I find the deflationary theory lacks the connection with (or "content" of) the world that I normally associate with the use of the word "truth". — Luke

:up:

Independent exploration is criticism to a theocracy. Don't forget also that Rushdie is viewed as an apostate which in itself calls for the death penalty. — Tom Storm

Indeed. Still, I remain puzzled with the intensity of the reaction to what I remember as a respectful, even insightful 'novelisation' of Mohammad's revelation.

I'm starting to think that Rushdie's real "crime" was simply to reveal to the world an embarrassing yet probably true story about Mohammad, that of the quranic verses inspired by the Devil (or by politics) and later retracted.

That story reminds us that no religious leader is perfect, not even the greatest one ever. Quite subversive when you think of it.

the example of an abacus — TheVeryIdea

I knew that @schopenhauer1 had already given the answer to the OP question but I like the abacus metaphor a lot, so I couldn't resist using it once more... :nerd:

Some information people would say there is mattering in what happens to matter. — schopenhauer1

In fact, that may be the weak point in Searle's lecture, at 33 mn or so: he starts to speak about information for 30 seconds, cracks a joke, and then moves back to talking about computers. It seems to me that all living creatures are information-intensive. There may perhaps not be information stricto sensu in a molecule of water -- in the absence of a living creature sensing it and for whom water would matter, as you say, water is perhaps best conceived as only a form, not yet information -- but what is the genetic code and DNA if not an information management system? It has syntax AND semantics (the proteins can be seen as the meaning of the DNA code).

Hello, hello, hello
Is anybody in there?
Just nod if you can hear me
Is there anyone at home?

Come on, come on down
I hear you're feeling down
Well I can ease your pain
Get you on your feet again

Relax, relax, relax
I need some information first
Just the basic facts
Can you show me where it hurts?

There is no pain, you are receding
A distant ship's smoke on the horizon
You are only coming through in waves
Your lips move, but I can't hear what you're saying

When I was a child, I had a fever
My hands felt just like two balloons

Now I've got that feeling once again
I can't explain, you would not understand
This is not how I am

I have become comfortably numb

OK, OK, OK
Just a little pin prick.
There'll be no more, aaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhh,
But you may feel a little sick.

Can you stand up, stand up, stand up.
I do believe it's working good.
That'll keep you going for the show.

Come on, it's time to go.

There is no pain, you are receding.
A distant ship's smoke on the horizon.
You are only coming through in waves.
Your lips move, but I can't hear what you're saying.

When I was a child, I caught a fleeting glimpse
Out of the corner of my eye.
I turned to look, but it was gone.
I cannot put my finger on it now.
The child has grown, the dream is gone.

I have become comfortably numb.

:smile: I always fancied Americanisms. They are so evocative. (one of my favorites is: it's not over untill the fat lady sings)

Excellent lecture, thanks!

He means that an abacus does not literally compute 2 + 2, or any other computation you use it for. Simply, if you code your 2+2 on the abacus the right way, and if you interpret the abacus' output the right way, you'll get 4. But the abacus itself doesn't interpret anything, or compute anything, it's just a piece of wood. Same for any computing machine.

"Tin. Roof. Rusted!" — 180 Proof

:-)

"A lyric from The B-52’s hit song “Love Shack,” tin roof, rusted is interpreted by some to mean “pregnant,” usually with an unintended baby."

Did you ever wake up with a song, not in your heart but running through your head...?
The tune just fine but the words...

This morning it was, "I can't stand the pain. On my window. Rain"

The song:
I Can't Stand the Rain - Ann Peebles (1974) — Amity

This happens to me a lot. I think my subconscious is speaking to me via songs, reminding me important stuff I need to mind, through the lyrics of songs popping into my head for no obvious reason.

In your case, it would be an expression of pain, that replaced the word 'rain' in the lyrics you recreated mentally. I am sorry that you are going (apparently) through some pain. The best song I know about that is unfortunately written for a man, and in French, but here is an attempt at a translation:




Hey Manu, get yourself home
Your beer’s awash with tears
The pub’s about to close
And you’re pissing off the barman
I never believed a guy in leather
Could cry like you do
I didn’t even think
You were capable of suffering
I was forgetting that your tattoos
And your knife blade
Are really just a way to protect
Your big soft heart

Don’t do anything stupid Manu
Don’t go slashing your wrists
One woman lost
Ten pals that come back

We were all shacked up
While you were single
You used to say “I’m bored shitless
And I’d like to save myself”
You met this chick
Who was good for no one
You said “she’s the one for me,
Or something ain’t right”
You were a bit hasty
Getting her name tattooed
In the place where your
Big stupid heart beats

Don’t do anything stupid Manu
You’re hurting me mate
One woman lost
It’s ten pals that come back

I tell you we’re wolves;
We’re meant to live in packs,
But never in couples
Or not for very long
Us lot, we sent our chicks packing
Donkey's years ago
You, you’re still in the blink
With yours and freaking out
Hey Manu, living free
Often means living alone
That can be a bellyache
But it’s good for the soul

Don’t do anything stupid Manu
Hatred ain't good for nothing
One woman lost
It’s ten pals that come back

She’s not in love anymore
Time to sling your hook Manu
She can’t be happy
In the arms of a hooligan
If when you tell her “I love you”
She asks for a light
If she has a migraine
As soon as you’re in the sack
Tell her that you’re sorry
That you must have been walking
On the wrong side of the road
The day you met her
You must’ve got your wires crossed

Don’t do anything stupid Manu
Don’t go slashing your wrists
One woman lost
It’s ten pals that come back

As to how it reads, like any book, even the cover and title can trigger.
So perhaps not an either/or but both depending on interpretation. — Amity

I guess I should read it again. It's (at least superficially) about Satan, known as Shaitan in Islam. And many other things.

A quick check on the history behind the title:

The Satanic Verses are words of "satanic suggestion" which the Islamic prophet Muhammad is alleged to have mistaken for divine revelation.[1] The verses praise the three pagan Meccan goddesses: al-Lāt, al-'Uzzá, and Manāt and can be read in early prophetic biographies of Muhammad by al-Wāqidī, Ibn Sa'd and the tafsir of al-Tabarī. The first use of the expression in English is attributed to Sir William Muir in 1858.[2]

The incident is accepted as true by modern scholars of Islamic studies, under the criterion of embarrassment, citing the implausibility of early Muslim biographers fabricating a story so unflattering about their prophet.[3][4] It was accepted by religious authorities for the first two centuries of the Islamic era, but was later rejected by some religious scholars (Ulama) as incompatible with Muhammad's perfection ('isma), implying that Muhammad is infallible and therefore cannot be fooled by Satan.[...]

There are numerous accounts of the incident, which differ in the construction and detail of the narrative, but they may be broadly collated to produce a basic account.[5] The different versions of the story are recorded in early tafsirs (Quranic commentaries) and biographies of the Prophet, such as Ibn Ishaq's.[6] In its essential form, the story reports that Muhammad longed to convert his kinsmen and neighbors of Mecca to Islam. As he was reciting these verses of Sūrat an-Najm,[7] considered a revelation from the angel Gabriel:

"Have you thought of al-Lāt and al-'Uzzá? And about the third deity, al-Manāt?"
–Quran 53:19–20

Satan tempted him to utter the following line:

"These are the exalted gharāniq, whose intercession is hoped for."

Al-Lāt, al-'Uzzā and Manāt were three goddesses worshipped by the Meccans. Discerning the precise meaning of the word gharāniq has proven difficult, as it is a hapax legomenon (i.e. used only once in the text).

Commentators wrote that it meant "the cranes". The Arabic word does generally mean a "crane" – appearing in the singular as ghirnīq, ghurnūq, ghirnawq and ghurnayq, and the word has cousin forms in other words for birds, including "raven, crow" and "eagle".[8] Taken as a segment, "exalted gharāniq" has been translated by Orientalist William Muir to mean "exalted women", while contemporary academic Muhammad Manazir Ahsan has translated the same segment as "high-soaring ones (deities)". Thus, whether the phrase had intended to attribute a divine nature to the three "idols" is a matter of dispute.[9]

In either case, scholars generally agree on the meaning of the second half of the verse, "whose intercession is hoped for", and this by itself would contradict a core tenet of what would become orthodox Islamic doctrine, namely that no saint or deity – nor Muhammad himself – can intercede for Muslims.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satanic_Verses

I like it; it's contemplative.

This thread is growing into a love shack, baby.

Shack
noun
A very simple and small building made from pieces of wood, metal, or other materials
Synonym: hut

Lots of great songs have been posted here since I last visited. Thank you all, inc. @Amity, @180 Proof and @Hanover. This thread is indeed about song lyrics, and how they can infuse poetry and wisdom in our life.

Listening to "We're not alone" now.

That point was covered in a recent Guardian article.
Basically, it doesn't matter the contents, it's the principle...the mere fact of criticism. — Amity

Ok but what criticism? If memory serves, the Satanic Verses does NOT read like a criticism of Islam at all, more like an independent exploration.

Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini never read Salman Rushdie’s book “The Satanic Verses,” his son Ahmed told me in Tehran, in the early nineteen-nineties.

Rare are the Muslims who ever read the Satanic Verses. That includes Rushdie's attacker, Hadi Matar. They just believe what some other cretin said about it. That's a big part of the problem. We got guys ready to kill for hearsay, for a fucking rumor...

I guess some people beg to be manipulated.

To my taste, I don't see enough in the press in defence of the book itself. It is a great piece of literature and I hope that people read it, and read it for a good reason, ie their reading pleasure. Haters looking for a dress-down of Mohammad will be disappointed. The prophet comes across as a great man, and there is no contempt for Islam in that book whatsoever.

So it's really sad to hear or read something like this:

. I spoke to two Sunni collogues of mine. Their response about what happened to Rushdie was - "You mock Islam, what do you expect? He's lucky to still be alive." Were they against the attack? "I wound't do it myself, but I understand the anger." — Tom Storm

I don't doubt what Tom says -- this is exactly the kind of feedback you'd get from any serious/involved believer in Islam. And yet there no mocking in that book.



Meanwhile:

Police are investigating a threat against JK Rowling that was made after she posted her reaction on social media to the attack on Salman Rushdie.

Rowling tweeted on Friday: “Horrifying news. Feeling very sick right now. Let him be OK.”

A Twitter user under the name Meer Asif Asiz replied: “Don’t worry you are next.”

It's a bit like if your French girlfriend would say: I don't speak French, it's called Français.

1) Political: There is no religious justification for the act but my condemnation would be unpopular with my flock. — Baden

More than unpopular: a Muslim cleric daring to defend Rushdie would become a potential target.

What is the view of Sunnis towards Shias? — Hanover

Sheer hatred.

Farsi means 'Persian' in Persian. To be precise, Afghans speak Dari, a sort of archaic Farsi.

I believe the answer to the OP question lies in a careful reading of the Satanic Verses. It's a masterpiece of a novel, highly enjoyable for a non-Muslim reader, but from a Muslim perspective it pushes a lot of the 'wrong' buttons.

I read it while living in Pakistan. At some point an Afghan door keeper / cleaner found the book on my bed and wrote in persian over the first page: "Death to Rushdie and Thatcher". (Unfortunately I lost this copy since then) I asked him 'WTF?' and we went into a long discussion about it.

In summary, his beef was that the life of Mohammad was not an appropriate subject for a novel. At some point he asked: How would you feel if someone wrote a novel about Jesus? I answered that it has been done, many times over, and while the hardest integrists were typically angered by movies or novels about Jesus, most Christians consider that it's fair use of freedom of speech.

This is something general, not specific to my door keeper: one of the issues with the Satanic Verses is that it includes a non-authorized biography of Mohammad, his revelation, and the writing of the Quran.

The eponymous satanic verses are a part of that story. At some point Mohammad issued some verses saying that the three traditional goddesses of Mecca were in fact intermediaries between Allah and His creation. By giving some space for the old polytheist religion, Mohammad might have tried to make his new, radical monotheism more easily acceptable to the Meccans. A few days later, the Prophet rejected those verses, stating that they were inspired to him by the Devil. This is actually true, historically, but a matter of embarrassment for Muslims. The book's title is quite provocative, for a Muslim.

More deeply, while Christianity and its holy books have been subject to much interrogations and challenges from Voltaire onward, Islam has never explored its own origins critically. Books analysing the early history of Islam critically are all written by non-muslim westerners. The only admissable tone or style of writing about Mohammad in Islam is hagiography: it has to be the life of a saint, told reverentially by believers in his sainthood.

Anything departing from such hagiography is blasphemous, even if showing Mohammad in a positive light (as Rushdie does in the Satanic Verses), even if historically accurate.

In particular, the Quran is untouchable. It is supposed to be the direct writings of God. Yet Rushdie shows a conflictual, painful revelation process, where Mohammad goes through much physical and mental suffering and struggle, and where the politics of the city get to impact the holy book, albeit in a transient manner. It implies that the Quran has a human touch, even if divinely inspired, and thus introduces an element of doubt.

Another 'button' in the book is that it represents Ayatollah Khomeini as an instrument of the Devil. That would explain the fatwa.

Whatever you posit as a theory of truth already relies on a foundation of truth... — Banno

:up:

The stuff that binds all of us is just clear water (for us.) But the stuff that binds most of us is, I claim, what the greats, among other things, make explicit and therefore optional. (That which is closest is hardest to see, like forgetting your glasses are on your nose.) — Pie

We punish one another for dishonesty or irrelevance or incoherence. We simultaneously enforce tribal norms and attempt installing new ones. — Pie

I used to think of it more or less along those lines until recently. Now my take follows Collingwood, whom I discovered thanks to @tim wood. It's not very different but more precise and informed by history, hence more dynamic and even political. Collingwood was a historian. He formalized this problem in a very clear and convincing manner in his Essay on Metaphysics, showing how our world view and 'absolute presuppositions' have been constantly changing over the course of history (down to very mundane things like the colors we see) under the influence of philosophy or religion, and how conflict-ridden and brutal this evolution was, sometimes.

He concludes that metaphysics are "ticklish". By that he means that a person whose metaphysics are challenged would typically become rather aggressive towards the challenger.

I found his analysis convincing, and believe it does explain why there tends to be some aggressiveness in philosophy, contrary to a naïve cliché of the serene philosopher. Philosophy cuts deep, and it hurts. A philosopher is only serene to the extent that his or her metaphysics remains unchallenged.

While a certain combativeness or competitiveness may serve the pursuit of better beliefs, I speculate that too much just locks everyone up in their safe space, only able to repeat what they find obvious or not. — Pie

As you might know already, to be locked in one's metaphysics forever is a very human thing to do, all the more so when such metaphysics and its motivators remain unconscious to us, outside any possible examination, while framing all our thoughts. So while I agree with you that deftness and diplomacy are good things in day to day business, eg to secure collaboration around shared goals, I am not totally convinced that the approach would work any better than 'combativeness' in a philosophic debate.

We know that Nietzsche is not trying to insult or trick us. There is no trust or failure of trust involve. — Pie

I actually think some authors are trying to trick their readers, even beyond death!

One can always ask for elaboration after all. — Pie

Yes.

An important distinction, in my view, is that between reading the dead and chatting with the living. — Pie

Thanks for the aphorism! Although I should ask for elaboration here because I'm not sure I get it. Do you mean that while chatting with the living, we ought to care for their feelings, understanding and impressions a great deal more than when chatting with the dead? That would make a lot of sense.

Concision is a fascinating issues. Terseness is typically good (so say the style books), but it can also suggests that the listener is not worth more than a quick remark. Do we find it easier to trust the verbose ? Because their primary motive, being understood, is so clear ? They value us, as ears at least, while the aphorist may take us for a mere target, performing for others at our expense perhaps and not for our illuminate.

To what degree is philosophy caught up in the desire to humiliate ? As Nietzsche might put, the dialogue can be a knife fight. — Pie

I agree with you that a concise one liner runs a risk of appearing as a put-down. Story of my life. But then, I personally appreciate conciseness in others, while I tend to intensely dislike verbosity, perhaps unjustly so. A good aphorism is food for much rumination and interrogation -- far more in my mind than a wall of text.

Nietzsche wasn't the last one to draw his blade, and there was something healthy, combative, almost vital in his lack of patience, I think. Life is short.

The story in John is told as a matter of truth, but in truth it is historically dubious. — Fooloso4

Why yes. Who could possibly have reported this conversation if indeed the scene happened as told, with Jesus all alone facing Pilate, without any disciple next to him?

I try to be clear and concise, in general, but often come across as inarticulate and condescending. To my defense, English is not my mother tongue.

FWIW, there's a passage in Aurelius about barking dogs. The godlike man does not judge, does not get caught in up in merely human notions of good and evil.

Such notions are toys for mere monkeys ? — Pie

It's been argued -- by a certain Comte-Sponville, specialist of Spinoza -- that one's moral sense is like one's sense of equilibrium: you can apply it to yourself, but not to others. And thus, we can judge ourselves based on our moral sense, but judging others must be based on law, not morality.

Saussure is one of my favorite thinkers. Good recommendation ! But bad social gesture. — Pie

Sorry, I'm not good at social gestures. That's a real handicap, by the way.

Truth, one might say is redundant just as long as it is adhered to, but what is needed is an account of falsehood, which is parasitic on a community of truth tellers. — unenlightened

:up:

Very important point. Any definition of truth must account or make room for its opposite -- falsehood.

It is realistic, it's exactly what the Cuban Missile crisis was, which no one really criticises US decisions about. — boethius

What are you talking about? Sending NATO troops and planes and warships into this war would literally be WW3. What do you think Putin will do when NATO troops get close to Moscow?

How many realists want to die in a nuclear holocaust?

You have argued here that rooting for and supporting the Ukrainians was more morally disgusting than bombing the Ukrainians.
— Olivier5

Which I have not argued. — boethius

You did, right here:

So what is the MOST disgusting of the two: to aggress your neighbour in such a war, or to cheerlead the victims trying to defend themselves?
— Olivier5

Cheerleading others to fight for your own virtue-signalling on social media is far more disgusting.

Actually fighting a war, at least there's skin in the game."Courage of your convictions" as they say in French. — boethius

----

I just explained at length the realistic option to protect Ukraine by "supporting Ukraine" which is to form a formal military alliance inside or outside NATO and send boots on the ground to do, or be prepared to do, actual fighting to protect Ukraine. — boethius

This is not a realist option, rather it's a recipe for WW3. Yet another proof that your position has very little to do with realism.

There seems to be a genuine incapacity to understand the realist position I and others have defended here as well as presented by John Mearsheimer. — boethius

Your position is very remote from any realism. You have entertained fantasies about nuking Ukraine. You have argued here that rooting for and supporting the Ukrainians was more morally disgusting than bombing the Ukrainians. This evidently implies an anti-Ukrainian and pro-Russian bias. It also shows that realism has little to do with your motivations, because a realist would never bother with such skewed moralism and fantasy of Armageddon, aware as he would be that it won't come across to his audience.

You and your walls of equivocating text are supporting the Russian war effort, even if you won't admit it openly.

I'm far the first to gripe about the mysteries of the correspondence theory of truth. I'm just asking how you navigate or tolerate them (the traditional criticisms, and the one in particular that I tried to articulate.) — Pie

I don't see a viable alternative to the correspondance theory of truth, and never managed to understand any of its critiques.

What is this representational, optical metaphor doing or trying to do ? — Pie

If you didn't know how it's done, you couldn't write a meaningful sentence on TPF, and since you clearly can write a meaningful sentence, I will assume you know how it is done. If you want a detailed analysis, you might wish to read about basic linguistics, eg Saussure, or I suppose Chomsky. I read that the recent progresses in automatic translation were based on modern linguistics à la Chomsky, with its concept of a universal grammar.

Yet the 'meaning' is just the more or less tentatively embraced 'structure of reality.' — Pie

The meaning of a proposition remains a representation of reality, at least an attempt at it. It's not the reality it tries to depict. It is true to the extent that it represents perceivable reality in an accurate manner.

there is a similar open-ended-ness in play. — Pie

The same applies to many objects, including material ones.

Presumably it's 'we especially rational and charming people who agree with Pie'... — Pie

So it was a regal we, fair enough.

I personally see truth as a property of certain sentences and other symbolic representations of reality, the property of having a good enough fit with said reality, as far as we can tell.

And China, me guess... And Turkey.

Was there no pollution, corruption and profiteering in the UK in the 40's? Was it not a very imperfect democracy, ruled in fact by a filthy rich aristocratic class? So where is the essential difference with Ukraine now? The queen?

Isn't the Putin regime a fascist and militaristic dictatorship, just like the Nazis were?

a certain time-independence — Pie

Like a piece of wood can have a certain permanence and durability, a sentence can remain known and meaningful over time. But neither the wood nor the sentence are "out of time". They are just durable, for a while.