• Janus
    16.2k
    But the Slitheytoves & Jaberwockeys if-then remains an obvious timeless if-then fact.Michael Ossipoff

    I disagree, if anything I think it's merely a semantic tautology which has no meaning or provenance outside human discourse. I don't think it's helpful to think of tautologies as facts; facts must be substantive. I do admit that insofar as they are expressed in languages all facts have a tautologous dimension to them, though.
  • Michael Ossipoff
    1.7k


    I’d said:
    .
    That’s why I say that it would be animal-chauvinistic to say that the only abstract facts that are valid are the ones that are in someone’s experience. That would only be so if you define validity as “experienced by someone”. That would be distinctly un-objective, It would also be something made true only by a special definition that says that it’s true.
    — Michael Ossipoff
    .
    You replied:
    .
    When you demonstrate that animals other than human beings understand abstract facts, …
    .
    No, I didn’t say that animals other than humans understand abstract facts. But some animals understand abstract facts. Humans are the animals that are known to understand abstract facts.
    .
    “Animal chauvinism” referred to a belief by animals (human ones) that only what’s experienced by animals (like us) is valid. …an unnecessary and unwarranted over-generalization of Anti-Realism.
    .
    You continued:
    .
    Regardless though, this wouldn't help support your assumption that the world prior to the existence of life consisted of abstract facts.
    .
    1. I emphasize that that issue or assumption isn’t important for my metaphysical proposal, which is about individual experience. Though I disagree with absolute Anti-Realism, it doesn’t contradict my proposal.

    2. It goes without saying that you’re free to and welcome to have a different opinion (in favor of absolute Anti-Realism). I’ve merely told why I don’t agree with that position.
    .
    As I’ve said my reasons for that are these:
    .
    1. To say that only facts that are experienced by an animal (like us) are valid, because “valid” means (at least in part) “experienced by someone”, is an instance of saying that something true because of the choice of a definition that says that it’s true.
    .
    2. The abstract facts that constitute your life-experience possibility-story aren’t really different from all of the other abstract facts.
    .
    3. Inevitable abstract if-then facts (of which I’ve given a few examples) are true, when evaluated for truth or falsity, by anyone anywhere anytime. Ancient Greece, or now, or on another planet, in another galaxy, in a different sub-universe of a physically-inter-related multiverse of which our Big-Bang Universe is a part…or even in an entirely different possibility-world.
    .
    Given that, there’s obviously something to those facts that is independent of the experiencer.
    -----------------
    But, as I said, you’re of course welcome to disagree, and that wouldn’t contradict my metaphysical proposal, which is an Anti-Realism, about individual experience. If you believe that abstract facts are valid only with respect to experiencers, that doesn’t contradict my Anti-Realist metaphysical proposal.
    .
    I just don’t take Anti-Realism to the extreme that you seem to be saying that you do.
    .
    I’d said:
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    at least comprehend that your meaning for “is” and “are” contradicts a meaning for them that is routine and standard in mathematics and logic.
    — Michael Ossipoff
    .
    Mathematicians and logician who use "is" and "are" use it to refer to what is the case, now.
    .
    Incorrect. But let’s just agree to disagree on that, and let others judge for themselves which claim is correct.
    .
    Continuing to state our claims about that isn’t serving any purpose.
    .
    It is only metaphysicians who extend this principle, through extrapolation, to make the claim that what mathematicians and logicians assume to be true right now, is an eternal truth. That is Platonic Realism, which I do not agree with. I think that mathematical truths are principles invented by the human mind, which are dependent on the human mind for existence, and therefore cannot be eternal.
    .
    Nevertheless, mathematicians and logicians are saying that their if-then facts are true any time, any place where they’re evaluated for truth/falsity. …timeless universal in that sense.
    .
    The matter of whether abstract if-then facts are valid or true only with respect to an experiencer is a different issue, a position held by some, but not all, in metaphysics. …but not an issue of mathematics or logic.
    .
    I agree that we disagree on that metaphysical matter, and I re-emphasize that that issue isn’t relevant to my metaphysical proposal, because my proposal is from the point of view of individual experience.
    .
    I’d said:
    .
    …and I’ve been answering your disagreements.
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    Whether they’ve been adequately answered isn’t for you, me, or any advocate of a position on the matter, to judge. It’s for outside observers of the discussion to judge. — Michael Ossipoff
    .
    You reply:
    .
    You answer my disagreements by reasserting the things I disagree with.
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    Thank you for your opinion on that.
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    As I said, that’s a matter for others to judge.
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    I’d said:
    .
    The point is that these inevitable abstract facts are absolutely, timelessly, true for anyone anywhere. … — Michael Ossipoff
    .
    You reply
    .
    I disagree. If the person cannot interpret the symbols, or misinterprets the symbols, then the abstracts are not true for that person.
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    They aren’t true for a groundhog, because s/he isn’t into that sort of thing at all. But neither are they false for a groundhog.
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    They’re true when examined/evaluated by humans. Can some humans be mistaken? Of course. If someone in authority says that even if all Slitheytoves are brillig, and all Jaberwockeys are Slitheytoves, nevertheless some Jaberwockeys aren’t brillig, I guarantee that his supporters will enthusiastically and emphatically agree.
    .
    Humans are subject to error, and sometimes outright delusion.
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    But the fact remains that, anywhere, anywhen, even in any self-consistent possibility-world, there would be a consensus for my Slitheytoves & Jaberwockeys if-then fact, among those who take interest in such discussion.
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    Said more accurately:
    .
    There will be a measurable statistical positive correlation between the people who agree with that statement, and the people who are evaluated to be right, in general, on objective practical matters of fact. …and there will be a measureable statistical positive correlation between people who disagree with that Slitheytoves/Jaberwockeys statement and people who are in general evaluated to be wrong about objective practical matters of fact.
    .
    How do you explain that, unless there’s something about that fact that transcends and is independent of any particular world or individual experience?
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    How do you answer my other numbered reasons (above in this post) for saying that abstract if-then facts are independent of experiencers?
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    And even if they were true for anyone anywhere, this does not make them eternal, which would require that they are true when there is no people, or anything to interpret the symbols.
    .
    It would mean that there’s something about those facts that transcends and is independent of a particular experiencer or a particular world.
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    Since the abstracts are expressed as symbols, and symbols require interpretation, and truth is attributed to the interpretation, then there can be no truth without interpretation.
    .
    And I emphasize that at least many or most abstract if-then facts can be expressed in words, in ordinary human spoken language.
    .
    Michael Ossipoff
  • Michael Ossipoff
    1.7k
    I disagree, if anything I think it's merely a semantic tautology which has no meaning or provenance outside human discourse. I don't think it's helpful to think of tautologies as facts; facts must be substantive.Janus

    That would be a good place at which for us to agree to disagree.

    Michael Ossipoff
  • Janus
    16.2k


    Yes, well at least disagreement was reached. :)
  • Michael Ossipoff
    1.7k
    Well, I should comment on this:

    disagree, if anything I think it's merely a semantic tautology which has no meaning or provenance outside human discourse. I don't think it's helpful to think of tautologies as facts; facts must be substantive.Janus

    There's certainly a sense in which a tautology isn't useful in a practical way, But they're certainly useful for illustrating other things,.making other points. ...as in this discussion.Tautologies are of course never surprising or very informative.

    Even if there were Slitheytoves and Jaberwockeys, my if-then fact about them wouldn't surprise anyone.

    But it was only intended as an easily shown example of an inevitable abstract if-then fact.

    Surely "If the associative axiom is true for the integers under the operation of addition, then 2+2=4 (with the definitions that I've stated)" is a fact (...as are the if-then facts about physical quantities and physical laws.) and you wouldn't deny that.

    The "then" provably follows directly from the "if".

    It differs from the Slithytoves & Jaberwockeys if-then fact only in degree of obviousness, and amount of wording needed to demonstrate that it's a fact.

    I do admit that insofar as they are expressed in languages all facts have a tautologous dimension to them, though.

    Yes, so it's artificial to draw a line among them, regarding which ones you agree are facts.

    It just means that some inevitable timeless abstract if-then facts (the ones that are tautologies) are simpler and more obvious than others..

    Michael Ossipoff
  • Michael Ossipoff
    1.7k


    Another way to say this is, I've been emphasizing that the person hirself (himself/herself) is part of hir life-experience possibility-story. ...but is obviously its essential, central component, as its protagonist, whose experience it's about.

    So my metaphysics doesn't require that facts exist independent of experiencers. The system of facts, and the experiencer who is part of that system can be regarded as timelessly being there together, as a complementary unit, a system of inter-referring if-thens.

    And, all along, I've been emphasizing that the complex system of inter-referring inevitable abstract if-then facts that is someone's life-experience possibility-story doesn't need to have global or objective existence. It needn't be considered other than in its own local inter-referring system.

    Neither does it need some sort of global permission to be, or some larger context or medium in which to be.

    For the purpose of my metaphysics, doesn't that avoid any problem about the existence of the facts? They're relevant only to eachother.

    Of course, without an experiencer, you could ask for whom it's all real, and what it means to say it's real. But that doesn't matter, because this life-experience possibility-story is about an experiencer, its central, essential, primary component.

    I don't know if I've made the point strongly enough, about the complete local independence of that experience possibility-story, that system of inter-referring if-thens, and that I'm not saying that it meaningfully "is", outside of its own context, or for anyone other than the experiencer who is part of that system of inter-referring facts.

    No one can deny that that system of inter-referring if-thens is there for itself and eachother, can they? I mean, the facts are only about eachother.
    ----------------------------------------

    That metaphysics that i propose is Anti-Realism, compared to MUH.

    But, quite aside from all that, I do claim a sort of Realism, as argued in the numbered list of reasons that i stated in my other post.

    It seems to me, then, that the "Realism"/"Anti-Realism" distinction might not be really useful.or always applicable.

    Michael Ossipoff.
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