We Are All Confident Idiots

[Speakpigeon]

That's putting 'truth' on trial isn't it. I mean if we can't know what is true and we can't reach a conclusion that we don't know to be true we are forced to compromise if we are to make a decision - I'll call it 'make progress' - if we are to increase understanding.

See the problem? We are increasing our understanding but we can't know truth.

I told you before but you don't listen: "understanding" entails "knowledge" and "truth". To understand A we have to know something about A and whatever we understand of A has to be true of something in A.

Further, this only applies to the material world. It doesn't apply to subjective experience.

Humans don't function under a truth regime in a known world.

Humans function under makes sense in a what we understand human world.

So rather than put truth on trial why don't we just operate with what we understand

That's what people do anyway. We live in a time where there has never been so many scientists, engineers, technicians and even professional philosophers (all coming out of production lines, so in a sense scientists are machines, yes). And they all do what you suggest here. But that's also true (Oops) of the seven or so billion people scavenging the planet today. And that was already true before and always (Oops again). Remember? It's our nature that determines what we do.
EB

 

[fromderinside]

I told you before but you don't listen: "understanding" entails "knowledge" and "truth". To understand A we have to know something about A and whatever we understand of A has to be true of something in A.

Further, this only applies to the material world. It doesn't apply to subjective experience.

That's what people do anyway. We live in a time where there has never been so many scientists, engineers, technicians and even professional philosophers (all coming out of production lines, so in a sense scientists are machines, yes). And they all do what you suggest here. But that's also true (Oops) of the seven or so billion people scavenging the planet today. And that was already true before and always (Oops again). Remember? It's our nature that determines what we do.
EB

I'm saying there is more than one level of conversation. So yes we can argue truth and falsity. Its just that truth and falsity aren't necessarily knowledge any more than are agreed upon understandings. In fact knowledge drerived from truths can be no more than a subset of the totality of our understanding. So truths and knowledge aren't appropriate goals nor starting points for understanding.

We use what we have at hand and agreed upon as a base for making things that permit us to better understand to find new areas upon which we can understand. Its that damn inductive thing again.

Sorry I keep bringing it up. On one level there is the fact there is the world. On another level there is disagreement about what is the nature of that world which is one place where we can find more upon which to agree upon and less on which to depend on explaining what we agree upon. We have existing agreement about what we understand A upon which we find ways to seek out better understanding B. This frame gets rid of any pretense of a need for absolutes even if there as some to be found along the way.

 

[Speakpigeon]

I told you before but you don't listen: "understanding" entails "knowledge" and "truth". To understand A we have to know something about A and whatever we understand of A has to be true of something in A.

Further, this only applies to the material world. It doesn't apply to subjective experience.

That's what people do anyway. We live in a time where there has never been so many scientists, engineers, technicians and even professional philosophers (all coming out of production lines, so in a sense scientists are machines, yes). And they all do what you suggest here. But that's also true (Oops) of the seven or so billion people scavenging the planet today. And that was already true before and always (Oops again). Remember? It's our nature that determines what we do.
EB

I'm saying there is more than one level of conversation. So yes we can argue truth and falsity. Its just that truth and falsity aren't necessarily knowledge any more than are agreed upon understandings. In fact knowledge drerived from truths can be no more than a subset of the totality of our understanding. So truths and knowledge aren't appropriate goals nor starting points for understanding.

We use what we have at hand and agreed upon as a base for making things that permit us to better understand to find new areas upon which we can understand. Its that damn inductive thing again.

Sorry I keep bringing it up. On one level there is the fact there is the world. On another level there is disagreement about what is the nature of that world which is one place where we can find more upon which to agree upon and less on which to depend on explaining what we agree upon. We have existing agreement about what we understand A upon which we find ways to seek out better understanding B. This frame gets rid of any pretense of a need for absolutes even if there as some to be found along the way.

Yeah, physics has always been about offering explanations of A in terms of B, and then of B in terms of C and on and on and on. Quantum physics seems to cut short the explanation trip. It says, "Nature works like this and there is no further explanation to look for". Now, we can try to find ways of applying QM to ever larger bits of reality, or find quirky QM mechanisms we could use to make money and things but the philosophical potential of physics has been shut down at the QM end. All you'll get now are usefull gadgets and practical applications allowing man to become ever more redundant. The other end is cosmology, the Big Bang and inflation theory. I won't be surprised when this end is closed off too, possibly through QM coming through to the other side, from the back of beyond so to speak. In the end, there will be no actual understanding. You will have the latest explanation proposal and it will seem ever closer to some putative reality. That will be the illusion. All we will have done will be to move from the subjective illusion of an objective world to a rational model of how this objective world is supposed to work in reality. We seem to have gained some degree of comfort, safety and entertainment, some of us anyway, but we are just as much the idiot as before with respect to the problem of the nature of reality. Let the young people of today look forward to a better future. Some may even get it.
EB

 

[fromderinside]

.... Let the young people of today look forward to a better future. Some may even get it.
EB

To look forward to a better future one needs to be in the right neighborhood and even then one needs to define better.