1. Descriptions are constructs.

So what? What does that mean to YOU?

What's wrong with a description being a construct?

This doesn't violate my position in the least.

2. Descriptions are ideas.

Ok, that was a sloppy wording on my part because I didn't expect a robot to be trying to attack me! Descriptions are how we CONVEY our ideas.

Happy now???

3. Truth is a description.

No, that's not what I said. And based on the context of everything that I have been saying it is truly facetious of you to even suggest this.

I was actually ASKING YOU to give me an example of a truth that is not the assessment of a description of a state of affairs.

Show me a "truth" that is not associated with a description of a state of affairs?

You can't do it! And you haven't done it yet!

4. Truth is an assessment of a description.

Yes, now that is what I said!

5. Truth is a correct correspondence between a description and a state of affairs.

That's RIGHT! That is the assessment that is being made of the description.

So 4 and 5 are saying the same thing!

7. Truth is the act of asigning truth value to a description of a state of affairs.

Exactly. That's precisely what is being done when the assessment has been made.

These are all part of the SAME PROCESS. Just trying to explain them in different ways in the hope that you might better understand them. But instead you use this as a means of trying to belittle the view.



No you're totally wrong. Even as hard as you have tried to muddle this up it has survived your ax.

C1. Truth is a construct.(from 1,3)

YES! TRUTH is a construct!

It is constructed by first obtaining a description of a state of affairs and then evaluating that description to determine as best we can if it corresponds to a correct description of the state of affairs in question

SO YES! Truth is indeed a human CONSTRUCT!

There is no doubt about that in my mind.

It's a human idea, a human ideal, a human invention.

C2. Truth is an idea.(from 2,3)

Yes it is! It a human idea concerning the assessment of descriptions to see whether or not they correctly correspond to states of affairs.

That's precisely what it is!

I don't deny that at all.

C3. Truth is an assessment of itself.(from 3,4)

NO, because remember that you got #3 wrong above!

Truth is an assessment of how well a description describes a state of affairs.

There is nothing circular about this. It's perfectly comprehensible and meaningful.

I don't understand why you are having such difficulty understanding this unless you have a mental block against even trying to understand what I am saying.

C4. Truth is a correct correspondence between itself and a state of affairs.(from 3,5)

No! Remember you got #3 wrong!

Truth is the status that we assign to a description that we believe to have ascertained to correctly correspond to a given state of affairs.

This is perfectly in line with what I'm saying.

C5. Truth is the act of assigning the value of itself to itself.(from 3,7)

Remember you got #3 WRONG!

What we CONSTRUCT as "TRUTH" is accomplished by assigning a truth value to a description when we have determined that this description correctly describes the given state of affairs.

That precisely how we CONSTRUCT our "truths"

Whether these "truths" actually DO correspond correctly to the state of affairs is a whole other question!

None-the-less this is the process that humans use to determine whether something is considered to be "True" or not.

~~~~~

I will be the first one to confess that this process is imperfect by far!

None the less, it is what it is.

This is how it's done Micheal.

~~~~

There is nothing wrong with my presentation. It's perfectly logically correct.

1. It defines the whole process in a meaningful comprehensible way without any ambiguity or contradictions whatsoever.

2. It recognizes the failings and limitations of the process.

3. It doesn't claim that what humans call "truth" actually correctly matches 'fact/reality'.

4. It totally embraces human frailty and our inability to do any better, and it recognizes that what we call 'truth' may in fact be an incorrect description of reality.

5. It's the way it's done.

~~~~~

Like I say, if you want to discuss some lofty abstract philosophical notion of some hypothetical imagined "PERFECT ABSOLUTE TRUTH",...Then as far as I'm concerned you're talking about metaphorical UNICORNS, because no one has ever seen that kind of 'truth' nor can then ever know it nor even define it in a meaningful way.

Save for perhaps in the way of the Zen. Just EXPERIENCE life for what it is and call that "truth".

But then there can be no arguments about truth because truth becomes whatever each individual experiences. And that kind of truth would most certainly be entirely subjective.

~~~~~

But no Micheal, with all your kicking and screaming you haven't found a single solitary flaw in my presentation. My description of truth WORKS!

You may not like it, but it is a logically sound definition!

I kinda feel this one has petered out... for me anyway.

This is not what I was looking for, I heard it in the news years ago but this article is close, hinting at unknown laws of physics.

http://www.dailygalaxy.com/my_weblog/2010/10/image-of-the-day-mystery-supernova-does-it-hint-at-unknown-laws-of-physics.html

Space is still mysterious, wish I could find the nova I was talking about that I heard of.

My ideas do not contradict each other.

If you don't want me to take things so personally then instead of acting as if you have proven errors in my posts why don't you try being polite and just asking for clarification when you think there is contradictions?

You never ASK for anything. YOU ATTACK!!!! AND ACCUSE!!!!

How can I not take that personally?

I will gladly clarify any misunderstanding you might have because there are NO CONTRADICTIONS in my presentation.

If you think there are it was a misunderstanding.

And potentially my fault due to a typo or poor wording at times. I'll accept responsibility for that.

But there are no logical errors in my description of how humans determine their "truths".

I'm right on the money. This has been my life's WORK!

I wonder what direction he thinks it has?

He hasn't offered anything constructive concerning his ideas of 'truth' yet. He refuses to give a definition or even a mere example to illustrate what he means by "truth".

His 'direction' at this point appears to be to do nothing more than to PERSONALLY ATTACK my views in a vicious hope of trying to belittle and destroy them by proclaiming that they are logically flawed.

If that's the "direction" he's headed in then he's in for a rough ride because he's dead wrong on that accusation!

My description of 'truth' is logically consistent and sound.

He may not like the way I define truth, but it's still a logically sound description none-the-less.

Not worth it.

Well science if far from complete. I'm sure the scientist are really excited about having new information to work with.

I'm sure they aren't going to have to go back and rewrite all of physics. But they may get to make some exciting new modifications to existing theories.

I love this stuff!

This is what scientists live for.

I got three right.

So you have an OPINION?

Do you have anything to support it?

You haven't even given your definition for 'truth' yet.

How can you even speak about a concept of 'truth' when you haven't even offered a description of what you mean by the term?

Maybe by YOUR definition of 'truth' won't be determined by humans.

My definition of 'truth' most certainly is determined by humans.

Humans invented truth. It's a human idea. A human concept. And humans have even decided precisely what it means to establish it!

And that's that.

My definition of 'truth' is in total agreement with all of this.

~~~~~

Insofar as I am aware you don't even have a definition for 'truth'.

So how can you know that humans don't determine something that you can't even define?

No, you're just being facetious again!

Because technically there's really nothing wrong with that statement.

Once we have assigned a 'truth value' to a description we commonly refer to that description itself as being "a truth".

That may "technically" be incorrect for someone who wants to nit-pick to hell and back, but for all practical purposes it's a common way to refer to things.

By my definition "ALL TRUTHS" must ultimately be a description of a state of affairs in the END of the process.

Because that's precisely what the process is!

It's the process of a assigning a truth value to a description.

Once we do that, then it's common practice to refer to that description as a "truth".

"The earth orbits around the sun" is a "truth" so we say.

But everyone KNOWS what this actually MEANS.

It means that this particular description has passed the criteria that was required to assign it a truth value of TRUE.

~~~~~

So it is perfectly acceptable to refer to a description that has already passed through this process as itself being 'a truth'.

So my statement makes perfect sense.

To say, "Tell me of a truth that is not a description of a state of affairs."

Is equivalent to saying, "Tell me of a truth that is not a description of a state of affairs that has been recognized as being a correct description of that state of affairs."

I shouldn't NEED to type all of that out. It should be obvious based on my position of what constitutes truth.

It's the way we commonly speak.

You're just being extremely difficult and aggressive.

~~~~~

Where's your definition of truth?

As far as I can tell you have NO CLUE how to define 'truth'.

Yet you seem to have no problem at all screaming and attacking other people's definitions.

Can't you just offer YOUR OWN VIEWS on the topic instead of constantly ATTACKING everyone else's views?

1. Descriptions are concepts.
2. Descriptions are ideas.
3. Truth is a description.
4. Truth is an assessment of a description.
5. Truth is a correct correspondence between a description and reality.
7. Truth is the act.

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C1. Truth is a concept.(from 1,3)
C2. Truth is an idea.(from 2,3)
C3. Truth is an assessment of itself.(from 3,4)
C4. Truth is a correct correspondence between itself and a state of affairs.(from 3,5)
C5. Truth is the act of assigning the value of itself to itself.(from 3,7)



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Since it has been said that 3 is wrong, just for clarity's sake alone...











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And just for a little added insurance against future accusations.

Truth is correspondence to fact/reality.

Period.

Truth is not a description, it is what makes the descriptions true.

And there is absolutely nothing wrong with any of that.

I've already justified the use of that language and what is meant by it.

Again, you're just being facetious.

I'm trying to speak to you like as if you are a person.

You keep attacking me like as if you are a mindless robot.

And that's precisely the definition that I've been giving!

This is why we say that a description that corresponded to 'fact/reality' (the state of affairs) is "a truth".

Because it satisfies that very correspondence.

So that's precisely what my definition states.

Seems like you're finally getting it.

Now what's you're problem?

There is nothing wrong with any of that.

You're just being a facetious again.

All of that fits right in with my description of truth and the way that humans commonly communicate.

There is no contradictions or inconsistencies in any of that.

Now that you have finally fessed up the definition of truth we can talk about!

My first question to you would be this:

What correspondence?

Correspondence between what?

If truth is a correspondence to fact/reality then what is this fact/realitity being corresponded to?

~~~~~

I think I know.

It's being corresponded to a 'description'.

And if that correspondence is recognized to be correct, then we say that this correspondence is the 'truth' (just as you have defined it above!)

And from that we conclude that the description that has passed this test is a 'TRUE' description.

In other words, it represents the correct correspondence with fact/reality which you have just defined to be 'truth'!

And so therefore the description itself represents 'truth' because it represents a correct correspondence to fact/reality.

~~~~~

That's precisely the definition that I have been giving for the concept of 'truth' all along.'

How could you not see this?

That certainly does not match anything you've claimed thus far! 5. almost gets it right... almost - but not quite. I tell you what Abra, if you could forgive your mind for it's own illusory accusations of my being 'facetious, difficult, and insulting', then we would rid ourselves of the thin-skinned emotional knee-jerk reactions, and perhaps we could get to why it is that 5 almost obtains. That would allow us to altogether avoid discussing the absurdity of 7.

Whaddaya say?



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1. You're the one who is unable to abstract the concept of a description beyond the words that we use to communicate those ideas.
2. Apparently you are limiting a "description" to being language only... The descriptions themselves are the ideas!
3. Tell me of a truth that is not a description.
4. Truth is a subjective human assessment of a description of a state of affairs.
5. "TRUTH" is nothing more than a correct correspondence between a description and a state of affairs.
7. ...truth is the subjective act of assigning a truth value to a particular statement or description of a state of affairs.

I'd be more than happy to have a truce with you. But it's going to have to be a two-way street.

You're going to have to start consciously paying more attention to how you object to things.

Try hard to rephrase things. Instead of just jumping on things and proclaiming them to be utterly wrong, why not try just voicing your objections in a style that requests more clarity in a polite fashion?

I'll try to do the same for you.

So you seem to have a problem with my description of 'truth' as I have presented it.

That in and of itself is fine,

I have no problem with that at all.

Can you just point out how you would set things up differently?

We don't need to agree with each others views.

Just tell me how you would define it differently. That way maybe I can at least understand what you mean when you refer to 'truth'.

The point is to try to understand each others views. Not tear each other down.