Knowledge and truth are judgements - they need a criterion. — TheMadFool

So you are saying no one knew anything until there was epistemology? That doesn't seem right......

There has to be a criterion for what it is to know before you can claim to know anything. You know that you can ride a bike because 1. you can ride a bike and 2. there's a criterion that helps you in establishing whether that (riding the bike) qualifies as knowledge. — TheMadFool

People knew things long before there were criteria of knowledge, don't you think?

Can we know something without knowing how we know it? Obviously. I know how to ride a bike without knowing the mechanics of balance (making minute steering adjustments opposite the direction of falling).

So knowledge does not require awareness of knowledge, Rather, successful action is an index of knowledge.

Meaning is not given, it is built.

That goes for language, and for life. — Banno

This.

Including subsets within subsets blurs the reality of the information. One would, I think, like to see statistics that give a clear picture of the quantity of each group, and the total does make more sense when it adds up to 100% — Sir2u

Percentage of people who like green eggs: 71%
Percentage of people who like ham: 85%
Percentage of people who like Dr. Seuss: 93%
etc., etc., etc..

The stats weren't presented as an analysis of the collective, but of the properties of individuals. No wonder I have so much difficulty offering systems theoretical arguments.

More preaching of predestination!
Whatever is said by the determinist is false because he couldn't say anything else! His intellect couldnt decide between two theories! His intellect is not free. He is an automaton and automatons cannot think.
Where does the word freedom come from? Who determined it to become an actual word!!!!! — Asif

Karl Popper has written probably the most succinct refutation of determinism I have found, volume three of his Postscript to the Logic of Scientific Discovery, the Open Universe.

Even for matter it lacks nuance. — Asif

Quite. R.G Collingwood says philosophy is a "poem of the intellect." I also recently read a comment that what substantiates a metaphysical theory is its "elegance"....

Sure, it can be a touchy subject, no doubt about it!

You're making the same error as the determinists. Are you proposing that I have freedom of choice about EVERYTHING? They exaggerate in one direction, you exaggerate in the opposite direction. — Hippyhead

I totally believe that not everyone is capable of enacting free choice to the same extent. Even though "theoretically" everyone does have the same capacity. I've lived the life of being trapped within my own inability to exercise the full power of my free choices; and I've experienced the opposite.

If you FEEL that you are trapped by the inability to exercise free choice, then obviously there IS a problem. You alone make that call.

If a general gives a private an immoral order, is the private free to disobey? You are the general of your own mind.

My only counter would be, if you really feel that you have not the power of the freedom of choice, you are pathologically impaired in some sense and probably should seek professional assistance (which would be the "free choice of last resort") Some people are broken, and most likely that was environmentally caused (organic pathologies aside). Even recognizing that something impacted you this way can relieve some of the suffering (it's not entirely your fault). I've seen the inside of enough therapeutic systems to know this is a common strategy. Assuming full responsibility is the other approach.

Ok then, so we could rehabilitate this thread with that if you wish. Or start another thread on the subject perhaps? Or let it go. Agreeable to any of the above. — Hippyhead

Hmmm. Well, vis a vis pessimism and free-will I can share this.

My wife's cousin came for a visit with her four year old son. She's a corporate lawyer, very intelligent, but also with some palpable anxiety issues, which are manifested a lot around her son. As we talked, she started to relate some events, her worry responses were coming up as a theme, and eventually she said to me, "I guess I am a pessimist." So I said, and are you a pessimist by choice?

That stopped her cold. She thought about it and thought about it, then we didn't really go any further. When she got home she emailed my wife, and mentioned that she was still thinking about that question.

Sartre has a conception of radical freedom, that we are free even to the point of not having to follow our own already developed patterns of thought and action. I embraced this conception a long time ago, and I implemented it. There were social things, for example, that I didn't do because I didn't like them. So I decided just to make an intellectual decision and to do them. And the more I did this, the easier it became. Like anything, if you do it enough it becomes a habit. So by embracing the idea of my own limitless freedom, I found it easier and easier to make positive choices, even when these were contrary to my own "inclinations."

So if we are pessimistic, I'd suggest that is by choice. And if we recognize that, then it becomes possible to make a different choice.

Suffering is made of thought. — Hippyhead

Yes, I advocate and practise a Stoic-Buddhist philosophy of life. Very much begins with this insight.

The bedrock of logic has to be our free ability to think and decide. — Asif

:up:

But if we're going to join threads started by people in trouble, maybe we should strive to make constructive suggestions, observations and comments etc? If a poster wishes to tell us that we're all doomed and there's nothing we can do etc, perhaps they should start their own threads for that? — Hippyhead

Obviously we should always act with compassion. But this isn't a therapy forum. If you ask a question about suicide on a philosophy forum then you should expect philosophical information. Suicide is primarily an "affective" thought pattern. So to me, bringing suicide up here suggests a desire to learn something new, to counter affect with reason. That's why I brought up Durkheim: he contextualizes suicide as a social phenomenon, providing an avenue to potential insights, and lessening the sense of isolation that invariably accompanies suicidal ideation. I've been there myself. As close to all the way there as you can get and still be around to write about it (i.e. I was revived).

Determinism is just an incoherent dogma. A restatement of the religious doctrine of predestination.
If things can only be one fixed way,how to account for diversity movement creativity novelty art?
If a mind can ponder over the question are we free or determined and decide or Express we Are free then what happened to determinism? Determinism cannot explain Individuality or diversity.
And causation,if everything has something causing its behaviour what is the first cause and why could there not be multiple causes?
And how do you identify primary causes? Obviously through the
Individual intellect. Thus showing the intellect is a primary
cause of understanding. Irrefutably so. — Asif

I've always thought so. Bemuses me though the number of people who are willing to argue that they are logically incapable of....arguing.

Yes, determinism 101, a huge pile of bunk. — Hippyhead

Of course it is.

To say that we have no control over anything we do implies equally that we have no control over anything we think or say. Thought epitomizes the awareness of the exercise of the freedom of will (Descates: Nor, moreover, can I complain that God has not given me freedom of choice, or a will sufficiently ample and perfect, since, in truth, I am conscious of will so ample and extended as to be superior to all limits.)

Determinism is valid within the constraints of closed systems, but whether there actually are completely closed systems in nature is dubious. Certainly the universe in toto isn't one. The idea of a universal determinism is self-contradictory, since it eliminates the possibility of the thinking mind that presents it.

If you are sincerely interested in suicide you might benefit from Durkheim's analysis of the social causes of suicide (anomie). I just read Talcott Parson's take on Durkheim's "Suicide" this morning, it was also excellent.

Are you saying it is always black and white and nothing in the greyscale? — Saurabh Bondarde

People resist having rights taken away from them. Should we have the right to enjoy things that are harmful to us and may eventually cost society extra in health care, etc? Maybe not, but that's the way it is now, and there will be a hue and cry if we try to legislate these costly freedoms away.

Hopefully succeeding generations will simply lose interest in unhealthy enjoyments. Education seems to me to be the key.

Undoubtedly alcohol and tobacco are quite hazardous, but people are free to consume them if they wish. I like to be informed about hazards, not forbidden. Choose your poison.

"It's better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied; better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied."
~J.S. Mill

If experience gave us a direct feed of truth, we would simply passively receive the truth through our experience — TVCL

Perhaps we do. There are myriad cognitive mechanisms which cause us literally to misperceive the truth in a variety of ways. List of Cognitive Biases

In light of this, I always formulated the goal of this kind of project as "learning to think correctly". Hence, coming to understand the psycho-social mechanisms responsible for biased thought.

So your claim is that if we permit illogical theories then reincarnation is permissible? — Banno

Life is not reducible to logic. Most of what transpires in the human realm fits into what Pareto call non-logical action, in case you didn't notice. All I pointed out is that failing to fit with a known scientific theory does not in itself invalidate an hypothesis. If it did, there would be no scientific breakthroughs or paradigm shifts.

Making such a theory scientific will push up its credibility rating to 100%, a desirable state of affairs, don't you think? — TheMadFool

It would if the subject matter was within the realm of science. Or perhaps I should say "current science."

But being unfalsifiable relegates any theory of reincarnation based solely on memories of past lives to pseudoscience. Can we do anything to repair such theories to make them scientific? — TheMadFool

But as I was pointing out, not all theories in the "human" realm are - or must be - scientific. To think that all theories must be scientific in nature is what leads down the slippery slope of reductionism.

I think Popper was talking about his famous falsifiability criterion for judging whether a given theory is scientific/empirical or not. If a given theory T explains everything then, nothing contradicts it and so it's unfalsifiable. — TheMadFool

Correct.

In sociological analysis it can be a given that there are "non-logical" theories which nevertheless factor significantly in the actual operations of the human world. So relegating the theory of reincarnation to the realm of non-logical theories doesn't undermine it.

I'm curious what you guys think of this idea: almost everyone in the Western world is essentially enlightened or capable of grasping the core facets of an enlightened mindset due to pervasive infusion of basic science and history into the educational system along with the centrality of technological thinking in broader culture — Enrique

Here I would you you are overestimating the general level of education. Even at the secondary school level, core competencies are deteriorating. For those who do go on to post-secondary education fields are becoming increasingly siloed. I think there is a frightening lack of generalized knowledge. Compared to fifty years ago I would say that people who are educated are less "comprehensively educated" now than then. And yes, this is a major barrier to any kind of enlightenment.

I'd say I'm more of an omnivore. I try to identify the gaps in my knowledge, and systematically fill them in while intuitively following theoretical directions from areas where I'm already conversant. Last year I studied Systems Theory extensively. That included some socio-psychological applications. I decided I had a gap there, so I dove into socioeconomics: Mead, Habermas, Weber, Marx. I'm halfway through the last volume of Capital. Did a bit of a detour to read Popper's three volume Postscript to the Logic of Scientific Discovery. That was a real eye-opener and something I'd hugely recommend to anyone.

Once I finish Parsons and Marx I'm moving into more socio-political stuff and linguistics. More Habermas, Dewey, Cassirer, Saussure. Ideally I'd like to consolidate my understanding in some kind of practical political way. I think the world is ripe for better ideas and reform.

Vygotsky looks good. Interesting how these sociocultural models of action seem to create a mutually coherent structure. The Parsons I'm reading is actually his interpretation of Marshall, Pareto, and Durkheim, so kind of a synthesis.

I've been thinking that it isn't so much that theories are "true" as that they are cohesive and coherent, both internally and externally. So what we are really doing in learning more and different theories is building up a vocabulary of descriptions that allow us to progressively better conceptualize and communicate abstract concepts. Like your description of perception, making an intelligible self and making an intelligible world.

The Peircean answer is when it becomes "my truth" rather than "our truth".

Language binds us as social animals to a collective identity, a communal point of view, a culturally-constructed model of "the self". So "truth" becomes that to which a community of inquirers practising practical reasoning would tend.

The community of inquiry is broadly defined as any group of individuals involved in a process of empirical or conceptual inquiry into problematic situations. This concept was novel in its emphasis on the social quality and contingency of knowledge formation in the sciences, contrary to the Cartesian model of science, which assumes a fixed, unchanging reality that is objectively knowable by rational observers. The community of inquiry emphasizes that knowledge is necessarily embedded within a social context and, thus, requires intersubjective agreement among those involved in the process of inquiry for legitimacy.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Community_of_inquiry

Pragmatism navigates the middle path between the extremes of relativism and positivism, or idealism and realism. — apokrisis

Yes, this fits very closely with the social philosophers I have been reading, Mead and Parsons certainly.

Seems like a non-starter until someone comes up with a coherent definition of Consciousness.. — Scemo Villaggio

What does it mean to define something? You can define "abstraction", because abstraction is a concept (I hesitate to say an abstract concept). You cannot really "define" a horse. A horse is what it is. You can "describe" a horse. In the same sense, I think you can "describe" consciousness, but you are not in a position to "define" it.....

I wonder, at what point does the agreement, "there is a truth," degenerate into the disagreement "this is the truth?"

Perception is as much a business of making an intelligible self, as making an intelligible world, in short. — apokrisis

Nicely put.

That's an interesting assumption. Nothing more. — Banno

For you, it's an assumption. For me, it's definitive of the ongoing experience of reality. I guess we each have our own truths. Mine fits with my understanding, I'm sure yours fits with yours.

Indeed, juxtaposing object and subject leads to incoherence.

So don't do it. — Banno

Except that objectivity and subjectivity are inextricably bound and form the basis of the world as we know it.

↪Pantagruel SO, sometimes the ball falls up?

Sure. — Banno

Why did I know that was coming?

It's context (frame) relative. If you are standing at the antipodes of the globe, and the ball is dropped, then what is it's direction, relative to you? Everything is true within a specific context.

Only a perspective which was completely free of intention would be truly objective. But then it would not be a perspective.
— Pantagruel

Sounds like a koan.

What is the view of no view viewed?

How is it that there is no thing in the "thing-in-itself"? — Nils Loc

Nothingness coiled in the heart of being? A lot of eastern philosophy I have read involves concepts like "passive volition" or "no mind". It may be something that you can actually "do" more effectively than you can encapsulate it with reason. Performance knowledge vs conceptual?

What is it you think this word does, here? — Banno

Qualifies the sense of "true" to match my earlier comments, that it is a perspective, and a reduction, or an approximation, rather than an absolute.

↪Pantagruel ...and yet the ball falls down. The funny thing about facts, scientific or otherwise, is that they are true. — Banno

More to the point, they are approximately true....

What you say is very true. There in an intrinsic energy of dialectics that needs to be considered. The human world is definitely polarized; and I think from the appropriate perspective, nature really is too. Systems theory shows natural systems exhibit a similar state of "heightened imbalance".

Excellent point.

Actually, facts themselves are ultimately subjectively conditioned inasmuch as they always represent one specific perspective. Scientific facts epitomize this. A scientific fact is always an abstraction from a holistic natural state to isolate some particular elements within a particular experimental perspective. It has been said, we murder in order to dissect. And we do it continuously. Only a perspective which was completely free of intention would be truly objective. But then it would not be a perspective.