These are not universal truths...

[Karpel Tunnel]

What is BEHIND the universal truth?

the demiurg?

truths are spoken. A universal truth is something which is universally spoken.

So universal truth means consensus truth?

Then are there any universal truths? We have solipsists, schizophrenics, contrary people, other cultures, animists....

[obsrvr524]

Since no one in this thread has actually mentioned it, can I note that no one here knows what "universal truth" means? Or is it just that everyone still on this board is in on the game of creating chaos and hopelessness by never revealing such things?

[Karpel Tunnel]

Since no one in this thread has actually mentioned it, can I note that no one here knows what "universal truth" means? Or is it just that everyone still on this board is in on the game of creating chaos and hopelessness by never revealing such things?

some people think it is not a coherent term. Iambiguous present a definition a page back. I think there are problems with that definition and presented a critique. Others seem to think universal truth means true for everyone. But that is confused.

Notice Zero Sum games use....

see if you can hold your breath without passing out.

Presumably he means there are no exceptions to that, so it is universal.

But that is confused since 'truth' works just as well there.

Homo sapiens need to breathe to remain conscious.

That statement is true, let's assume. To then say it is universally true, or a universal truth, adds no extra meaning. It is speaking about all humans. So at best it is redundant.

Iambs seems to mean it is universally believed.

But that rarely happens and certainly doesn't make it true or truer. And it would be a bad term for it.

[obsrvr524]

Since no one in this thread has actually mentioned it, can I note that no one here knows what "universal truth" means? Or is it just that everyone still on this board is in on the game of creating chaos and hopelessness by never revealing such things?

some people think it is not a coherent term. Iambiguous present a definition a page back. I think there are problems with that definition and presented a critique. Others seem to think universal truth means true for everyone. But that is confused.

Notice Zero Sum games use....

see if you can hold your breath without passing out.

Presumably he means there are no exceptions to that, so it is universal.

But that is confused since 'truth' works just as well there.

Homo sapiens need to breathe to remain conscious.

That statement is true, let's assume. To then say it is universally true, or a universal truth, adds no extra meaning. It is speaking about all humans. So at best it is redundant.

Iambs seems to mean it is universally believed.

But that rarely happens and certainly doesn't make it true or truer. And it would be a bad term for it.

Yes I have read the thread and thank you. But my question was whether these people actually, in reality, believe what they are saying. Too many threads on this board appear to be just a game of playing with words to stir things up. For example it is hard to believe that the Iambiguous character is at all ingenuous.

[Silhouette]

Right now all you're doing is reifying experience.

Continuous Experience is already real and concrete whether I want it to be or not - no conversion or "making" on my or anyone else's part is required.
Discrete experiences are what is "made" or converted from Continuous Experience - that's where the process of reification occurs: not in the existence of Continuous Experience before reification occurs, and to which reification must apply in order for reification to have a starting state (pre-reification) as well as a resulting state (post-reification).

Im saying there is no criterium for posting continuous experience as more fundamental than discrete experience, as your notion of the former is derived from the latter.
We've had this discussion in 2013 or 2014 on Humanarchy, of course, but Tom Secker (the owner) took it offline, I think prompted by his Marxist handlers.

Not so. Knowing is by definition meaningful. Means imply a transition from one state to another. Fundamentally meaning therefore requires a pre-meaningful state from which to create meaning in the form of a different state to what was started with. Such a state that precedes the meaningulness of knowing must therefore be immediate and unavoidable. Both meaning and knowledge must first of all have the property of existence, therefore existence precedes meaning and knowledge. The immediate and undeniable state of existence is experience (Continuous Experience). So logically there must exist an immediate and unavoidable state to found everything that subsequently follows, making experience both directly undeniable, empirically speaking pre-knowledge, and necessarily existent logically speaking post-knowledge. You can derive Continuous Experience post hoc, but it presents itself unavoidably ante hoc regardless, so deriving Continuous Experience indirectly from discrete experience can be done (as I am doing here) but it is not reliant on doing so due to its direct confrontation as existence.

It is appearance, reportedly in the same type of way (if not with exactly the same content) for everyone, and so anything beyond that is what results from such an appearance - including and not limited to conceptions of gaps in experience that are not experienced. They all unavoidably boil down to that same origin in experience with no apparent gaps.

This is a non sequitur, as you're using the term "gap" both as positive and as negative.

If I'm understanding this criticism, gaps are only negative: the "existence" of a gap is literally a contradiction in terms, which is why there are no gaps - logical contradictions don't exist. This is why experience is fundamentally continuous, because it is free from logical contradictions like gaps.

No."Experience" is irreducible (except to its singular quality which is valuing) but the argument for its continuousness is, as I see it, merely syntactic, which does not amount to a foundational idea in my book.

But we can agree to disagree here, at least you're actually invested in your idea, and it isn't hollow semantics.

Of course it isn't hollow semantics. There's a reason why it resolves so many formerly paradoxical philosophical dilemmas.

Yes, experience is irreducible - that's why I'm proposing it as the fundmental substance. Valuing is what you do to "make" it into something in terms of discrete experience. This is why I've always rejected VO as fundamental, however much sense it makes to propose valuation as "relatively" fundamental. Value has to apply to something, just the same as logic - indeed we did have this discussion in 2013 or 2014 on Humanarchy. How can you "like or dislike" without something against which to apply said like or dislike? How can you logically reason without anything to logically reason with? There needs to be something first, before you can value it, or refer to it as "a value". You can only isolate a thing as a value after there's a something to isolate from. Experience happens first, valuation and logic happens to that. How can you know what you value first before it exists? You'll remember, hopefully, my criticism of VO that existence precedes value because value has to first of all exist, else it's fundamentally non-existent. Experience is the concrete form of existence in the abstract - I'm posing them as the same thing. Value isn't existence, value is of or about existence.

[Karpel Tunnel]

Yes I have read the thread and thank you. But my question was whether these people actually, in reality, believe what they are saying.

I am pretty sure Faust believes that 'universal truth' is incoherent - though I may be biased since I tend to agree -, iambiguous believes that it means what he defined it to me, since this matches his previous explanations of the difference beween is and ought assertions and is a foundational idea in many of his posts; and I am quite sure Zero Sum believes what he is arguing though I don't think he is focused on the term itself, since nothing Faust has said means he thinks he can get away without breathing.

Too many threads on this board appear to be just a game of playing with words to stir things up. For example it is hard to believe that the Iambiguous character is at all ingenuous.

I've gone back and forth on that issue. But he seemed geniunedly rattled (which he often does not seem) when rebuffed earlier in the thread by Faust.

[Karpel Tunnel]

Right now all you're doing is reifying experience.

Continuous Experience is already real and concrete whether I want it to be or not - no conversion or "making" on my or anyone else's part is required.
Discrete experiences are what is "made" or converted from Continuous Experience - that's where the process of reification occurs: not in the existence of Continuous Experience before reification occurs, and to which reification must apply in order for reification to have a starting state (pre-reification) as well as a resulting state (post-reification).

So then chair, rock, cat
would be reifications? or?

This sounds like a kind of idealism. Not that I'm disagreeing. It's more parsimonius than realism.

[obsrvr524]

I am pretty sure Faust believes that 'universal truth' is incoherent - though I may be biased since I tend to agree -

Thank you again and you seem a level headed guy, so what is it about the term "universal truth" that seems "incoherent"?

I'm a believer in references so let me provide reasonably reputable source:

Universal definition is - including or covering all or a whole collectively or distributively without limit or exception; especially : available equitably to all members of a society.

Truth definition is - the body of real things, events, and facts : actuality

A "Universal Truth" would be a truth that applies to all places and all things.

A truth is considered to be universal if it is logically valid (logical) in and also beyond all times and places.

There doesn't seem to be anything incoherent about any of that so is the real question merely whether any such thing as a universal truth exists?

[Silhouette]

So then chair, rock, cat
would be reifications? or?

With no gaps in Continuous Experience, there are no fundamental grounds to separate what could otherwise be identified as e.g. chairs, rocks and cats from anything else - as such things are experientially continuous with one another.
But whilst all melds seemlessly into everything else, with some degree of smoothness in transition: the sharper the transition the more grounds there appear to be, generally speaking, to distinguish smooth transitions either side of a sharp transition from one another, as the beginning of a "discrete" experiences. These are the grounds behind reification based on, and as distinct from a unity fundamentally devoid of defined things like chairs, rocks and cats.

This sounds like a kind of idealism. Not that I'm disagreeing. It's more parsimonius than realism.

Experience transcends the "real", "ideas" and "matter" - all things that are derived from experience as more fundamental.
Experience is fundamentally neither matter, idea, real nor imaginary, but it can be subsequently dissected into each of these categories artificially - as described above.
All matter, idea, reality and the imaginary presuppose existence, which is a prerequisite in the abstract for all things. This same prerequisite in the concrete sense is experience.

[Karpel Tunnel]

With no gaps in Continuous Experience, there are no fundamental grounds to separate what could otherwise be identified as e.g. chairs, rocks and cats from anything else - as such things are experientially continuous with one another.
But whilst all melds seemlessly into everything else, with some degree of smoothness in transition: the sharper the transition the more grounds there appear to be, generally speaking, to distinguish smooth transitions either side of a sharp transition from one another, as the beginning of a "discrete" experiences. These are the grounds behind reification based on, and as distinct from a unity fundamentally devoid of defined things like chairs, rocks and cats.

Was that a yes?

Experience transcends the "real", "ideas" and "matter" - all things that are derived from experience as more fundamental.
Experience is fundamentally neither matter, idea, real nor imaginary, but it can be subsequently dissected into each of these categories artificially - as described above.
All matter, idea, reality and the imaginary presuppose existence, which is a prerequisite in the abstract for all things. This same prerequisite in the concrete sense is experience.

I suppose phenomenalism would have been a better suggestion.

[Silhouette]

With no gaps in Continuous Experience, there are no fundamental grounds to separate what could otherwise be identified as e.g. chairs, rocks and cats from anything else - as such things are experientially continuous with one another.
But whilst all melds seemlessly into everything else, with some degree of smoothness in transition: the sharper the transition the more grounds there appear to be, generally speaking, to distinguish smooth transitions either side of a sharp transition from one another, as the beginning of a "discrete" experiences. These are the grounds behind reification based on, and as distinct from a unity fundamentally devoid of defined things like chairs, rocks and cats.

Was that a yes?

Sure, in the context of what I just said.
Sorry for giving context if you just wanted a binary yes/no...

Experience transcends the "real", "ideas" and "matter" - all things that are derived from experience as more fundamental.
Experience is fundamentally neither matter, idea, real nor imaginary, but it can be subsequently dissected into each of these categories artificially - as described above.
All matter, idea, reality and the imaginary presuppose existence, which is a prerequisite in the abstract for all things. This same prerequisite in the concrete sense is experience.

I suppose phenomenalism would have been a better suggestion.

Phenomenalism is closer sure, but's it's more like pre-phenomenalism in its foundations.

[Fixed Cross]

Yes, experience is irreducible - that's why I'm proposing it as the fundmental substance. Valuing is what you do to "make" it into something in terms of discrete experience. This is why I've always rejected VO as fundamental, however much sense it makes to propose valuation as "relatively" fundamental. Value has to apply to something, just the same as logic - indeed we did have this discussion in 2013 or 2014 on Humanarchy. How can you "like or dislike" without something against which to apply said like or dislike? How can you logically reason without anything to logically reason with? There needs to be something first, before you can value it, or refer to it as "a value". You can only isolate a thing as a value after there's a something to isolate from. Experience happens first, valuation and logic happens to that. How can you know what you value first before it exists? You'll remember, hopefully, my criticism of VO that existence precedes value because value has to first of all exist, else it's fundamentally non-existent. Experience is the concrete form of existence in the abstract - I'm posing them as the same thing. Value isn't existence, value is of or about existence.

That has nothing to do with VO though.
VO posits the valuator as being.
And yes, we value before we actually make the encounter - we select, we make a sucking motion (valuing, selecting, anticipating) before the air (value) comes in.
Ive been explaining this on H and every single post Ive produced here on VO (many hundreds of posts) so you really, reallyreallyreally have not at all paid the slightest bit of attention.

I refer you again to the ancient post "summary of VO"
http://beforethelight.forumotion.com/t1 ... e-ontology

Gotta at least learn the very basic definition before you attempt to validate your theory in relation to it, let alone prove it superior to it.

You're nowhere near reaching as deep as you should be.

[Karpel Tunnel]

Sure, in the context of what I just said.
Sorry for giving context if you just wanted a binary yes/no...

More is good, and I was pretty sure it was a yes, but I wanted confirmation. The interesting thing for me is that I would have considered you more of a realist - in the philosophical sense, not in the hey, you are not so grounded as I thought. To consider physical objects reifications puts you on the fringe. Not complaining or disagreeing, but hence my double checking.

Phenomenalism is closer sure, but's it's more like pre-phenomenalism in its foundations.

I can see that. What people don't seem to realize is that when they tell you to hit yourself with a stick and say if you still think it is a reification, they are asking you to experience something, aim for a certain kind of experiencing. They've had that map so long they think it has to be the territory. And when they feel the stick hit them, they experience it via the map.

[Fixed Cross]

In order to be able to falsify your theory Silhouette (falsifiability is, as you know, required for philosophical concepts) Ive started an investigation into experience, which you haven't defined.
My insight here is that you have misunderstood the nature of experience, and was therefore able to extrapolate it (the lacking conception of it) to "continuous experience" which however defies the very properties of experience as we know it.

Here is the thread that I made yesterday, essentially to investigate Experientialism.
viewtopic.php?f=1&t=195347

[Fixed Cross]

What is BEHIND the universal truth?

the demiurg?

truths are spoken. A universal truth is something which is universally spoken.

So universal truth means consensus truth?
Then are there any universal truths? We have solipsists, schizophrenics, contrary people, other cultures, animists....

I think universal consensus is universal agreement, not universal proclamation.
But thats an excellent list.

I maintain, not from dictionaries but from pondering the meaning of the words myself using the ways it has been used historically, that the best way to understand the concept "truth" is as belonging to the realm of communications. A truth is a statement. "We consider these truths to be self-evident" "do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth" -
So if truth is a statement, a universal truth is a universal statement. And I don't know what that means. So I agree with Faust, even if I recognize that this isn't hard mathematics. You can simply claim, as most seem to be doing here, that "truth" means the same as "fact", but I wouldn't go along with that.

[Pedro I Rengel]

What is BEHIND the universal truth?

the demiurg?

truths are spoken. A universal truth is something which is universally spoken.

More likely someone that feels un-secured. Un-fastened. Up-rooted. Falling upwards. Grasping for anything sticking out to hold on to.

Truths are known. At the flimsiest, seen, discerned. They are courted and chased. Men lose much more than their lives in the attempt.

But I insist, let's look a little closer at social justice.

I really don't think it has been investigated thoroughly or at all.

[Pedro I Rengel]

Truth has a definite scent.

[Silhouette]

Ive been explaining this on H and every single post Ive produced here on VO (many hundreds of posts) so you really, reallyreallyreally have not at all paid the slightest bit of attention.

I refer you again to the ancient post "summary of VO"
http://beforethelight.forumotion.com/t1 ... e-ontology

Gotta at least learn the very basic definition before you attempt to validate your theory in relation to it, let alone prove it superior to it.

You're nowhere near reaching as deep as you should be.

Not gonna lie, I've never made that much of an effort to really get to the bottom of VO because I've never come across a compelling reason to do so - no offense.

I'll try to put the effort into having a peruse of your summary thread from your forum - it would be nice to be confronted with depths deeper than I'm used to.

In order to be able to falsify your theory Silhouette (falsifiability is, as you know, required for philosophical concepts) Ive started an investigation into experience, which you haven't defined.
My insight here is that you have misunderstood the nature of experience, and was therefore able to extrapolate it (the lacking conception of it) to "continuous experience" which however defies the very properties of experience as we know it.

Here is the thread that I made yesterday, essentially to investigate Experientialism.
viewtopic.php?f=1&t=195347

I responded to your thread. Hope it clears a few things up, but I'm pretty sure we already danced this dance years ago.

Falsifiability is very high on my list, of course. The thing about Falsification though is that it applies to concepts and conceptual models - knowledge: discrete experiences. Continuous Experience isn't knowledge, its unity defies knowledge due to what I was saying about "meaning" by definition being a bridge between a plural quantity of things. In the same way as existence, it's pre-knowledge: knowledge has to exist first and foremost, before anything else.
You'll find all the same difficulties in applying Falsification to "Existence" itself.

How do you falsify existence?
You can verify it simply in the attempt to verify or falsify it, as the action of doing so in itself is something that exists - so even a failure of Verification of Falisification of existence supports existence. "Therefore existence".
The same applies to the concrete form of the abstract concept of existence that is "experience". Trying to verify or falsify it is an experience in itself, so in the same way, either way: "therefore experience".

But falsifying existence?
To falsify existence, the possibility of non-existence is required to signify that existence is false. However, the existence of non-existence is a logical contradiction. Do we therefore conclude that existence doesn't exist because it's not Falsifiable? Of course not, as existence not existing is too a logical contradiction.
The same too goes for experience. How do you experience non-experience so as to assess any potential falsity? The same logical contradiction makes experience "unavoidable" - as I was describing it before: pre-knowledge. Falsificationism requires knowledge (of discrete experiences), and so it's necessary to consider the limits of Falsificationism as not a be-all and end-all of truth. After all, Falsificationism itself is infamously unfalsifiable! But nevertheless, it's a requirement for all else, hence being so "high on my list".

The same goes for definition: definition is knowledge and by derivation it presupposes bounds and limits. What are the limits of existence? What's outside of existence to be on the other side of the bounds of existence? Nothing? Well then there is no boundary to existence and therefore no definition. Attempted definitions of existence are all tautologous, synonymous, or they comprise of things contained within existence. Definition cannot be in its own terms or in terms that are less than it: you can't bound something with something that's within its own bounds/less than itself. The same goes for Continuous Experience, which is just the concrete form of abstract existence. You don't chuck it out just because it defies definition anymore than you do if it defies Falsificationism - so long as there's a logical reason to keep it - as there necessarily is so for both existence and experience: they logically have to exist.

More is good, and I was pretty sure it was a yes, but I wanted confirmation. The interesting thing for me is that I would have considered you more of a realist - in the philosophical sense, not in the hey, you are not so grounded as I thought. To consider physical objects reifications puts you on the fringe. Not complaining or disagreeing, but hence my double checking.

Me being grounded Yes, I'm on the fringe, philosophically, economically, musically, with regard to religion - everything really. You can't push the boundaries if you're not at the boundaries.
Question away & thanks for taking an interest.

Phenomenalism is closer sure, but's it's more like pre-phenomenalism in its foundations.

I can see that. What people don't seem to realize is that when they tell you to hit yourself with a stick and say if you still think it is a reification, they are asking you to experience something, aim for a certain kind of experiencing. They've had that map so long they think it has to be the territory. And when they feel the stick hit them, they experience it via the map.

Yes, the more correct question is whether you think the stick hitting you was an experience - and of course it was, just like everything else, necessarily.

[iambiguous]

There is no fight with iambiguous.

There is only the fight,

Within one's self.

To the extent others here do construe an exchange with me as a "fight", I am more than willing to concede that my point of view is no less an existential contraption. I'm not arguing that my understanding of "universal truth" is the right one. I'm suggesting only that however it is understood by others [conceptually, by definition, in a world of words] it needs to be explored contextually out in the world of human interactions.

Out in the world that we live and interact in, there seem to be things and relationships able to be demonstrated as true for all of us. While other things are believed to be true by us in our heads but are less able to be demonstrated to others.

On this thread, others will either take the "statements" they make regarding "universal truth" and ground them in particular sets of circumstances or they won't.

As for the fight with our selves, that is no less embedded, situated. Either in a world of words or in an actual existential context. What can we say regarding those things we think, feel, say or do? And, then, what can we in fact establish as true such that all rational men and women are going to share our assessment?

[Pedro I Rengel]

It's not whether:

To the extent others here do construe an exchange with me as a "fight", I am more than willing to concede that my point of view is no less an existential contraption. I'm not arguing that my understanding of "universal truth" is the right one. I'm suggesting only that however it is understood by others [conceptually, by definition, in a world of words] it needs to be explored contextually out in the world of human interactions.

Out in the world that we live and interact in, there seem to be things and relationships able to be demonstrated as true for all of us. While other things are believed to be true by us in our heads but are less able to be demonstrated to others.

On this thread, others will either take the "statements" they make regarding "universal truth" and ground them in particular sets of circumstances or they won't.

As for the fight with our selves, that is no less embedded, situated. Either in a world of words or in an actual existential context. What can we say regarding those things we think, feel, say or do? And, then, what can we in fact establish as true such that all rational men and women are going to share our assessment?

It's whether you want me to tell you the story of the bald chicken?

[Ecmandu]

Iambiguous,

I'm not sure how many times I have to repeat this before it sticks and/or you reply...

If any beings consent is being violated, anywhere in existence, we can objectively state that existence is 'evil'.

We know people's consent is currently being violated in existence; we know existence is currently evil.

The question then becomes, "will existence always be consent violating?"

If we can prove that existence will always be consent violating, we can objectively assess that existence is not only conditionally 'evil', but rather inherently and irreconcilably 'evil'.

That would be an objective universal truth, but even further, a moral/ ethical objective universal truth.

There are ways to objectivly analyze these types of questions.

If it necessarily is the case that existence violates consent in perpetuity, then ethics solves as this: violate as much consent as you possibly can for the best life.

[iambiguous]

Note to others...

If you think you understand what he means here as it relates to the relationship between describing what some construe to be universal truths in regard to human interactions in conflict over value judgments, statements about them, and how to differentiate them technically, please provide your own context in which his "philosophical concepts" might be expressed as meaningful given the part that most interest me: actually reconciling or resolving these conflicting goods down here on the ground.

Straw men are used to avoid having to engage in conflict, if that answers your question.

No, as a matter of fact, it doesn't even come close. More to the point, that you are actually able to think yourself into believing that it does?!

From my frame of mind, you come at me with things like this:

They are often preemptively fabricated to distract from problematic experience but often enough spontaneous misapprehension of the case at hand.

How is this not just intellectual gibberish? What does it denote regarding the points I raise above pertaining to "the relationship between describing what some construe to be universal truths in regard to human interactions in conflict over value judgments, statements about them, and how to differentiate them technically..."

Choose a context and we can exchange our current understanding of "objective truth" and "universal truth". Then in that actual substantive exchange if a straw man pops up you can pounce on him. Expose to everyone here exactly what you mean by the accusation itself.

Or, instead, are observations of this sort all just tongue in cheek?

Also, how do you suppose astrology fits into all of this? If that's an appropriate point to being up.

Right now the Sun is on the last degree of Scorpio. I don't know what you are asking.

Well, why don't we start with what you construe to be the most epistemologically sound statement that can be made about "universal truth"; and then the most epistemologically sound statement that can be made about astrology.

And then bring both statements out into the world and, contextually, examine their relevance relating to that which is of most interest to me here: the nature of truth in regard to conflicting goods as the embodiment of daseins intertwined in any particular political economy out in a particular world.

[iambiguous]

It's whether you want me to tell you the story of the bald chicken?

Sure, Kid, go ahead, why not.

[iambiguous]

Iambiguous,

I'm not sure how many times I have to repeat this before it sticks and/or you reply...

I consent to you repeating it 3.14159265359 more times. Then, after consulting with Max Cohen and Darren Aronofsky, we'll see.

[Ecmandu]

Iambiguous,

I'm not sure how many times I have to repeat this before it sticks and/or you reply...

I consent to you repeating it 3.14159265359 more times. Then, after consulting with Max Cohen and Darren Aronofsky, we'll see.

Note to others:

That's the best you can do? Trying to mock me for word salad? I can assure you, my reply to your posting history is clear and sane.