Truth, Objectivity and Popper

[weltweit]

And as regards the question "what is the meaning of life?" ..

So many people already have explanations from their own disciplines that I wonder why you would consider it as a final question at all.

What is the meaning of life?

Evolutionary biologist = survive long enough to breed
Christian = do good and be good in order to gain entry into heaven
Believer in Karma = do good in the hope of a better life in the next life
Nihilist = there is no meaning of life. There is no meaning.
etc etc

 

[Nikolai]

I don't know how you can speak with such authority for somebody else! You seem so certain about what i can or can't do. The mistake you are making however is limiting experiences to the brain. Don't forget that we have the mind, the body, and the soul, and the latter is independent of the brain. It is the interconnector between oneself and the whole of existence, and is found outside the parameters of time and language, both human constructs.

Indeed, where you have time and language, you have human perceptions and you don't have 'truth'. But go beyond both, into the realms of the soul and existence, and 'truth' is uncovered.

For you to categorically deny what i have experienced is both rather strange and interesting! But either way, you are unnecessarily limiting yourself mate. Having enjoyed reading your posts i'm a wee bit surprised at this, but there you go.

Whoa I really disagree with what you're saying...! but it's very interesting to hear such a conflicting standpoint to my own.

Ok, going on what you said - sure let's not limit experiences/epistemology to the brain - that would be silly. You mention other/additional 'ways of knowing' - mind, soul, body - and yes perhaps we can gain a 'fuller' knowledge or grip on 'truth' this way. But surely the very fact you mentioned mind, body, soul is limiting in itself. We can learn through other ways but such other ways are not all encompassing. Is this where we differ? I'm picking up a tone of some kind of 'universal consciousness/truth' idea from what you say. So we're all linked into that are we? Even if we are, I still feel like I know bugger all, so I doesn't help me!

I mean sure, I take acid, it feels at the time that I maybe have some grip on 'truth' or whatever, but then it depends on what level you looking at. Experiences are reducible to brain chemistry right - so how do you know if they have any meaning or bearing on 'truth'. You cannot know this for sure.

And the very experiences you have are in themselves discrete entities - they have boarders. We may sometimes feel like we are at one with 'truth', but how can you trust such mere human mental states? I think you'd be foolish to.

So, back to Popper (because I know you all love him really!). Popper thought the end of science was 'truth'. I think that's bollocks because all knowledge we can ever hope to gain is produced by our 'humanness', or in other words, all knowledge is a construct of subjectivity.

 

[fela fan]

Disagree, questions are great for expanding knowledge, indeed unless and until you know what it is you want to discover (in the form of a question) how can you go about approaching it?

That's why i said questions are fine up to a point. In fact the more the better. More questions more answers more knowledge. But after a while, something more than this is required. After all, what exactly is one going to do with all this knowledge that is accumulated?

At that point it becomes useful to question your answers, until finally you drop the lot...

 

[fela fan]

Whoa I really disagree with what you're saying...! but it's very interesting to hear such a conflicting standpoint to my own.

Ok, going on what you said - sure let's not limit experiences/epistemology to the brain - that would be silly. You mention other/additional 'ways of knowing' - mind, soul, body - and yes perhaps we can gain a 'fuller' knowledge or grip on 'truth' this way. But surely the very fact you mentioned mind, body, soul is limiting in itself.

I will endeavour to make clearer my thinking, but not so much time at the mo, so will need to come back to your post. Particularly as such a subject requires clear thinking before articulating!

But just right now, no i don't think mind body and soul is limiting, in fact i think that is everything covered. But i may change my mind after more thought about what exactly constitutes the soul. But this really is the important one of the 'trinity' (get the use of this word...?!).

For the thing that is non-human, that we can tap into, that is the 'truth', that goes way beyond human perceptions, is the great timelessness that exists. It can quite neatly be covered by the word 'existence', but again we must be careful about reducing things to language. However, language is all we have to communicate with, and while knowledge is easily dealt with using language, dealing with the higher concepts that we are here is not so easily done with mere language.

I believe it is through the soul that we reach this timelessness, this existence. Most certainly the mind is a limiting force, one that creates boundaries such that are decided by our humanness.

I need to rethink things through, however i'm still happy with what i wrote that you feel you disagreed with. I have a feeling however that perhaps we're not so far from disagreement. Certainly the end of science is not truth, as you say. Back to the rest of your post later...

 

[fela fan]

I mean sure, I take acid, it feels at the time that I maybe have some grip on 'truth' or whatever, but then it depends on what level you looking at. Experiences are reducible to brain chemistry right - so how do you know if they have any meaning or bearing on 'truth'. You cannot know this for sure.

Ah, acid. What acid does is quite interesting, never mind the (usually) exciting and magical times one can have on a trip. I feel acid strips one's need to pander to society and everybody else. It affords its user a chance to escape the shackles that are both placed on you by society, and by one's perception that society has placed them on you, and instead can be oneself for a period of time. There is no need to do anything except what you want to do. We get a glimpse of existence, which is nothing more than what is, is.

And this existence has nothing to do with brain chemistry, or brains per se. This 'truth' has nothing to do with the human brain, it resides outside of it, and can only be experienced outside of it.

The other thing acid does is make redundant just about anything that we normally consider important, and that is well interesting too. I often recall how trivial both money and dope were when on a trip. Both of which i hated being without normally...

And that is the glimpse of 'truth', of existence. For judgments cease for a wee while, and that is condition of experiencing 'truth': cutting out brain activity based on our past.

 

[fela fan]

And the very experiences you have are in themselves discrete entities - they have boarders. We may sometimes feel like we are at one with 'truth', but how can you trust such mere human mental states? I think you'd be foolish to.

So, back to Popper (because I know you all love him really!). Popper thought the end of science was 'truth'. I think that's bollocks because all knowledge we can ever hope to gain is produced by our 'humanness', or in other words, all knowledge is a construct of subjectivity.

Experiences, or rather the filter in our brain through which we make sense of them, have boundaries, yes, they are discrete entities, agreed. But the actual experience, unadulterated by our brain's filter are part of the big 'truth'.

Everything that happens, happens; everything that is, is. That is existence, and that is 'truth'. We can't be at one with 'truth', we can be it itself, or we can still be blocked from uncovering its essence. We are part of the whole thing, and it is part of us, the trick is in throwing of the layers of covers that we have picked up from society that block us from discovering it.

One of the major blocks is organised religion which insists on God. While we have God, we cannot have 'truth'. It's one or the other!

 

[Nikolai]

Thanks fela. Similarly, I shall come back to this.

Did I mention I was an anti-realist?

 

[fela fan]

Thanks fela. Similarly, I shall come back to this.

Did I mention I was an anti-realist?

No, i don't think you did, particularly since i'm not sure what this might be! But it sounds good, because if i understand it right, being realistic is accepting things that one doesn't want to particularly accept.