Truth and Belief

[perplexity]

Originally Posted by Isa

If there is no true or false, how can you even have a point to make?

Belief makes the point.

Originally Posted by Isa

What is it you are pointing to?

Originally Posted by de Silentio

Plato was deeply concerned with the difference between belief and truth.
What are some of your thoughts?

Thoughts are variously believed or not believed, thus deemed to be true or false.

Originally Posted by Isa

How can your subjective experience be any more right than any other subjective experience?

Value judgement, which is to say belief thus pretends that one subjective experience is right while another is wrong.

Originally Posted by Isa

If you see a red rose, it is a subjective experience; there is no right/wrong or true/false, it just is. But once you make an inference about a subjective experience; like planting a red rose in red soil will make it more red; then for the inference to be true, it must line up with reality, or it is a falsehood.

One is therefore deemed to conform to reality while another is not.

Originally Posted by Isa

Believing that something is false, if it is false, is not a falsehood. If a subject believes something that does not line up with reality, that belief is a falsehood.

Reality is thus a belief.

It is all a matter of agreement.

The better way to agree is to discard this peculiar attachment to the myth of the absolutely eternal single reality.

It is so much more sensible to agree to the truth of an infinite variety of realities.

[boagie]

Originally Posted by Isa

Hi Boagie,

A fact of logic is if a statement is to be considered to have a truth value, either to be true or false, it has to have the possiblity of being either. And as it has been pointed out, subjective experience cannot be either true or false, it just is; so subjective experience cannot be the "seat" of truth.

Subjective meaning, without truth, is meaningless. Without truth and meaning, there is no thought, only experiece. Without truth, meaning and thought, there is no communication. Without truth, meaning, thought and communication; there can be no agreement.

There is truth.

Hi Isa,

I believe you are complicating this more than it needs to be, when dealing with subject and object. You are subject anything that is not you is object. Objects for the most part do not have thoughts, do not discern meaning, of course other people which might be considered objects to you have their own relations with object. Subjective meaning can be about truths or falsehoods, it is a value judgement about the physical world, a vaule judgement about a relationship between subject and object, between you and object.

The first part of your statements, subjective experience does indeed come to some conclusions, it is only the physical world as object which by itself has no meaning because no one has given it any meaning. People discern for themselves what is true or false about the relationship they have with the physical world as object. Try to look at it this way, the physical world as object is potential, potential meaning to a subject/person. The physical world without a person/subject would remain nothing but potential. Only the person decides meaning, true or false up or down, good or bad it is the property of humanity as subject.

[Arjen]

@ Isa, Perplexity & Boagie:
Subjectivity has no bearing whatsoever on true or false. Objectivity doesn't either. They are terms for something else entirely. They are most frequently used to deduce reasons for claiming something is true or false however.
The explenation for this lies in the following thought:
I may, in a subjective way (for I am a subject) experience something. Let's say I experience heat. If I would claim that I was experiencing heat another could say that this was a subjective remark for what I experienced as heat the other may experience as a chill. If I would remark that I experienced a wind of 20 degrees (on whichever scale) the other would only be able to agree with me (if indeed the wind was 20 degrees). That I experienced it subjectively as warm has absolutely no bearing on the truth of the matter: it was 20 degrees. That is an objective truth. We can reach objective truths by abstracting from teh subject (according to Immanuel Kant...and I second his opinion).

We see that there are three distinctions to be made in this matter:
- a subjective (and therefore possible) perception
- a subjective perception which is equal to (and therefore really exists) an objective experience
- an objective (and therefore necessary) experience

I suppose this is not something which can be explained so quickly. If you would like to learn more on this theory just follow the link to Immanuel Kant...or start a topic on him.

[boagie]

Originally Posted by Arjen

@ Isa, Perplexity & Boagie:
Subjectivity has no bearing whatsoever on true or false. Objectivity doesn't either. They are terms for something else entirely. They are most frequently used to deduce reasons for claiming something is true or false however.
The explenation for this lies in the following thought:
I may, in a subjective way (for I am a subject) experience something. Let's say I experience heat. If I would claim that I was experiencing heat another could say that this was a subjective remark for what I experienced as heat the other may experience as a chill. If I would remark that I experienced a wind of 20 degrees (on whichever scale) the other would only be able to agree with me (if indeed the wind was 20 degrees). That I experienced it subjectively as warm has absolutely no bearing on the truth of the matter: it was 20 degrees. That is an objective truth. We can reach objective truths by abstracting from teh subject (according to Immanuel Kant...and I second his opinion).

We see that there are three distinctions to be made in this matter:
- a subjective (and therefore possible) perception
- a subjective perception which is equal to (and therefore really exists) an objective experience
- an objective (and therefore necessary) experience

I suppose this is not something which can be explained so quickly. If you would like to learn more on this theory just follow the link to Immanuel Kant...or start a topic on him.

Arjen,

It is a further complication, but perhaps still not so clearly so, for the subject would not experience said 20 degrees but sensation of temperature not a reading. What is true is what is relative to the subject it can be no other way. This just off the top of my head, I will spend some time considering your proposition and post another response later. Can a subject be mistaken, I think that has already been established, but that could only be established by anothers subjective experience. I think relativity is the operative word here, if subject is not relative to object what then. I getting carried away here before having considered your proposition, later

[kennethamy]

Originally Posted by boagie

Arjen,

Thanks for the input. In what way might this defination of subject and object not be accurate? If all meaning is the property of a subject certainly objectively there is no true or false.

Does that mean that it is not true that the speed of light is not greater than the speed of sound?

If it is true that because meaning is the property of a subject (if that is true) and it that implies that (for instance) it is not true that light is faster than sound, then I would urge you to give up the view that meaning is a property of the subject, because I am far surer that it is true that light is faster than sound, than you or anyone can possibly be sure that meaning is the property of the subject (whatever that might mean). (I need not, I am sure, point out that if you think, as you must, that it is true that all meaning is the property of the subject, and that it is true that implies that there is not truth, then you really cannot think that there is no true or false, since you have just told us that you believe that there are at least two true propositions).

[Isa]

Originally Posted by perplexity

Reality is thus a belief.

It is all a matter of agreement.

The better way to agree is to discard this peculiar attachment to the myth of the absolutely eternal single reality.

It is so much more sensible to agree to the truth of an infinite variety of realities.

If, as you say, the truth is that there are an infinite variety of realities from which to choose; why do you insist on discarding only the one that states the absolutely eternal single reality?

And if there are an infinite variety of realities, then it is all fiction, so what meaning does "myth" have?

[perplexity]

Originally Posted by Arjen

We see that there are three distinctions to be made in this matter:
- a subjective (and therefore possible) perception
- a subjective perception which is equal to (and therefore really exists) an objective experience
- an objective (and therefore necessary) experience

I suppose this is not something which can be explained so quickly. .....

This was already explained:

Originally Posted by perplexity

< >

Obviously enough, an objective truth that can only be be subjectively known is an oxymoron.

The objective truth is a belief, not a truth

"Objective" means "believe this or else"

"Subjective means, "go away, your opinion is not convenient"

Sophisticated abuse.

[boagie]

Originally Posted by kennethamy

Does that mean that it is not true that the speed of light is not greater than the speed of sound?

If it is true that because meaning is the property of a subject (if that is true) and it that implies that (for instance) it is not true that light is faster than sound, then I would urge you to give up the view that meaning is a property of the subject, because I am far surer that it is true that light is faster than sound, than you or anyone can possibly be sure that meaning is the property of the subject (whatever that might mean). (I need not, I am sure, point out that if you think, as you must, that it is true that all meaning is the property of the subject, and that it is true that implies that there is not truth, then you really cannot think that there is no true or false, since you have just told us that you believe that there are at least two true propositions).

kennethamy,

For our purposes it does not matter what the speed of light is, a fact can only be known by a subject, The speed of light has been subjectively determined, it is subjective knowledge. Again, the physical world holds no meaning in and of itself, the object needs a subject for there to be any meaning whatsoever.

[perplexity]

Originally Posted by Isa

If, as you say, the truth is that there are an infinite variety of realities from which to choose; why do you insist on discarding only the one that states the absolutely eternal single reality?

This is about the deliberate disregard of personal experience, the difference between truth and belief.

Ontologically, a single reality postulated as a theoretical sum total of infinite personal realities is logically irrefutable.

More to the point, where is the proof, beyond the mere assertion?

[boagie]

Originally Posted by Isa

If, as you say, the truth is that there are an infinite variety of realities from which to choose; why do you insist on discarding only the one that states the absolutely eternal single reality?

And if there are an infinite variety of realities, then it is all fiction, so what meaning does "myth" have?

Isa,

There are as many realities as there are subjects.

Edit: There is nevertheless a striking similarity between most.