How can I Avoid Saying More Than I Know?
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How can I Avoid Saying More Than I Know?
- LuckyR
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Re: How can I Avoid Saying More Than I Know?
Sure. You are taking on a task of either impossible dimensions or one quite easily attained. It all depends on your definition of "truth". If you believe that there is only one true truth, then since you are not omniscient, you are doomed to failure before you start. OTOH if your meaning is that you will not tell any lies, then that is something that many kindergardeners do routinely.Platos stepchild wrote:I want to explore the possibility that speaking nothing but the truth is a virtue. But, I don't even know how to recognize most truth statements, as such, much less to speak nothing but. Oh, sure; there are many things which I'm convinced of. But, I need a general means of evaluating any given statement, so as to know it's truth-value. The biggest hurdle of all is getting past what I sincerely believe to be true, to actually knowing it is. As far as I can tell though, this'd mean getting a bird's-eye-view of my own skin. Short of skinning myself, this seems impossible. Does anyone have any ideas, or suggestions?
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Re: How can I Avoid Saying More Than I Know?
Propositions are either tautologies , or syntheses which are not known for sure. So only tautologies are absolutely true.Platos stepchild wrote:I want to explore the possibility that speaking nothing but the truth is a virtue. But, I don't even know how to recognize most truth statements, as such, much less to speak nothing but. Oh, sure; there are many things which I'm convinced of. But, I need a general means of evaluating any given statement, so as to know it's truth-value. The biggest hurdle of all is getting past what I sincerely believe to be true, to actually knowing it is. As far as I can tell though, this'd mean getting a bird's-eye-view of my own skin. Short of skinning myself, this seems impossible. Does anyone have any ideas, or suggestions?
Truth is much the same as goodness in that we cannot attain either of them in their pure forms. Possibly, as Keats claimed, truth is beauty and beauty is truth. We can recognise beauty and we can make beauty.
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Re: How can I Avoid Saying More Than I Know?
So, where does this urge come from, this insatiable need to say what cannot be said? It seems that man is doomed to ache in this plaintive way. Poets seek meaning, instead of truth, speaking elliptical and sometimes tortuous language. And we, their readers are left, on our own to ferret out some Delphic truth. Scientists don't venture beyond their equations, believing that truth and meaning are irrelevant to their obscure symbols. And we, the public are left, on our own to ferret out some Delphic truth.
I want more than 1+1=2. The bordertown between truth and meaning cannot be a ghost town; it just can't be. Because if it is, if it is, then we've deceived ourselves into mistaking our blindness for vision. We jibber-jabber, making words without speaking any meaningful truth. I can't accept that, as evidenced by my hope that this post is both meaningful and true. But, I can't be sure...
- Alec Smart
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Re: How can I Avoid Saying More Than I Know?
I'm not going to pretend I know what any of this means, Plato, but it certainly sounds like you know what you're talking about. You seem to have matured as a philosopher since you first came here but I just wish that, sometimes, you would be a bit more upbeat. Life doesn't always have to be so serious.Platos stepchild wrote:I long to speak some meaningful truth, and to recognize it, as such. If tautologies are the only meaningful truth, then this statement cannot, itself be meaningful, inasmuch as it's not tautological. But if not meaningful, then why even speak it? And if not spoken, then what's left to say? I don't want to jibber-jabber platitudes, deceiving both myself and others as to their importance.
So, where does this urge come from, this insatiable need to say what cannot be said? It seems that man is doomed to ache in this plaintive way. Poets seek meaning, instead of truth, speaking elliptical and sometimes tortuous language. And we, their readers are left, on our own to ferret out some Delphic truth. Scientists don't venture beyond their equations, believing that truth and meaning are irrelevant to their obscure symbols. And we, the public are left, on our own to ferret out some Delphic truth.
I want more than 1+1=2. The bordertown between truth and meaning cannot be a ghost town; it just can't be. Because if it is, if it is, then we've deceived ourselves into mistaking our blindness for vision. We jibber-jabber, making words without speaking any meaningful truth. I can't accept that, as evidenced by my hope that this post is both meaningful and true. But, I can't be sure...
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Re: How can I Avoid Saying More Than I Know?
Well; I do love a good party. It's just been a long time since I've been invited to one. Maybe that'd take the edge off. Oh yeah, by the way; how ya been, dude?Alec Smart wrote:I'm not going to pretend I know what any of this means, Plato, but it certainly sounds like you know what you're talking about. You seem to have matured as a philosopher since you first came here but I just wish that, sometimes, you would be a bit more upbeat. Life doesn't always have to be so serious.Platos stepchild wrote:I long to speak some meaningful truth, and to recognize it, as such. If tautologies are the only meaningful truth, then this statement cannot, itself be meaningful, inasmuch as it's not tautological. But if not meaningful, then why even speak it? And if not spoken, then what's left to say? I don't want to jibber-jabber platitudes, deceiving both myself and others as to their importance.
So, where does this urge come from, this insatiable need to say what cannot be said? It seems that man is doomed to ache in this plaintive way. Poets seek meaning, instead of truth, speaking elliptical and sometimes tortuous language. And we, their readers are left, on our own to ferret out some Delphic truth. Scientists don't venture beyond their equations, believing that truth and meaning are irrelevant to their obscure symbols. And we, the public are left, on our own to ferret out some Delphic truth.
I want more than 1+1=2. The bordertown between truth and meaning cannot be a ghost town; it just can't be. Because if it is, if it is, then we've deceived ourselves into mistaking our blindness for vision. We jibber-jabber, making words without speaking any meaningful truth. I can't accept that, as evidenced by my hope that this post is both meaningful and true. But, I can't be sure...
- Alec Smart
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Re: How can I Avoid Saying More Than I Know?
I'm OK, Plato, but I'd feel better if I could see you being a bit less pessimistic.Platos stepchild wrote:Oh yeah, by the way; how ya been, dude?
- Burning ghost
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Re: How can I Avoid Saying More Than I Know?
I just say everyone is correct and true, but no one can communicate pure thought. The more I come to understand different views the more I come to agree with them obviously! If I agree with something it is because I understand it. My understanding is the same as the intended understanding because my perspective will always possess an element of individuality.
I find a bigger problem to be avoiding what I don't understand by way of dismissal. Although without regulation of where to look and what to investigate we'd probably never get anything substantial done.
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Re: How can I Avoid Saying More Than I Know?
I certainly can say a lot of extraneous things about why I'm dissatisfied. One of them might well be that the root of my dissatisfaction lies in the world. It seems much more likely that the reason lies within me. The fault [dear Brutus], lies not in our stars, but in ourselves. My innui is as intimate to me as I am to me; it's become a layer of tight skin. So, how then can it be out there, when it feels like it's nestled in here?
I am dissatisfied; a restless dialectic stirs and agitates me. It bloats me like gas; so, how is Kant right? Synthetic statements, being rooted in the world allow an infinite number of things, both true and false to be said of them. Therefore, the format I am x can't
address why I'm x. There are just too many different ways to be restless. I won't find the reason for my being dissatisfied contained within I am; I must search within a different construct: me.
I am me. This is what Kant would'ave called an analytic statement. To be me is necessarily contained within the meaning of I am. I needn't look further, certainly not to the world to find the answer. And yet, all that skin is wrapped around me, and not I-am, This is why I earnestly believe the innui, the still-born ache which so unnerves me is far too subtle for language to express. I'm still driven to understand and narrate my dissatisfaction; but, the narrative I create looses more than it captures.
My categories of understanding are grotesque caricatures of what I meant them to be. I need to tame my still-born ache with a name, just as the ancients believed they could tame demons by naming them. And yet, there are no suitable names. So as Virgil said, If I cannot bend the higher powers, I will move the infernal regions. I want all of that restlessness and dissatisfaction to move me, in my deepest regions. Here and here, alone will I find out how to avoid saying more than I know, because language, both extraneous and true shrivels like burning pages in the inferno.
Note to Smart: damn; I've gone and done it again. I'm one sour son of a bitch; that's for sure.
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Re: How can I Avoid Saying More Than I Know?
- Felix
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Re: How can I Avoid Saying More Than I Know?
Platos stepchild said: I want to explore the possibility that speaking nothing but the truth is a virtue.
Obviously you've subverted you own inquiry, if you cannot recognize truth than you cannot express it.But, I don't even know how to recognize most truth statements, as such, much less to speak nothing but.
I would say though that we can only speak relative truths, because as Ele suggested the real thing demands more than lip service, it must be lived.
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