And you could claim that it's true but it could still be false. Makes no difference anyway. There is no such a thing as an unknown proposition, whether true, false or anything in between!

A proposition can be false or undecidable.

17. If true, a proposition, then that proposition is known

Where does Fitch commit an error, make a boo boo? — TheMadFool

In assuming that this applies only to true propositions. In fact it applies to any proposition, true or not. An unknown proposition is an unproposed proposition. It's like an unthought thought: a contradiction in terms.

The propositions that are known are those that exist. They exist because they are known. There is no reservoir of unknown propositions out there, waiting for us to discover them and propose them. We make them propositions, or our computer surrogates.

I have edited the post for clarity. I do agree that we're done with this tangent, in that whether machines can be 'proposers' or not makes no difference to the argument that a proposition must be proposed by a proposer in order to exist.

Sure; I'm fine with that too, so long as we don't suppose proposers understand things. — InPitzotl

This is your take. Mine is that we have to suppose understanding for there being a proposer. But irrespective of which perspective you take, whether machines can be 'proposers' or not, it makes no difference to the argument that a proposition must be proposed by a proposer in order to exist.

Presumably scientists are willing to accept data on tarot reading and astrology, that's how they know it's bunkum. — Isaac

If they know it's bunkum, why would they accept it?

. But it implies that a proposition does not need a "proposer". It also implies that a proposition does not need a "proposer" to be a true proposition. All a proposition needs to be created is to be some string that something creates. — InPitzotl

Well then, that thing is the proposer. If your computer is proposing a proposition, it is the proposer of this proposition.

By contrast, the program that I wrote is certain to produce true propositions — InPitzotl

That's only because you limit it to very simple arbitrary statements mechanically derivable from arithmetic. So computers can sort letters alphabetically. Big deal. Try and have your Inspiron 3847 answer questions about real states of affairs, like elephants and castles for a change.

Siri? How many castles can fit in an elephant?

So all this 'consensus of experts' we've been hearing about are only dealing with the data they've previously decided they're willing to accept? — Isaac

Why yeah, it doesn't include tarot reading or the position of Saturn in Virgo, if that's what you have in mind.

How ultimately does right prevail over wrong, reason exhausted, if not by snout-bashing, whether metaphorical or literal? — tim wood

As a gentleman of fortune myself, I prefer kicking them in their private parts.

The data must convince me. — Merkwurdichliebe

There is no force in the world that can convince you to accept some data that you want to reject. Try and talk to a holocaust denier or a 9/11 truther if you don't believe me.

Not sure where that leads you. It makes no difference whatsoever to my argument that there is no such thing as an unknown proposition... If computers can make propositions, what problem does that create?

Monkeys hitting randomly at a typewriter could produce English sentences too. So fucking what?

Consider that we humans repeat things humans say all of the time, — InPitzotl

But we mean it, when we do so. A mere recording or mechanical production of a sentence cannot invest meaning in that sentence. And a sentence without meaning or intention is not a proposition.

The first time these three strings were lexically compared in human history is very likely on October 1, 10:03:44pm. — InPitzotl

Ok, for the sake of the argument... So what?

That is a red herring — InPitzotl

It's not. It's the core of my argument that by coding in this phrase "is lexically prior to", you created a pattern your computer would follow to compose sentences that have nothing new in them, that teach us absolutely nothing new. These sentences are mere recordings, and that's all there is to it, in this particular case.

Even in a more sophisticated case of a program writing poetry, the sentences produced are not actually understood by the machine, and therefore it is hard to say they are proposed by the machine. Rather they are produced mechanically.

Not all sentences are propositions. Maybe your computer does not really mean it.

And even if, for the sake of the argument, I accept that my sister's doll really meant what she said and that your computer really proposes something, what problem does that pose exactly?

Okay, it's definitely an interesting / illuminating example so let us dig a bit.

If my sister's doll was not saying "j'ai faim" but instead "This is a random noise" and would then make a random noise (as she was found to do), it would be exactly like your computer. It would have said things like:

"This is a random noise: WOOOEEZKREW."
"This is a random noise: RATABOOM."
"This is a random noise: POOPOOPIDOO."

And it would have been right all the f.....g time! Why? Because someone programmed it to produce random noises and say "this is a random noise" in rapid succession.

The argument of the recording doesn't hold either, because you did record the phrase "is lexically prior to" in your code, and it's the only meaningful part of the output sentences, just like for the doll...

This is demonstrated by my ability to meaningfully say that this program generates only true propositions. — InPitzotl

Right. So when my little sister's doll used to say "Maman" and "J'ai faim", it was not just playing a recording? It was actually stating the proposition: "I am hungry"? I need to call my sister. It never occured to her that the doll was meaning it.

And when I use a pen to write on paper, my pen and my paper are the ones doing the writing.

And when you greet a friend over the telephone, you are actually greeting your telephone.

As for 'correspondence'

According to correspondence theory, truth consists in the agreement of our thought with reality. This view ... seems to conform rather closely to our ordinary common sense usage when we speak of truth. The flaws in the definition arise when we ask what is meant by "agreement" or "correspondence" of ideas and objects, beliefs and facts, thought and reality. In order to test the truth of an idea or belief we must presumably compare it with the reality in some sense.

1- In order to make the comparison, we must know what it is that we are comparing, namely, the belief on the one hand and the reality on the other. But if we already know the reality, why do we need to make a comparison? And if we don't know the reality, how can we make a comparison?

2- The making of the comparison is itself a fact about which we have a belief. We have to believe that the belief about the comparison is true. How do we know that our belief in this agreement is "true"? This leads to an infinite regress, leaving us with no assurance of true belief.
— Randall, J. & Buchler, J. - Philosophy An Introduction p133 — Wayfarer

I think point 1 is easy to deal with: we don't already know reality (or not all of the things we want to know about reality) before we aquire some data or empirical evidence about it. Getting and analysing data takes efforts and resources. So making the comparison between belief and reality is not something that magically gives you full knowledge of reality (and then why do you need belief?). Instead, it takes an effort, and illuminates only a little part of reality. Doing so allows you to test your beliefs.

Not sure I understand point 2. Assuming it means: you have to start from the fundamental belief that human experience is 'true', I agree with it.

I figured it out alright: all existing propositions are the ones that are known, one way or another. The ones that have been stated.

ETA: Here is roughly what I think I'm doing. You're generally proposing that there's a time relationship here: First, a proposition is proposed by a proposer (and thereby understood). Then, we can ask whether it's true or not. Finally, we can answer it.

I've arranged a scenario where this is flipped around. First, we can say the propositions will be true. Then, the propositions are created. Only after that, they are read and for the first time understood. — InPitzotl

Indeed, first you define a class of propositions of the type X > Y. This implies the assumption or definition of an ordinal (classified, indexed) set, two different elements if which can always be attributed one and only one of the following propositions: A > B or B> A. Like the set of natural numbers.

Then you create some code, i.e. a text, that translates all this in a set of instruction a machine can process and chew on. The machine produces an output of the type: X > Y after generating X and Y randomly.

What the machine does is follow your instructions to generate particular examples of an arbitrary humanly-created ordinal classification system. The machine doesn't even know it's doing that, not anymore than a mechanical clock knows what its needles mean for us.

Likewise, when I read proposition 6, I could look at it and say, "awww, what a cute little grammatically correct true English sentence!" — InPitzotl

That's a stretch. Your machine-generated "sentences" would strike an odd chord in a natural conversation between people.

There was no paper. As mentioned, it was a 4K LG monitor. This actually happened; it was not a thought experiment. — InPitzotl

That makes no difference to the argument. The machine doesn't know the meaning of what it writes. It is just arranging pixels on a screen the way you told it to.

The key is to remember that a statement not in existence cannot be true or false. It needs to exist first. i.e. be stated. Then and only then can it be assigned a truth value.

did not state proposition 6 at 10:04:44pm. I did not author proposition 6 at 10:04:44pm. I did not phrase proposition 6 at 10:04:44pm. — InPitzotl

You did take what was a bunch of dots on paper and you did make a proposition out of it by assigning some meaning to it.

S1 contains those propositions that have already been made and those that are yet to be made. — TheMadFool

No, it does not. An unproposed statement cannot be a proposition; at best it is an unproposition.

1. "IHLLVJCU" is lexically prior to "VDTSHSGB" but successive to "EPOOTTLS". — InPitzotl

You think your machine proposed this proposition? But how can it be, when the machine has no clue what it proposes? The machine just organizes ink on paper or pixels on a screen according to your instructions. It cannot understand what it 'writes'. It doesn't even know what a proposition is. So it ain't proposing anything. YOU, when you read the output, understands it a certain way, to mean a certain thing. You then create the proposition -- understood as a meaningful sentence -- based on what is for the computer just dots on a screen or on paper.

Right. But if truth can only be propositional, then the Fitch is a non starter. Propositions need to be proposed before they can be true or not true. An unknown proposition does not exist.

I’m not American and I nevertheless still doubt the official narrative. — AJJ

Technically, you don't need to be an American republican to be a cretin (though it helps). All you need is to swallow their lies. You see, you all proud of yourselves because you can doubt the 'official narrative', but any idiot can do that. Call me when you can doubt your own narrative, when you can see through the many lies of your own side, when you are not possessed anymore by this obscene eagerness to believe anything as long as it is not official.

Olivier “I tend to distrust collective wisdom too” 5. — AJJ

I’m no MAGA-capped cretin, you got that right.

to assume they at least have a narrative in which they're the heroes not the villains — Isaac

Oh they do: they are the Darwinian heroes who survive because they are fit for survival. Or not... Many of them actually die.

it's possible, but I can't for the life of me think why you'd start out from that assumption as a default position whilst at the same time assuming our doctors, governments and corporations have nothing but our best interests at heart. — Isaac

But the Covid contrarians keep lying all the time. And you said you mistrust all governments because they lie all the time. So why turn a blind eye to all the lies of your side, all the BS by Trump and co, all the clown show on the right? Why trust such a bunch of obvious liars? Why not stay on the fence?

You are casting your lot with a lot of very crazy people.

But what is funny about your type, about those folks who lose contact with reality, progressively as it often happens, who start to doubt the official narrative and question all the seemingly settled points, what's funny with them is how naïvely they take the alternative narratives coming from their similes in good spirit, as potentially true and valid, without even the slightest doubt.

Because it is not the government saying it, therefore it must be true... :mask:

Name a truth that's not propositional. We're going round in circles. — TheMadFool

If I name it, I make it propositional. But okay, maybe you are right. Truths are descriptions of some state of affairs, therefore there is not such thing as an unknown truth.

It has to if you're right. — TheMadFool

Nope. The procedure only makes sense if truth can only be expressed in words. It's begging the question.

All truths are propositions [you disagree but haven't been able to make your case] — TheMadFool

You haven't been able to make yours either.

All truths are known. — TheMadFool

Only because there's no such thing as an "unknown proposition".

Would that make any sense though?

If truth must be in the form of a proposition, then there is no unknown truth because there's no such thing as a realm of already formed English sentences waiting to be discovered. A proposition must be proposed by someone before it can exist.

You own this one, this naïve profession of faith in the motives of a whole bunch of people you know nothing about.

And yet you stated:

It's not like people are agreeing that these measures are necessary to avoid the net cost of millions of lives but then saying "fuck it, I don't care". They don't believe these measures are necessary to avoid the net cost of millions of lives. — Isaac

Is there not scope for me to trust some of them? — Isaac

Oh I'm sure none of them ever lied, nor did you, ever....

My money is on a very different idea than yours: a good number of COVID contratians are of the opinion that we're making too big a big fuss for a few thousands deaths, that the world is fundamentally Darwinian and tough luck if the weak die. I know that because they say so online, including here.

They have a point of sort... The world is Darwinian and everybody dies in the end. But if we can avoid crowding hospitals in the meantime, why not?

I didn't realise you actually wanted answers! — Isaac

You're welcome not to answer my questions but I will keep asking them, if you don't mind too much.

Because I've spoken to many of them, depends on who their doctor is, respectively.

So you've spoken to many of them antivaxxers and, apparently you trusted them. It didn't come to your mind that they could be dishonest. Which is strange given your general mistrust for folks and society. I can see that some people are worthy of your trust, still.

So what does your doctor say then?

By showing it.

A picture could carry some truth for instance.

A truth is not necessarily a proposition. If truth exists out there in the wild (if truth is out there), it may not be phrased in the form of neat English sentences yet, until someone does so.

These questions remained unanswered BTW:

"It's not like people are agreeing that these measures are necessary to avoid the net cost of millions of lives but then saying "fuck it, I don't care". They don't believe these measures are necessary to avoid the net cost of millions of lives."
— @Isaac

And you know that how, pray tell?

"They don't believe it because their governments have told them it and their governments routinely lie."

What does their doctor say? — Olivier5

Anyone can question the motive of anyone else but it takes a huge sense of entitlement and some intellectual laziness to ask me to question my own motive for you, which is in essence what @Tzeentch was asking...

"You're another". Now that's a new one!