case, however, Buddhism ceases to be a religion and becomes a philosophy and Metaphysics becomes a religion.
I'm not sure that isn't a valid reclassification. |
Looking at the history of religions, I don't think it is valid. |
"Too much certainty and clarity could lead to cruel intolerance" -Karen Armstrong
Check out my art store: http://www.marfknox.etsy.com
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Dave W.
Info Junkie
USA
26021 Posts |
Posted - 11/13/2007 : 21:48:33 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by Dude
And if it is impossible to know an unknowable thing, then how would you know it is unknowable in the first place? That implies knowledge of the thing in question. |
No, it only requires meta-knowledge of the thing in question.
Say that we've got a seamless metal box the size of a railroad boxcar in the middle of New York City and a statement that if we damage, move or otherwise tamper with the box it will explode with a force of approximately 1,000 megatons. It's got an electrical cord, a button and a light protruding from one side, and it weighs enough that it might be upwards of 60% solid lead by volume.
If the electrical cord is plugged into normal house current, then pushing the button once for less than one second results in the light coming on for five seconds after a delay of two seconds. If we push and release the button twice within one second, the light comes on for three seconds after a delay of three seconds. No other form of button pushing results in the light coming on. If the electrical cord is not plugged in, the light never comes on.
In this obviously contrived scenario, given what we know about the box, we can say with certainty that the internal mechanism of the box - that which causes the light-flashing behaviour in response to button pushing - can not ever be known. It may be a straighforward and simple electrical circuit, or it could be the result of billions of calculations occuring within multiple high-end servers networked together. It could be that the button activates a mechanical device with cogs and gears which pushes another button to light the light. Or it could be some poor guy with a stopwatch and a 100% efficient recycling unit.
What we know is that we cannot know what's inside the box, so long as the risk to the citizens of New York outweighs the possible benefits of assuming that the warning statement is a lie. We can guess, and/or misapply Occam's Razor, but if the warning is real then the only ways to even try to find out what's inside will probably destroy all the evidence of what's inside (as well as many millions of lives).
And unlike the nature of reality, there's nothing to tentatively accept on pragmatic terms, since the box itself isn't an example of pragmatism (being of no obvious utility). Well, perhaps we can discount the guy with the stopwatch, but how much closer to knowing what's inside does the elimination of one possibility out of trillions get us? |
- 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 - 11/13/2007 : 22:08:32 [Permalink]
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Dave_W said:
| What we know is that we cannot know what's inside the box |
More accurately: We won't look inside the box.
I could sit in orbit and have someone on the ground open it up though. Or we could evacuate NY state and have a robot pop it open... or any number of things.
So the content of that box has to be classified as merely unknown. It would be highly inappropriate to label it as inherently unknowable.
I'm talking about being able to assign "inherently unknowable" to some thing as a trait. I don't see how it can be done and remain logically consistent.
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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
26021 Posts |
Posted - 11/13/2007 : 22:28:53 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by Dude
More accurately: We won't look inside the box.
I could sit in orbit and have someone on the ground open it up though. Or we could evacuate NY state and have a robot pop it open... or any number of things. |
You've got a reason to doubt the warning? Either of those actions, if the warning is correct, would result in ensuring that the insides are unknowable through their very thorough destruction. Even if we could, for example, collect spectrographic data on the contents of the box other than the explosive device during the explosion, we couldn't say whether what appears to be the signature of 17 Dell rack-mount servers were 17 functional Dell rack-mount servers, or if they were connected to the button and/or light in any way.| I'm talking about being able to assign "inherently unknowable" to some thing as a trait. I don't see how it can be done and remain logically consistent. |
Well, what's different about the existence of an objective reality that makes its being unknowable logically consistent? Perhaps it's because logic itself is definitional, and so can't exist where at least an illusion of objectivity is missing? |
- 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 - 11/14/2007 : 02:23:00 [Permalink]
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Dave_W said:
| You've got a reason to doubt the warning? Either of those actions, if the warning is correct, would result in ensuring that the insides are unknowable through their very thorough destruction. Even if we could, for example, collect spectrographic data on the contents of the box other than the explosive device during the explosion, we couldn't say whether what appears to be the signature of 17 Dell rack-mount servers were 17 functional Dell rack-mount servers, or if they were connected to the button and/or light in any way. |
Well,if the contents were destroyed then we'd have some data about them! The simple fact that they could be destroyed by a nuclear detonation is a datapoint, we know soething about it, which means that the exact content of the box remains unknown rather than inherently unknowable. Maybe a detailed analysis of the actual blast and the blast residue will reveal even more datapoints about the content of the box. Maybe the blastwave sends some intact debris out of the fireball..
And what about penetrating radar, ultrasound, high power xrays, and other potential methods of looking inside that wuoldn't violate the rules against tampering or moving?
| Well, what's different about the existence of an objective reality that makes its being unknowable logically consistent? |
Much, but that is the basic reason why I prefer to not make the certain conclusion that it is inherently unknowable.
| Perhaps it's because logic itself is definitional, and so can't exist where at least an illusion of objectivity is missing? |
Definitional, yes. But it is also contextual. A thing that is logically consistent in one context may not be so in a different one.
But yes, you need objectivity within specific contexts for logic to apply.
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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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H. Humbert
SFN Die Hard
USA
4574 Posts |
Posted - 11/14/2007 : 08:15:08 [Permalink]
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Dude, what was Charles Darwin thinking at 8:07 PM on the evening of October 7th, 1831? Is there, in principle, a way we could ever know that?
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"A man is his own easiest dupe, for what he wishes to be true he generally believes to be true." --Demosthenes
"The first principle is that you must not fool yourself - and you are the easiest person to fool." --Richard P. Feynman
"Face facts with dignity." --found inside a fortune cookie |
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Dude
SFN Die Hard
USA
6891 Posts |
Posted - 11/14/2007 : 15:28:34 [Permalink]
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H.H.
Dude, what was Charles Darwin thinking at 8:07 PM on the evening of October 7th, 1831? Is there, in principle, a way we could ever know that?
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I guess I'm not saying this well enough.
Is there a way that you or I could know the answer to that question? No, I can't think of a way unless he happened to be penning a journal entry at that precise moment or something along those lines.
But there was at least one person who definitely knew the answer to that question, Chuck himself. Maybe the person he was having dinner with knew also.
So, if someone knew it, then you cannot ascribe an inherently unknowable nature to that thing.
I do not disagree that there are probably an infinite number of things that you and I can consider to be in effect unknowable. My objection is to the larger concept of claiming that anything can possess the inherent quality of unknowableness.
In this context it becomes a single word fallacy, sort of like omnipotence in that the word contains two mutually exclusive propositions.
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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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What is religion?
