Does objective knowledge mean perfect knowledge?

[Quotidian]

Well said Dawson.

Whilst I agree that perfect objectivity is not attainable, I think it is quite reasonable to say that there are degrees of objectivity (and by implication, degrees of subjectivity.) For instance if you were judging a talent contest, you would not normally be allowed to adjudicate your child's performance; for similar reasons, professionals such as doctors and lawyers are generally expected not to treat or represent their immediate family. You do see examples of politicians and journalists and the like, who make errors of judgement because of subjective bias.

So, I think as a of pragmatic rule, objectivity is important, but its limits need to be acknowledged.

If there is no absolute truth, then certainly there is no absolute (objective) knowledge as our definition of knowledge must contain truth in it to even be considered some kind of knowledge to begin with.

The Greek sceptics of the later academy made a great deal of such arguments. But then you're always faced with a version of the liar paradox - if all propositions are to be distrusted, then so too is the proposition 'all propositions are to be distrusted'! So scepticism does easily tend to become self-defeating. It has its uses but it too can't be considered to be all-powerful.

[David Henry9]

Objectivism considers "existence exists" aka the external objective world exists/is, to be the basic axiom of all truth.

[Infinite_zero]

The Greek sceptics of the later academy made a great deal of such arguments. But then you're always faced with a version of the liar paradox - if all propositions are to be distrusted, then so too is the proposition 'all propositions are to be distrusted'! So scepticism does easily tend to become self-defeating. It has its uses but it too can't be considered to be all-powerful.

Well I see little connection between scepticism and the statement: If there is no absolute truth then there is no absolute knowledge. Given that Knowledge entails truth.

I mean, I have not implied that this means there are no truths. This is obviously only regarding absolute truths and nothing else, to then imply something about the absolute knowledge.

I can also make it clear that I view knowledge as relative, meaning the truth also becomes relative in that sense. With relative here I'm talking about the certain context it's true in.

For instance: The statement "I'm writing on a laptop" has no meaning nor truth value if we look at solely the sentence without the context of where this sentence belongs, i.e. who wrote it, and also when. This sentence would have little to no meaning if written 100 years ago for instance. And obviously if someone wrote this with a pen on paper, then that also would be false. If anyone but a human subject wrote it, then that too would be false. It is true insofar it is read through the context it's in. And I am really writing on a laptop, though I got no way to prove that, so this truth would really only be true to me and anyone else observing me writing this down as I'm writing right now.

Therefore the sentence: "That mammoth is eating" has little meaning and truth today, as there are no mammoths alive, but again, seen through a context, where for instance someone is watching the Ice Age movies or a documentary showing animation of a mammoth eating something, that sentence becomes true.

So this is far from scepticism, as the whole idea of scepticism is more or less a fallacy itself if one looked deep enough into it.

[Pages]

I wish I had some examples for this thread, but I don't have any. That's because objective knowledge is elusive or may not exist. Maybe perfection is meant to always be just out of reach.

What do you think? What have you to say?

PhilX

2 + 2 = 4 is an existent objective knowledge.

Perfection is the illusion. For us to term something as being perfect we need to know what that thing would be at it's best (without any further improvement). Unfortunately for human's elusive perfection, everything is evolving and knowledge has been increasing ever since humans became conscious of them

[Misty]

Is there really anything like objective knowledge? All the knowledge that we have is subjective. We use our subjectivity to arrive at conclusions but since our subjective knowledge is itself limited, there does not seem to be any way to be sure that the conclusion is free of subjectivity.

If you were being swept away by a tsunami would that be an example of objective knowledge translating to your subjective knowledge? If you were knocked out immediately but survived, would you believe the devastation around you or what others say happened? Objective just means outside an individuals thoughts or feelings, subjective is viewpoint or bias.

-- Updated Mon Nov 24, 2014 2:22 pm to add the following --

2 + 2 = 4 is an existent objective knowledge.

Perfection is the illusion. For us to term something as being perfect we need to know what that thing would be at it's best (without any further improvement). Unfortunately for human's elusive perfection, everything is evolving and knowledge has been increasing ever since humans became conscious of them

Do you think there might be "perfection" in chaos?

[AB1OB]

Is there really anything like objective knowledge?

I think it comes down to practicality. We want knowledge that we can rely on. If we can't rely on it, it is worthless.

But things are never clear-cut, there are always shades of gray. So what we often want to know is, under what conditions does a certain bit of knowledge apply? Sort of the knowledge to know how to use the knowledge.



It is true that we experience the world internally. With the proper technology, we could put somebody inside a box and simulate a virtual existence in the stone age around the area of the box. As long as he had to stay in the box and view it, through his peep-holes, we could fool his perspectives of sight, sound, smell, feel and even taste if we allow some transfer from without. It would be virtually the same as the real thing, from that perspective.

All the knowledge that we have is subjective. We use our subjectivity to arrive at conclusions but since our subjective knowledge is itself limited, there does not seem to be any way to be sure that the conclusion is free of subjectivity.

Knowledge (like the universe in general) evolves. We find something that works, for our practical purpose. We develop and understanding (intuition) about how it may be working (providing practical results). As knowledge evolves we gain and understanding of the functional concepts behind the results, then we can modify and adapt our techniques in order to improve results.

We can never know that we have the complete answer. But if it works, it is practical and answers can become more complete with time. Even hitting a dead-end can be positive. While you can never prove a theory completely perfect you can disprove it. If that happens, then another (at least a chance for an improvement) path is taken.

[Vijaydevani]

Is there really anything like objective knowledge? All the knowledge that we have is subjective. We use our subjectivity to arrive at conclusions but since our subjective knowledge is itself limited, there does not seem to be any way to be sure that the conclusion is free of subjectivity.

If you were being swept away by a tsunami would that be an example of objective knowledge translating to your subjective knowledge? If you were knocked out immediately but survived, would you believe the devastation around you or what others say happened? Objective just means outside an individuals thoughts or feelings, subjective is viewpoint or bias.

I think there is a confusion between experience and knowledge with data thrown in the mix. We have experiences which provide us with data. The data is analyzed by us from our individual perspective and that gives us knowledge. Seeing 2+2=4 is not knowledge. Understanding what it means is knowledge. The tsunami provides its own set of objective data which would be common to everyone. How that data is analyzed individually is a completely different matter. Also just because all knowledge is subjective does not mean it is all wrong. There could be a number of different correct ways of looking at the same thing.

[Pages]

2 + 2 = 4 is an existent objective knowledge.

Perfection is the illusion. For us to term something as being perfect we need to know what that thing would be at it's best (without any further improvement). Unfortunately for human's elusive perfection, everything is evolving and knowledge has been increasing ever since humans became conscious of them

Do you think there might be "perfection" in chaos?

Perfection is an illusion

[Misty]

Do you think there might be "perfection" in chaos?

Perfection is an illusion[/quote]

"Perfection is an illusion" - This statement cannot be proven.

-- Updated Tue Nov 25, 2014 8:59 am to add the following --

Is there really anything like objective knowledge? All the knowledge that we have is subjective. We use our subjectivity to arrive at conclusions but since our subjective knowledge is itself limited, there does not seem to be any way to be sure that the conclusion is free of subjectivity.

Without objective knowledge there wouldn't be anything to subjectify.

[Pages]

(Nested quote removed.)


If you were being swept away by a tsunami would that be an example of objective knowledge translating to your subjective knowledge? If you were knocked out immediately but survived, would you believe the devastation around you or what others say happened? Objective just means outside an individuals thoughts or feelings, subjective is viewpoint or bias.

I think there is a confusion between experience and knowledge with data thrown in the mix. We have experiences which provide us with data. The data is analyzed by us from our individual perspective and that gives us knowledge. Seeing 2+2=4 is not knowledge. Understanding what it means is knowledge. The tsunami provides its own set of objective data which would be common to everyone. How that data is analyzed individually is a completely different matter. Also just because all knowledge is subjective does not mean it is all wrong. There could be a number of different correct ways of looking at the same thing.

There is a confusion between experience and knowledge but, I guess you're the one caught up in the mix (no offence). Analysis of data is A process of acquiring data but, knowledge does not depend on that to manifest. Knowledge and experience all have to do with being aware of something. What you experience you have knowledge of, whether or not that thing is really how you experience it is another phase of knowledge (analysis) where you think that's only where knowledge comes in.

I think knowledge and experience mean thesame thing but, used in different context with respect to the language from which they originate. 2+2=4 is an information revealed through experience and therefore called knowledge (of the fact). It is an objective truth when known becomes an objective experience or knowledge.

-- Updated November 25th, 2014, 10:11 am to add the following --

I wanted to write "...A process of acquiring knowledge..." I can't see the edit button

-- Updated November 25th, 2014, 10:24 am to add the following --

Do you think there might be "perfection" in chaos?

Perfection is an illusion

"Perfection is an illusion" - This statement cannot be proven. [/quote]

Let me lay it down for like how some scientific evidences are generated. When a theory endures unsuccessful refutation it acquires the tendency of becoming a fact. I said perfection is an illusion because I have never seen or heard of a stagnant existence. Nothing we know still is thesame way we knew it. And since another irrefutable theory is that we don't even know the intention of nature's evolutions we cannot rightly say whether something is evolving to be good or bad of which would help us to measure the phase which we'll label being perfect if attained. But if you can give me an example of an existence that have remained unchangeable for a long time at the peak of it's evolution, I'll reconsider my theory.

-- Updated November 25th, 2014, 10:29 am to add the following --

Pardon my mistakes... I'm using a small-screen phone and it's hard for me to proof read every line... I really need that "edit" button

[AB1OB]

(Nested quote removed.)


I think there is a confusion between experience and knowledge with data thrown in the mix. We have experiences which provide us with data. The data is analyzed by us from our individual perspective and that gives us knowledge. Seeing 2+2=4 is not knowledge. Understanding what it means is knowledge. The tsunami provides its own set of objective data which would be common to everyone. How that data is analyzed individually is a completely different matter. Also just because all knowledge is subjective does not mean it is all wrong. There could be a number of different correct ways of looking at the same thing.

There is a confusion between experience and knowledge but, I guess you're the one caught up in the mix (no offence). Analysis of data is A process of acquiring data but, knowledge does not depend on that to manifest. Knowledge and experience all have to do with being aware of something. What you experience you have knowledge of, whether or not that thing is really how you experience it is another phase of knowledge (analysis) where you think that's only where knowledge comes in.

I think knowledge and experience mean thesame thing but, used in different context with respect to the language from which they originate. 2+2=4 is an information revealed through experience and therefore called knowledge (of the fact). It is an objective truth when known becomes an objective experience or knowledge.

-- Updated November 25th, 2014, 10:11 am to add the following --

I wanted to write "...A process of acquiring knowledge..." I can't see the edit button

-- Updated November 25th, 2014, 10:24 am to add the following --

(Nested quote removed.)


Perfection is an illusion

"Perfection is an illusion" - This statement cannot be proven.

Let me lay it down for like how some scientific evidences are generated. When a theory endures unsuccessful refutation it acquires the tendency of becoming a fact. I said perfection is an illusion because I have never seen or heard of a stagnant existence. Nothing we know still is thesame way we knew it. And since another irrefutable theory is that we don't even know the intention of nature's evolutions we cannot rightly say whether something is evolving to be good or bad of which would help us to measure the phase which we'll label being perfect if attained. But if you can give me an example of an existence that have remained unchangeable for a long time at the peak of it's evolution, I'll reconsider my theory.

-- Updated November 25th, 2014, 10:29 am to add the following --

Pardon my mistakes... I'm using a small-screen phone and it's hard for me to proof read every line... I really need that "edit" button[/quote]

I agree with pretty much every point you presented in this post, especially the aggravation caused by the lack of editing options.

[Bohm2]

I'm sympathetic to this innatist view:

I think we are forced to abandon many commonly accepted doctrines about language and knowledge. There is an innate structure that determines the framework within which thought and language develop down to quite precise and intricate details. Language and thought are awakened in the mind, and follow a large, predetermined course, much like other biological properties. They develop in a way that provides a rich structure of truths of meaning. Our knowledge in these areas, and I believe elsewhere-even in science and mathematics-is not derived by induction, by applying reliable procedure and so on; it is not grounded or based on "good reason" in any useful sense of the notion. Rather it grows in the mind, on the basis of our biological nature, triggered by appropriate experience, and in a limited way shaped by experience that settles options left open by the innate structure of mind. The result is an elaborate structure of cognitive systems of knowledge and belief, that reflects the very nature of the human mind, a biological organ like others with its scope and limits.

This conclusion, which seems to me well-supported by the study of language and I suspect holds true far more broadly, perhaps universally in domains of human thought, compels us to rethink fundamental assumptions of modern philosophy and our general intellectual culture, including assumptions about scientific knowledge, mathematics, ethics, aesthetics, social theory and practise and much else, questions too broad and far-reaching, for me to try to address here, but questions that should, I think, be subjected to serious scrutiny from a point of view rather different than those that have conventionally been assumed.

Language and the problems of knowledge
http://sammelpunkt.philo.at:8080/1284/1/Chomsky.pdf

[Infinite_zero]

Without objective knowledge there wouldn't be anything to subjectify.

I'm unsure whether you imply with this sentence that since without objective knowledge there can therefore not be anything to subjectify as a conditional here, means that objective knowledge then is independent of any subject. If that is the case then I'll have to counter that with saying this:

Knowledge itself, as in the idea of knowledge, that of knowing something, surely exists through the fact that there is something in existence to gain this thing called knowledge to begin with. It's not objective knowledge that's the primary instance, but the subject that has to be the primary instance. Because it's the subject that objectifies substances, basically anything outside it's mind, but that is through its own subjectivity. It's not objective in the sense as a stagnant entity/substance or knowledge that's independent of the subject. It's objective in the sense that it's independent of the subject in existing, but is acknowledged as an object through the subject. Surely to state that there exists knowledge when there are no subjects in existence is too far fetched and really a radical statement in my opinion for this reason: How can something exist as attainable, when there is nothing in the world to attain that which is attainable? In other words, how can knowledge in general, or said it like this; how can knowledge simpliciter exist? When there is nothing in existence to gain that knowledge.

It's the same perspective when it comes to science, some people think scientific laws are never changing laws that have always existed, and that we're just discovering what's already there. But is that really the case? There is little that tells us that the sciences are things that are discovered in that sense, rather than that the sciences are something invented as a tool for describing nature more accurately according to the subject. One could also take Kant's "Copernican revolution" that has already been mentioned earlier I believe.

Either way, there isn't something out there waiting to be "discovered" as if it was knowledge that existed for 14 billion years (if one accepts the BBT). There is also difficulties in understanding that objective knowledge or knowledge in general exists, especially without language. Without it, one can hardly think or formulate even simple ideas or thoughts. I can only imagine one being able to have images as a way of gaining some sort of knowledge type memory. But ideas without words or language itself are hard to even imagine. Yet to claim "objective knowledge" exists even then, seems hard to accept given there is no necessity involved in it for accepting it.

[Pages]

Without objective knowledge there wouldn't be anything to subjectify.

I'm unsure whether you imply with this sentence that since without objective knowledge there can therefore not be anything to subjectify as a conditional here, means that objective knowledge then is independent of any subject. If that is the case then I'll have to counter that with saying this:

Knowledge itself, as in the idea of knowledge, that of knowing something, surely exists through the fact that there is something in existence to gain this thing called knowledge to begin with. It's not objective knowledge that's the primary instance, but the subject that has to be the primary instance. Because it's the subject that objectifies substances, basically anything outside it's mind, but that is through its own subjectivity. It's not objective in the sense as a stagnant entity/substance or knowledge that's independent of the subject. It's objective in the sense that it's independent of the subject in existing, but is acknowledged as an object through the subject. Surely to state that there exists knowledge when there are no subjects in existence is too far fetched and really a radical statement in my opinion for this reason: How can something exist as attainable, when there is nothing in the world to attain that which is attainable? In other words, how can knowledge in general, or said it like this; how can knowledge simpliciter exist? When there is nothing in existence to gain that knowledge.

It's the same perspective when it comes to science, some people think scientific laws are never changing laws that have always existed, and that we're just discovering what's already there. But is that really the case? There is little that tells us that the sciences are things that are discovered in that sense, rather than that the sciences are something invented as a tool for describing nature more accurately according to the subject. One could also take Kant's "Copernican revolution" that has already been mentioned earlier I believe.

Either way, there isn't something out there waiting to be "discovered" as if it was knowledge that existed for 14 billion years (if one accepts the BBT). There is also difficulties in understanding that objective knowledge or knowledge in general exists, especially without language. Without it, one can hardly think or formulate even simple ideas or thoughts. I can only imagine one being able to have images as a way of gaining some sort of knowledge type memory. But ideas without words or language itself are hard to even imagine. Yet to claim "objective knowledge" exists even then, seems hard to accept given there is no necessity involved in it for accepting it.

I've talked about this a lot of times. I am watching tv right now, just because you don't hear the sound doesn't mean the sound doesn't exist. How do I know? Because I can hear it. If I leave the tv on and go out of range of the sound, does it stop? Of course not. It just exists outside my subjective knowledge. I find it really strange and confusing when people doubt the existence of objective existence or knowledge.

[AB1OB]

...................... I find it really strange and confusing when people doubt the existence of objective existence or knowledge.

Objective existence or knowledge are 2 different animals.

Objective existence is independent from awareness.

Knowledge is dependent on awareness.

Objective existence is a continuum. Everything that now exists has a continuous pathway of existence back to the beginning of expansion.

Knowledge is intermittent. There is a perceived illusion of a continuum (duality of body and mind). There is no continuum with knowledge, it is the unreal interpretation of and by the real. The body/brain is real. The mind is not real. The mind does not exist independently from the body. The body exists independently from the mind.

I posted this before someplace but it is pertinent here...

USING A MATHEMATICAL CONSTRUCT TO VISUALIZE THE ANSWER TO THIS TOPIC:

HOW CONSCIOUSNESS REALLY EXISTS OUTSIDE OUR BRAINS

We are going to study existence. This will require positioning the entity (which is "existing") in its proper frame of reference.

To do this we will use a coordinate system:



Next we plot the positions of a brain existing in our discontinuous quantum reality. These are the points where measurement by observation are possible (the plane of reality). (the "GPS coord's" of the brain @ a specific point in time z-axis):



Now, from the perspective of the brain, it's flow through reality is this:



BUT...this is the actuality of the continuum:



We can convert this all to mathematics but that is not the point here. We just want to understand the relativities. So rather than making this a mathematical expression, I will just interpret in regular language.

Continuous existence alternating-ly proceeds through the plane of reality and imagery. "Continuous" is important. (Lack of continuity is illogical.)

Now let's look at imagery. Ideas, thoughts and similar things that are constructs of the Imaginary Plane. They do not have a continuous 3-dimensional existence in reality. They never pass through the Plane of Reality.

We can plot the positions, when our charted brain encounters these images, as below:



This is a discontinuous existence. Because of our perspective, we have a warped sense of imagery's continuity. It looks to us like this following picture.



For all our intents and purposes, it functions as this imagined continuity and leads to and imagined duality of mind and body. What we incorrectly think is real:


IMAGINED DUALITY