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Ideas

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby dealing with it on Tue Oct 14, 2014 3:54 pm

Plato argued against the sophists. He wrote that there are absolutes of Truth, Good, Beauty, Knowledge, and Justice in a metaphysical heaven filled with just these sorts of Ideas. A sophist might say "man is the measure of all things" and then argue so that the weaker position seems the stronger. Plato, on the other hand, looked for truths which went beyond such playful quibbles.

What happens if you throw Platonic reasoning out the window, and treat sophistries as legitimate arguments?

What if Truth is a delusion, Good a myth, Beauty a bait-and-switch, Knowledge a pretention, and Justice fantasy? Is it possible to live with that much uncertainty?

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Re: Ideas

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby Aniihya on Tue Oct 14, 2014 4:07 pm

You are suggesting the elimination of objectivity. A world that revolves around subjectivity is most certainly a possibility that doesnt seem much of an impossibility, however progression becomes an uncertain possibility due to the lack of certain certainty which results in certain uncertainty and uncertain uncertainty as knowledge could be believed as a myth.
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Re: Ideas

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby Saarai on Tue Oct 14, 2014 4:22 pm

We already do. One man's truth can be a lie. One man's good an evil onto others. Beauty is skin deep or what's on the inside. Knowledge different from intelligence. And justice for some an injustice for others.

I think it comes down to if you're okay with uncertainty or if you're an enemy of the unknown.
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Re: Ideas

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby Solo Wing Pixy on Tue Oct 14, 2014 4:32 pm

I'm reminded of a passage from one of my favorite books.

Terry Pratchett wrote:“All right," said Susan. "I'm not stupid. You're saying humans need... fantasies to make life bearable."

REALLY? AS IF IT WAS SOME KIND OF PINK PILL? NO. HUMANS NEED FANTASY TO BE HUMAN. TO BE THE PLACE WHERE THE FALLING ANGEL MEETS THE RISING APE.

"Tooth fairies? Hogfathers? Little—"

YES. AS PRACTICE. YOU HAVE TO START OUT LEARNING TO BELIEVE THE LITTLE LIES.

"So we can believe the big ones?"

YES. JUSTICE. MERCY. DUTY. THAT SORT OF THING.

"They're not the same at all!"

YOU THINK SO? THEN TAKE THE UNIVERSE AND GRIND IT DOWN TO THE FINEST POWDER AND SIEVE IT THROUGH THE FINEST SIEVE AND THEN SHOW ME ONE ATOM OF JUSTICE, ONE MOLECULE OF MERCY. AND YET—Death waved a hand. AND YET YOU ACT AS IF THERE IS SOME IDEAL ORDER IN THE WORLD, AS IF THERE IS SOME...SOME RIGHTNESS IN THE UNIVERSE BY WHICH IT MAY BE JUDGED.

"Yes, but people have got to believe that, or what's the point—"

MY POINT EXACTLY.”
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Re: Ideas

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby Screwface Romeo on Tue Oct 14, 2014 5:05 pm

You're confusing sophists for a unified group with unified teachings. In reality, this was not the case. "Sophists", as a group, were merely a class of philosopher teachers whose only unifying factor was that they charged money for their services. While many of them were believed to teach that there was no objective truth, and trained their pupils to argue both sides of a point, it is inaccurate to classify them as a united school of thought based around these ideas. It's also very difficult to nail down exactly what various sophists believed, and which opinions were most popular, because the vast majority of our knowledge of the sophists comes from guess who? Plato, who made no bones about the fact that he despised them, and approached his documentation of their ideologies from a position of hostility. It's like basing your knowledge of the American Democratic Party and its teachings on a podcast by Rush Limbaugh.

Now, if you're going to leave sophists out of it, and merely approach the topic of Plato's ideology, that's a different story.

I disagree with Plato. As a matter fact, I disagree with any ideology that promotes the idea of a universal, objective morality. The idea that the human condition is black-and-white is a childish delusion. There is no black-and-white. Humanity is a sea of gray. Morality, ethics, good and evil, are all based on what the person classifying them values. In other words, they are subjective. Those of you who desire moral certainty, I'm afraid I have to disappoint you. Searching for certainty when it comes to philosophy, morality, and politics, is chasing a dragon that you will never catch. That leaves you two options: pick a preset ideology, and follow it, or create a set of values for yourself, and make decisions based on applying your principles to what you observe in the world around you. I believe that people need principles and a concept of good and evil in order to function, but I also believe that people need to accept that they are subjective, and relative terms.

My own principles are pretty simple: creating the most good for the most people is Good. Creating the most personal freedom that you can without harming others is Good. Using, abusing, and harming people to satisfy your own personal greed and avarice is Evil. Persecuting and misstreating people for things they can't help, such as skin color or sexual orientation, is Evil. Forcing your beliefs, your opinions, and your morality on other people is Evil. Cynicism, Skepticism and Pragmatism should influence or at least inform a person's decisions. Those are my principles. I believe in them, but I also know that they are as subjective as any other set of principles. And I'm okay with that, because I'm comfortable with what I believe. I don't need it to be universally and objectively true in order to be satisfied.

Aniihya wrote:You are suggesting the elimination of objectivity. A world that revolves around subjectivity is most certainly a possibility that doesnt seem much of an impossibility, however progression becomes an uncertain possibility due to the lack of certain certainty which results in certain uncertainty and uncertain uncertainty as knowledge could be believed as a myth.


I would argue that platonic reasoning is actually the more subjective branch here. For one simple reason: platonic reasoning is rooted in the idea that there is such a thing as a universal morality. Morality is quite possibly the most subjective thing on the planet, next to beauty, art and politics.
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Re: Ideas

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby Aniihya on Tue Oct 14, 2014 5:22 pm

Screwface Romeo: You are suggesting that I argue that there is an universal morality. However where did I state such. I in fact believe that if there was the change that knowledge would become myth, that the world would remain unchanged.

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Re: Ideas

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby dealing with it on Tue Oct 14, 2014 5:23 pm

Screwface Romeo, it was a simplification. I wasn't sure if people would care if I name-dropped Protagoras as the name behind the example. Just like I don't think anyone cares if I point out that Aniihya's argument sounds like something Gorgias might say.

I like pre-Socratic philosophers. I think they're all surprisingly relevant to modern philosophy. But I'll pick my battles.
Screwface Romeo wrote:Now, if you're going to leave sophists out of it, and merely approach the topic of Plato's ideology, that's a different story.
Yes, feel free to leave the sophists at the door.

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Re: Ideas

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby Screwface Romeo on Tue Oct 14, 2014 5:35 pm

dealing with it wrote:Screwface Romeo, it was a simplification. I wasn't sure if people would care if I name-dropped Protagoras as the name behind the example. Just like I don't think anyone cares if I point out that Aniihya's argument sounds like something Gorgias might say.

I like pre-Socratic philosophers. I think they're all surprisingly relevant to modern philosophy. But I'll pick my battles.
Screwface Romeo wrote:Now, if you're going to leave sophists out of it, and merely approach the topic of Plato's ideology, that's a different story.
Yes, feel free to leave the sophists at the door.


Understood, I took the time to point it out because I was worried that the simplification would confuse the question. Nothing personal, I just felt that if we're going to wrestle complex issues like this, we need to deal with them complexly.

Aniihya wrote:Screwface Romeo: You are suggesting that I argue that there is an universal morality. However where did I state such. I in fact believe that if there was the change that knowledge would become myth, that the world would remain unchanged.


I'm having a very hard time figuring out exactly what you are arguing, because the language you use in that initial post seems more interested in being poetic than actually making sense. I prefer to speak plainly, and explain exactly what I mean in simple terms, in order to avoid confusion, at the risk of sounding simplistic and uneducated, rather than use weasel words and high flung dialect to make myself appear smarter.

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Re: Ideas

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby Aniihya on Wed Oct 15, 2014 12:53 pm

Okay, really simple terms maybe leaving half of it out: I did not believe in a universal morality to begin with, so the world in my view will not be any different.

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Re: Ideas

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby dealing with it on Wed Oct 15, 2014 7:53 pm

Screwface Romeo. I agree that morality is not black-and-white, so we have no real debate there, but what of other Ideas? Is Truth black-and-white? Or is pluralism the word of the day? Is one's Truth another's falsehood, in the same way that one's Beautiful is another's ugly?

Is Truth the same for a Cynic, a Skeptic, and a Pragmatist? Or is there an underlying difference which needs to be respected and understood?

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Re: Ideas

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby VindicatedPurpose on Mon Nov 03, 2014 12:26 pm

Did not Aristotle argue in the Nicomachean Ethics that we should "not expect more precision than the subject-matter admits"?

What was Aristotle's point about absolutes?
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Re: Ideas

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby dealing with it on Mon Nov 03, 2014 7:12 pm

VindicatedPurpose wrote:Did not Aristotle argue in the Nicomachean Ethics that we should "not expect more precision than the subject-matter admits"?
Yes, but since someone is borrowing my copy of Aristotle's complete works, I can't comment further.
VindicatedPurpose wrote:What was Aristotle's point about absolutes?

Here's a link to the relevant thought:
Aristotle's Theory of Universals
The primary difference between Aristotle and Plato is that Plato believes that Ideas exist somewhere out there in a heavenly realm of universals (where there are perfect Tables, perfect Good, perfect Beauty, perfect Number 5), whereas Aristotle believes that universals exist only so far as they are instantiated. Universals are an example of similarity between two particulars, not similarity of two particulars to a third, abstract, Idea.

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Re: Ideas

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby VindicatedPurpose on Tue Nov 04, 2014 12:08 am

dealing with it wrote:
VindicatedPurpose wrote:Did not Aristotle argue in the Nicomachean Ethics that we should "not expect more precision than the subject-matter admits"?
Yes, but since someone is borrowing my copy of Aristotle's complete works, I can't comment further.


*Eyeroll*

His work is practically ubiquitous on the internet.

dealing with it wrote:
VindicatedPurpose wrote:What was Aristotle's point about absolutes?

Here's a link to the relevant thought:
Aristotle's Theory of Universals
The primary difference between Aristotle and Plato is that Plato believes that Ideas exist somewhere out there in a heavenly realm of universals (where there are perfect Tables, perfect Good, perfect Beauty, perfect Number 5), whereas Aristotle believes that universals exist only so far as they are instantiated. Universals are an example of similarity between two particulars, not similarity of two particulars to a third, abstract, Idea.


Could you use an ostension to explain that last statement?
Last edited by VindicatedPurpose on Tue Nov 04, 2014 12:49 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Ideas

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby dealing with it on Tue Nov 04, 2014 5:34 am

VindicatedPurpose wrote:Could you use an ostension to explain that last statement?
The difference between Aristotle and Plato is the degree universals can exist. A Platonist might say that a given universal subsists (exists*) concretely. For a particular to be red, for instance, there needs first be a universal known as "redness". For two universals to be red, there still only needs to be a universal "redness". Since they don't technically exist in the world -- they subsist in a heaven of Ideas -- we learn abstract language through our memory of the world of universals.

Ostentiously, an apple and a sunset are both red because they partake of redness.

To an Aristotelian, Ideas are superfluous. Two red objects share the universal redness not because of some third "redness". Instead, the universal subsists in the comparisons between the two particulars: "redness" is what they have in common. We learn abstract language by comparison, not memory.

Ostentiously, we say an apple and a sunset are both red because they look similar. There is no third "greater" thing to explain the similarity.


*Subsists is used in place of "exists" when talking about universals. The verb "to be" is reserved for individual things (aka, particulars).

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Re: Ideas

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby dealing with it on Mon Nov 10, 2014 5:45 pm

I guess I could say:

The cellphoneness of my cellphone subsists in all cellphones. How does it manage this? How does the universal subsist in the particular?

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Re: Ideas

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby VindicatedPurpose on Mon Nov 10, 2014 9:35 pm

This discussion is locked in a whether "absolutes" exist or not. Platonic reasoning works only if one is an adherent to it. At the same time, whether or not absolutes exist is different from our ability to appreciate them.

As Aniihya said, that they did not believe in a universal morality. That said, if Plato's idea of Forms is true in his sense of the word, then the absolute that is universal morality exists (just as an example), whether or not Aniihya or any other person for that matter believes in it or not (appreciates or does not appreciate). And because they are absolutes, they must exist in this absolute heaven that Plato spoke of.

The issue is that we can not perceive these absolutes, so we do not really have a concrete "They exist period."

You can throw out platonic reasoning, but the platonic forms may still exist without us knowing. So it seems like we'd be living in an uncertain world, and maybe we already do.

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Re: Ideas

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby dealing with it on Tue Nov 11, 2014 5:59 pm

VindicatedPurpose wrote:The issue is that we can not perceive these absolutes, so we do not really have a concrete "They exist period."
The problem with getting rid of universals is that they appear everywhere in language. In English, you can easily create one by adding the suffix -ness to any common noun (paper + ness = paperness). The issue has remained in philosophy for the last 2500 years without resolution.
VindicatedPurpose wrote:You can throw out platonic reasoning, but the platonic forms may still exist without us knowing. So it seems like we'd be living in an uncertain world, and maybe we already do.
Sure. If you can't rule out Plato's heaven of Forms, nor can you prove that it is necessary, we live with uncertainty.

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