The logical analysis was valid, regardless of grammer.

You know precisely what we are talking about I hope, right?

We are talking about pink smooge, but don't ask me to define it, its everything and nothing, its what made nothing everything.

You know its not the grammer that prevents us from having a proper conversation about pink smooge, your no idiot . . .

Its clear you want to shuffle off the pink smooge and not think abut the pink smooge, or at least not clearly, it far easier to hum about the pink smooge when in the shower and not really look it in the eye when facing it, trust me I know.

Look, either you care about the conversation and the act of communicating or you do not, and this is the last time I am going to ask nicely for you to clean the grill off

I rather suspect at your house the grill stays nice and clean, but no the public grill is a nasty mess!

Communication, its worth the effort.
Language was developed to facilitate communication.
Effort must be expended by both parties to communicate.
If one party unduly places a burden on the conversation by using language in a unique way, it would be impolite to do so without agreement and perhaps the person introducing the new language should step up.

Lets apply this concept to other aspects of life.

Community grill.

We all use the community grill.
In this community we have agreed grilling is good, and worth the effort.
Well here I am a griller who was taught by my dear ole grilling mom to make sure and clean up the grill when im done so that the next person doesn't have to do part of my job.

I seriously hope you fellas are keeping up . . .

Defining unique words/unique usage, the crud on the grill, The burden of proof, its all the same if you are going to go to the effort of the task at hand, communication, grilling, determining truth, you should step up to the task and not place the burden on others. We each have to step up, you can continue to pretend your doing your part, but I think we all know whats going on here.

If your answer is seriously, a) I am not interested in communicating, b) I am not interested in grilling, or c) I am not really interested in truth, then please ignore this message from your friendly neighborhood reality checker.

A lot of this is confusing because the nature of when a belief is held, how that belief came to be and the line between doubt and belief is naturally subjective and perhaps for any given idea not well established in the mind of the potential believer.

Some people will have a methodology on how and when they construct beliefs, some people are completely emotional and rely solely on feelings on how they construct beliefs, most people fall somewhere in between.

If I state that a belief is a concept with positive characteristics, and we can all agree on that, then we can know what it is by defining the characteristics.

Lets use some examples.

I believe that my chair will support my weight. Perhaps I have come to this belief empirically, through testing or observation of its weight bearing characteristics, perhaps it will be the communication of a trusted authority, my brother told me its a nice sturdy chair, or perhaps its pure emotion, I have a fond attachment for Victorian straight backed chairs(no I really do not)and believe they are always sturdy.

Regardless of how I have come to trust that this chair will support my weight, the belief itself is an idea that I hold to be true.

So I hold that beliefs are ideas we hold true.

But we must distinguish between "I believe that", and "I believe in" statements.

I believe in giving to charity.
I believe that giving to charity is good.
I believe that giving to charity is my responsibility.
I believe that many of the poor are not to blame for there situation.

Usually believe in statements hold several believe that statements hidden within them.

Anytime you hear a believe in statement, try to think of the actual things within that statement that you "believe that".

So if someone says I believe in spirit. What you do believe that spirit does? What do you believe that spirit is made of? What you do believe that the purpose of spirit is?

I believe in god. What do you believe that god does? What do you believe that god is? What do you believe that happens to you when you die?

I would appreciate it is everyone could break down the believe in statements to the believe that components, then we can really dig into what people believe is happening, taking place, or what actually is. This also helps the individual understand more about what they actually believe.

How true . . . they always think they know what they are talking about dont they . . .

Which is not the topic, and has not been claimed.

The topic is about who should have to foot the effort, those who use words in a unique way, or those that use the words in the common way?

Even today, the mathematicians still hold out that mathematics should be based on a continuum. Even thought Zeno had proven that to be a false notion 2500 years ago, and Modern Science has empirically verified it.

So maybe there should be a 'burden of accepting proof' considered somewhere in all of this. Zeno proved his point. But no one accepted his proof.

Where's the burden of accepting what's been proven?

That's an interesting twist of vantage points isn't it?

DO YOU LIVE 4 GOD OR YOUR SELF

agreed on or not, facts are only what we experience ourselves. so yes, if it happens to me it's a fact regardless of whether anybody agrees that it happened to me.

agreed on or not, facts are only what we experience ourselves. so yes, if it happens to me it's a fact regardless of whether anybody agrees that it happened to me.

When terms are being used in a way which does not support the most commonly used definitions, should the one using the term in an uncommon way provide an valid argument for the acceptance of his/her uncommon use of that term?

Who here could or would argue with the use of the term ice cream?

Why is any other term treated any differently?

If I were to use the term ice cream in a way which contradicted the known definitions and/or common uses, would I not be responsible for giving a valid argument for another to accept that use?

Some people claim that they love philosophy but they are not interested in politics . I just wonder how they can arrive to this conclusion . Philosophy is the search fro the truth by means of logic . Since politics is full of lies, deception and manipulation how can one be not interested in seeking the truth there as well ?.

I see what you mean and I think you're beginning to touch on what I am thinking, however, the focus still seems to be upon the objective measures necessarily for discussing meaning. I think that the idea of meaning being subjective need not be mentioned, as it is a given really. All attempts to discuss it are necessarily objective as well, so that also needs no further attention.

I do not think that the topic can be fully expressed in cause and effect terms. Those attempts would either require knowing what the causes actually are or be sidetracked into figuring them out, and therefore lose the focus. I think that there can be an overview of sorts given which encompass all possible cases.

Sky wrote:I am inclined to agree Sky. That being said, words have a different kind of meaning than say a symbol such as a flag. That is kind the direction I wanted to pursue. I would like to establish what it is that constitutes/develops meaning within an individual and perhaps how that is done.

I would say that the conversation needs to be focused upon what a fact actually is.

It is a fact that the earth revolves around the sun.

The above statement is true.

The earth revolved around the sun before we knew it did.

The above statement is true.

Given the above, how could one possibly conclude that the we determine what is a fact through agreement? I think it is much more accurate to conclude that we learn of facts through knowledge. The designation of the label fact when bestowed upon that set of physical relations does not create it's truth value, in and of itself. It only does so in the sentences which decribe this.

There is no denying the subjective personal involvement required in all of our understanding, yet I find it to be self-sourced or perhaps a little disingenious to attribute the very existence of things which have been realized to exist - in and of themselves - to our subjective nature, just because of that nature.

Our subjective nature cannot be denied.

That does not mean everything else in the universe depends upon that for it's existence. Our ideas do not constitute the makings of the universe as it is - in and of itself.

You have to agree on a definition for the word fact first.