To move in all directions qua knowing presents the imminent consequence of epistemic relativism: there appears to be no one single truth and a subsequent violence results in our thinking and in our being in the world.
The fact that we can extend outward presents an ontological imminence that cannot be denied: I believe.
Things more accurately contain a multitudinality in and of themselves, at once containing a singular essence that hinges in all directions in its relationality.
So what really is, is what is being known, regardless of how many ways it can be known.
Descartes' doubt was thus not the best way to approach our deep questions.
Faith actually is.
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what's a qua?
conjuction
in the capaity of; as being: I'm not sure that leisure qua leasure is bad, but that a desire for leasure above anything else may be circumspect.
'leisure qua leisure' I meant
Hmmmmmm... I'm not sure why moving in many directions of knowledge necessarily results in violence, in thinking or in being. You set this up as a premise, but I'm not sure why you think so.
Nor do I understand why outward extension equals belief.
I tend to agree with the view that all things are multifaceted and yet, on some level, unitary. Are you saying that because such a state exists for everything, that knowledge of that state is innate in things and the universe?
Ordering hot dog"
"One with everyhting"
Do not want!!!!
I always appreciate your comments Sky. And thanks for giving me this luxury!
Moving in many directions of knowledge does not necessarily result in violence, in thinking or in being.
But in our case, I think it has and this is my case:
In relativising knowledge, we in effect dissolved ontology, or at least claimed to have. What are the radical constructivists if not that? To be sure, ontology has lost much flavour within philosophy departments, sometimes dismissed, thought non-substantive, and has been taken up largely by physicists and modern mystics (which tells you something about ontology as a discipline, and to its links with early philosophy, where the philosopher was also the (al)chemist, the physicist, and the priest).
Anyhow, in relativising knowledge, we lost some of our grip on the real, 'cause now, anything and everything was real, and anything and everything was completely relative (and this does not mean that this is not so, but that's another matter).
So more specifically, in dissolving ontology, we confused the transitivity of knowledge with the intransitivity of being, the world, and our place in it.
This has in turn resulted in the luxuries we take with the world, 'cause in knowing it with all our liberties, we have come to think of it as ours so to speak, or being largely of our making or of our choosing.
Anthropologically, this I would argue contextualises the movement from systems of leadership, to those of rulership, in effect from our role as stewards, to our new role as, well, dare I say it, rapists.
I guess I hope I don't need to make the case for the violence.
And as to why outward extension equals belief, what else can our activity in the world be if not that? I act the way I do b/c of what I believe, consciously or otherwise, and irregardless of whether I have control over my beliefs or not.
Interestingly, I would also answer like this: This is the word made flesh.
And as to your final point, sort of, but not exactly.
I am saying that because such unitariness exists for everything, that that unitariness exists innately, and that knowledge of that innateness should in turn suffice for belief in a real world, something which surprisingly is not so straight forward for philosophers.
And your final point also makes me think of the Greek 'logos' as a way of intimating this relation, between the word of a thing and its reality, knowing is being in other words, or knowing as being, ultimately creative, productive, and as a result, imminently filled with responsibility.
Bursting of a moral ontoloy so to speak.
It's interesting... I do get the point that contemporary views emphasize the role of the viewer in the nature of that being viewed - ever since the wave-particle nature of light was discovered and all the fallout from that. I am certainly partial to a viewpoint that says there is more to it than that, that reality is not just what we observe and how we observe it, but is somehow objective. And, that is certainly just a belief of mine, not backed up by any empirical knowledge.
But I would disagree with some of what you say. I do not necessarily act in the world because of my beliefs. I act for all kinds of reasons, belief being only one of them. If I eat some food after getting home late at night from a gig (which I just did), there is no belief there, just hunger. In fact, my belief would be that I'm probably not all that hungry but just eating out of habit, and yet I do it anyway. Addiction is like that - how much of an addict's behaviour can be chalked up to their beliefs??
I think, too, that there is another way to look at the world as being one of our making, of our choosing. We can also look at the world as being inevitably affected by our choices, and therefore bear the great burden of that responsibility. While that may not be the most common attitude taken, you shouldn't assume that it is not possible within this paradigm. I certainly feel that it is. I feel very humbled by the idea that the way I view the world in fact shapes it and determines it, in some small way.
But, of course, some people do become drunk with power. That is human nature. I just had a conversation with someone this evening about modern society and how people are taken in by advertising, by societal pressures. I pointed out that this has probably always been the case, as human beings are human beings. I can't believe that we have changed very much in just a few thousand years.
And, I really enjoy these conversations also...
If you think of belief very broadly, it can capture instinct as such a form.
And in response to your potentially impossibly high standard for empirical evidence to ground the existence of something objective, I turn to something said a long time ago:
I know there is objective truth b/c I can feel it.
Ha!
Well, I think that instinct=belief is a pretty broad definition of belief, not what I usually consider that word to mean. Also, I don't know where you thought I was holding up some "impossibly high standard for empirical evidence" in regards to existence - I don't think I said anything in that regard, and in fact I did say that I am partial to believing that reality is objective, regardless of the evidence.
And while I can't dispute your feeling of objective truth, what about those of us who don't feel it? Are we wrong? Are you wrong? Do we live in parallel universes?
well, string theory tells us there are 26 or 27 dimensions, possibly.
so parallel universes/realities, etc, are entirley possible on some level.
point: I see starlight every night that is actually 9000 years old, and 9000 years from now some dude will be seeing MY light-- the light from tonight or tomorrow or whatever.
this alone suggests to me that even time itself is fluid and relative.
but i'm way out of my element here in the rarified world of philosophy (except that i know it's from the greek philos= love and sophia= wisdom).
Instinct=belief is a broad definition indeed, but it is possible, in the sense that this may define a range/continuum, or an onological character of sorts. And this is not that far from thought=action, as we alluded too before, I think.
And in saying that you are partial to believing reality as objective, but that this is just your opinion, I am saying that you are demanding proof for something that I believe is already supported by plenty of evidence.
I guess I propose the evidence of unitariness, of knowing that we all feel some thing, regardless of its multitudinality.
So when I say I can feel it, I know you can too.
:)
And does string theory really tell us that there are at least 26 or 27 dimensions? I didn't know that. When I wrote that into the String poems I think I just arbitrarily chose that #, or maybe I was really quoting you. Funny.
you might've been quoting me--
i got it from one of my only sources of scientific knowledge for the layperson-- bill bryson's "a short history of nearly everything".
I was listening to the Massey lecture on cbc a few months ago; Margaret Sommerville was speaking about ethics and she said something that really struck me as important. She said that that the opposite of faith is not doubt but certainty. I think it is relevant to the concept of knowing, believing and all things epistemelogical.
opps, I meant epistemological...sigh
ym sllepgni scuks
epistemagogical.
epistimigoogical?
eimpistimillogicall?
Hmmmmm, ok I see what you are saying.
I get the belief-instinct connection, as we certainly can internalize some beliefs and then act instinctually on them, but I don't think that means that instincts are necessarily beliefs. In other words, all x=y does not mean all y=x (I know there's a more standard philosophical way to say that, but I forget the terminology).
And when I stated "I believe...but that is just my opinion" I wasn't implying that I personally need more proof on the matter, but that other people might think such proof is needed.
If you think that your feeling something means others do too, well I can't agree with you there. I live in a world where I'm pretty sure I have no clue what most people are feeling, and it certainly has nothing to do with what I myself feel about anything.
I can't say that I follow string theory, though I find it interesting... Michio Kaku is one of the leading researchers in that field, and here's the forum on that topic on his site: http://www.mkaku.org/forums/forumdisplay.php?s=140be87023b35316d6009aec5a25390c&f=40
Why does faith have to have an opposite?? One of the tricks of language and of logical thought is to draw false analogies. In what is called analogical leveling, languages change over time (in part) because speakers draw parallels between aspects of grammar that actually did not have parallels in the language in the first place. That's why kids say thinks like "I goed, he sayed" etc. I think that concluding that "opposite" is a relevant category for every abstract notion we can think of is not really accurate. What's the opposite of unicorn? Of slithey? Of utopia? (don't say dystopia, that's even less meaningful ;)
I think we've come back full circle to what we talked about on a previous post, again. Summed up by Sky's:
"If you think that your feeling something means others do too, well I can't agree with you there. I live in a world where I'm pretty sure I have no clue what most people are feeling, and it certainly has nothing to do with what I myself feel about anything."
This may be that personal isolation/uniqueness that we all have. The human condition! To be human you must feel it. So, nobody can make out what your complex system of beliefs and senses is like, leaving you unable to to communicate the impossible, just like everyone else. Alone together.
PS. The opposite of unicorn is pumpkin
That's just a circular argument: You're human, so you feel like a human and can't tell other humans, and they're human too so they feel the same way, so we're all the same because we're human! It's really not that profound. I mean, we all see in three dimensions because we have two eyes facing forward, like many related primates and many other unrelated species. True, but so what?
"It's really not that profound...So what" ?!?!?!?!
You're just trying to get me going now =P
Just for fun- we weren't talking about the profundity of shared belief/senses, just whether or not we had them. And yeah, the 3d thing is another good example thanks. (also, I still think the 'human condition' is profound, or even that we exist is profound, how did anything ever sprout from nothing? it's beyond my comprehension-what is origin).
I wasn't really trying to enter an argument at all, I just wanted an excuse to say what the opposite of unicorn is.
=)
OK OK... I'll let the debate end! And yes, everything is equally profound in some respect, but that does lighten the meaning of 'profound' quite a bit, don't you think?
But if you're going to insist that pumpkin is the opposite of unicorn, you've really got a debate on your hands.
Everyone knows it's cabbage sprouts!
profound in SOME respect. Meaningless in many others.
lol, cabbage sprouts it is.
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