Philosophy undermines truth

[seeds]

The first three are empirical...

Well yeah, but there are differences:
1. Do bricks fall down wells?
Yes they do; it's a bare fact.

Are you sure about that?

Isn't that one of those "relativity" issues?

I mean, when viewing the earth from this higher perspective,...



...if a well is situated on the top of the sphere, then yes, bricks appear to be falling downward.

However, if a well is situated on the bottom of the sphere, then bricks are literally being drawn (pulled) upward...

...(or sideways if wells are on the sides of the sphere).

Sorry if this is taking the conversation off on a tangent, but I've always wanted to do a video where I am simultaneously dropping a bowling ball and a ping-pong ball to show how they both hit the floor at the same time, except, in this case, the video image would be upside-down.

And the point is that the upside-down video would make it seem as though gravity was "lifting" the bowling ball and the ping-pong ball from my hands and pulling them to the "ceiling"...

...(which is pretty much the truth of what is actually taking place everywhere on the planet when the experiment is viewed from the outer space perspective).

And that (to me, anyway) would seem to give a better visual demonstration of how gravity really works (as opposed to the "falling" scenario).

What I am attempting to demonstrate with the upside-down video is that because the inertial mass of the bowling ball (i.e., its resistance to movement) is much greater than the inertial mass of the ping-pong ball, it is therefore more difficult for gravity to "lift" the bowling ball than it is to "lift" the lesser mass of the ping-pong ball.

However, it is because the ping-pong ball has less mass, then there is less substance for gravity to grab hold of, so to speak, compared to the greater amount of substance comprising the bowling ball.

And that, in turn, creates a situation where gravity (in some converse/inverse, yet equalizing way) has just as hard a time in moving the ping-pong ball through space as it does in moving the more massive bowling ball.

All of which the wizards of math and physics have sorted out and provided us with proven mathematical principles for why the movement of the b-ball and the pp-ball balance out and thus hit the "ceiling" at the same time.

Anyway, I just wanted to point out that your assertion that it's a "bare fact" that bricks "fall" down wells might need a second look.

(Btw, u̶w̶o̶t̶ Will, it's good to have you back from your lengthy hiatus.)
_______

[Will Bouwman]

IF thinking THEN am ELSE am not.

I reject that logic on the grounds that it is bollocks.

It's quite strange that you chose to introduce somebody you disagree with, no?

Not really. I have never met, nor read any person with whom I have agreed about everything.

[Will Bouwman]

Anyway, I just wanted to point out that your assertion that it's a "bare fact" that bricks "fall" down wells might need a second look.

Well yeah, it all depends on your point of view.

(Btw, u̶w̶o̶t̶ Will, it's good to have you back from your lengthy hiatus.)

Good to hear from you too.

[bahman]

How don't you know this?

Think of an elephant. It's now true that you are thinking of an elephant. Where's the fact that you are thinking of an elephant?

You don't need a fact for what you are thinking.

Great! So you agree - it's true that you are thinking of an elephant but you can't prove it to me.

What this has to do with the fact that cannot be proved by another fact?

[Iwannaplato]

It took a long time to get to the math and insights that even brought the concept of space time, the way Einstein thought of it, into anyone's head.

The mathematical concept of spacetime was given to Einstein by his teacher Hermann Minkowski.

First, so? Instead of saying 'Oh, ok, I see what you meantor whatever, this seems irrelevant. We'd had bricks and wells a long time before M was born, But, I do think the real appearance of gravity as curved spacetime arose in Einstein's mind first, not that it matters in context.

Though Minkowski took an important step for physics, Albert Einstein saw its limitation:
At a time when Minkowski was giving the geometrical interpretation of special relativity by extending the Euclidean three-space to a quasi-Euclidean four-space that included time, Einstein was already aware that this is not valid, because it excludes the phenomenon of gravitation. He was still far from the study of curvilinear coordinates and Riemannian geometry, and the heavy mathematical apparatus entailed

Long story short, we are some way off confirming whether spacetime is a substance.

Whatever the bolded means. It will likely means something different from what the presocratics meant when they were competing to label the base substance.

Here's something I wrote in another article for Philosophy Now:
As was becoming clearer to the Greek philosophers, not only were gods a matter of taste and circumstances, their metaphysical, protoscientific hypotheses were subject to how the evidence – the appearance and behaviour of the world – was interpreted.
This point was taken up by Anaximander (c.610-c.546 BC), another student of Thales’. Rather than quibble about which element was primordial, he suggested instead that the different elements were all states of some underlying stuff that he called the apeiron, which means ‘the boundless’ or ‘the undefined’. This otherwise-undefined stuff was a smooth mixture of opposites, hot and cold, wet and dry. This is clearly a volatile mixture, and at some point it started to curdle, separating into the familiar Greek elements, earth, water, air and fire.
There is only one piece of the written work of Anaximander that survives. It is the oldest quote attributed to a philosopher in the Western tradition:
“Whence things have their origin,
Thence also their destruction happens,
As is the order of things;
For they execute the sentence upon one another
–The condemnation for the crime –
In conformity with the ordinance of Time.”
It is difficult to tell from a few lines of poetry how Anaximander’s system worked in any detail, but the core seems to be that, depending on its blend of competing properties – hot and cold, wet and dry – the apeiron could become anything. The different ways these contrarieties – hot, cold, wet and dry – were mixed defined an element: fire is hot and dry; air is hot and wet (think steam); water is cold and wet; leaving earth cold and dry. This idea was taken up by Aristotle, who says in On Generation and Corruption: “Our own doctrine is that although there is a matter of the perceptible bodies (a matter out of which the so-called ‘elements’ come-to-be), it has no separate existence, but is always bound up with a contrariety.”
https://philosophynow.org/issues/104/Ph ... d_Branches
Bit long winded perhaps. The point is that the ancient Greeks were familiar with the idea that the stuff the universe is made of may be reducible to measurable qualities, albeit heat and humidity rather than modern concepts of mass and energy.

It's not clear to me at all that Anax. is making a claim about substance, as it seems like physicalists are doing in contrasting themselves with other substance claimers. I can see how he's closer to what modern qm, at least at a metaphorical level, is saying about the ground of reality. Neither one of them, it seems to me, is making a general claim about substance. It's this, not that, kind of claims. 'Boundless' 'infinite' or as one online describer says...

And so Anaximander appeals to what is known as the Apeiron, an unobserved substance (substance being a rather generous description for it) that has no limits placed upon it

My point around physicalism is that it seems like a particular claim about substance, and a category which has criteria that exclude and include. But these criteria are not fixed. It is an amoebic category, swallowing more and more, when convenient. Whatever is decided to be real gets put in the category 'real' is then called physical. To me that's not a substance but rather a clinging to a category due to an old battle with other -isms.

The physical is actually a set of conclusions about what is real. And a la Feyerabend we can't even call that category a set of things concluded following a specific methodology, nor can we even limit it to several methodologies, given that new ones may arise.

Which is why I took issue with what seemed like a claim that we can put certain things in box 'impossible' to ever know and other things in the 'possible' boxes. Impossible seems like saying never. And then also the four category schema.

I mention people with different experiences because there are things, like rogue waves for a now fairly non-controversial example - where some people were rational to believe in something they could not demonstrate to the expert community (who also at the time were rational to be skeptical, though perhaps not fully rational in how they dismissed given their experiences. We don't know what else falls into that category, I think.

Absolutely. Never say never.

OK, great. Perhaps good to end on a note of agreement. I'll leave it here.

[Age]

The first three are empirical...

Well yeah, but there are differences:
1. Do bricks fall down wells?
Yes they do; it's a bare fact.

Are you sure about that?

Isn't that one of those "relativity" issues?

I mean, when viewing the earth from this higher perspective,...



...if a well is situated on the top of the sphere, then yes, bricks appear to be falling downward.

There IS NO 'up' NOR 'down' from the ACTUAL IRREFUTABLE True perspective of 'things'.

Once 'you', adult human beings, LEARN HOW TO FIND and SEE the ACTUAL Truth of 'things', then 'things' like 'this' BECOME MUCH CLEARER, and even CRYSTAL CLEAR.

However, if a well is situated on the bottom of the sphere, then bricks are literally being drawn (pulled) upward...

LOL
LOL
LOL

'Literally being drawn upwards'.

...(or sideways if wells are on the sides of the sphere).

Sorry if this is taking the conversation off on a tangent, but I've always wanted to do a video where I am simultaneously dropping a bowling ball and a ping-pong ball to show how they both hit the floor at the same time, except, in this case, the video image would be upside-down.

Even in so-called 'science', back in the days when this was being written, it was CLAIMED that objects fall at the SAME speed, which the absolute ABSURDITY and STUPIDITY OF speaks for itself.

And the point is that the upside-down video would make it seem as though gravity was "lifting" the bowling ball and the ping-pong ball from my hands and pulling them to the "ceiling"...

NOT necessarily so AT ALL.

And, from my perspective it NEVER would.

...(which is pretty much the truth of what is actually taking place everywhere on the planet when the experiment is viewed from the outer space perspective).

LOL

Are you sure about that?

And that (to me, anyway) would seem to give a better visual demonstration of how gravity really works (as opposed to the "falling" scenario).

These people actually spoke as though 'gravity' and how 'it' works was some 'thing' NOT VERY EASILY and VERY SIMPLY UNDERSTOOD, YET.

What I am attempting to demonstrate with the upside-down video is that because the inertial mass of the bowling ball (i.e., its resistance to movement) is much greater than the inertial mass of the ping-pong ball, it is therefore more difficult for gravity to "lift" the bowling ball than it is to "lift" the lesser mass of the ping-pong ball.

WHY?

However, it is because the ping-pong ball has less mass, then there is less substance for gravity to grab hold of, so to speak, compared to the greater amount of substance comprising the bowling ball.

And that, in turn, creates a situation where gravity (in some converse/inverse, yet equalizing way) has just as hard a time in moving the ping-pong ball through space as it does in moving the more massive bowling ball.

BUT there WAS and IS ABSOLUTELY NOTHING 'hard' AT ALL here

All of which the wizards of math and physics have sorted out and provided us with proven mathematical principles for why the movement of the b-ball and the pp-ball balance out and thus hit the "ceiling" at the same time.

Anyway, I just wanted to point out that your assertion that it's a "bare fact" that bricks "fall" down wells might need a second look.

(Btw, u̶w̶o̶t̶ Will, it's good to have you back from your lengthy hiatus.)
_______

I will just POINT OUT that what you CLAIM here, and in some other places, DOES NEED a second look, AS WELL.

[Skepdick]

IF thinking THEN am ELSE am not.

I reject that logic on the grounds that it is bollocks.

Well if you don't like the logic, then focus on the English.

"I thnk therefore I am." Is only half the story.
The other half is "I don't think therefore ...""?

Not really. I have never met, nor read any person with whom I have agreed about everything.

Nevermind everything - you didn't even agree with the very quote you chose.

[Will Bouwman]

IF thinking THEN am ELSE am not.

I reject that logic on the grounds that it is bollocks.

Well if you don't like the logic, then focus on the English.

"I thnk therefore I am." Is only half the story.
The other half is "I don't think therefore ...""?

I reject that English on the grounds that it is bollocks. You are flogging a dead horse, Skepdick. Thanks to Flannel Jesus for reminding me of this:

Looks like a pretty explicit basic logical fallacy to me

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denying ... %20not%20Q.

Not really. I have never met, nor read any person with whom I have agreed about everything.

Nevermind everything - you didn't even agree with the very quote you chose.

It's a tool, Skepdick; not the sharpest but it can be honed.

[Skepdick]

I reject that logic on the grounds that it is bollocks.

Well if you don't like the logic, then focus on the English.

"I thnk therefore I am." Is only half the story.
The other half is "I don't think therefore ...""?

I reject that English on the grounds that it is bollocks.

I reject your rejection on the exact same grounds.

You are flogging a dead horse, Skepdick. Thanks to Flannel Jesus for reminding me of this:

Looks like a pretty explicit basic logical fallacy to me

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denying ... %20not%20Q.

Indeed! You don't even logic; or English. Congratulations.

This is denying the antecedent

If I think THEREFORE I am ( P → Q)
If I don't think THEREFORE I am not ( ⌐P → ⌐Q)

This is NOT denying the antecedent. This is affirming the consequent.

If I think THEREFORE I am (P → Q)
If I don't think THEREFORE I am ( ⌐P → Q)

Said simply: I am if I think; and I am if I don't.

Can you tell the difference or is this too higher grade for a philosopher?

It's a tool, Skepdick; not the sharpest but it can be honed.

How are you honing a tool you disagree with?

[Skepdick]

Looks like a pretty explicit basic logical fallacy to me

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denying ... %20not%20Q.

Lets explain it to the idiot.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Material_ ... inference)

P → Q ↔ ¬P ∨ Q

In English: "Think therefore am" is materially equivalent to "It's true that I don't think OR it's true that I am."

But this formula is satisfiable by Q=true (I am) irrespective the value of P (thinking)

Which is... THE FUCKING POINT.

[Flannel Jesus]

Thanks to Flannel Jesus for reminding me of this:

Looks like a pretty explicit basic logical fallacy to me

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denying ... %20not%20Q.

You're welcome. I've got the guy blocked but I still hope he can learn why that's a fallacy and internalise it.

[Skepdick]

Thanks to Flannel Jesus for reminding me of this:

Looks like a pretty explicit basic logical fallacy to me

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denying ... %20not%20Q.

You're welcome. I've got the guy blocked but I still hope he can learn why that's a fallacy and internalise it.

To believe yourself the teaacher when you are the student is the epitome of stupidity.

Bonus points for blocking the guy who shows you your own misunderstanding.

[Iwannaplato]

So, here we all are participating in some form of the possible activities under philosophy. Are we all undermining truth?
And if someone answers this question correctly, does this mean their response is undermining truth?

[Skepdick]

So, here we all are participating in some form of the possible activities under philosophy.

No we aren't. You might be. I am not.

I reject philosophy and I refuse to practice it. Why is this premise so difficult to grasp for philosophers?

If you are going to keep claiming that I am doing philosophy - take up the burden of proof and convince me.

[Gary Childress]

And you don't seem to care one bit how you brush up against others. Fucking psychopathy at its finest! Grow a fucking conscience or get the fuck away from me, asshole!!

Is there ANY 'psychopathy' in this response of 'yours' here, "gary childress"?

I apologize, Age. Yes. There was psychopathy in my response. It seems to drive me crazy when I see someone on a forum making sweeping generalizations like "you adult humans..." as though s/he's blaming everyone but her/himself for the way the world is--literally saying "if it weren't for you all, life would be wonderful for me right now". And when someone posts something like "in the days when this was written..." as though that person refuses to make the more rational step of directly addressing the person(s) present (perhaps thinking s/he is tarnishing his or her interlocutor(s) posthumously to a future audience), then that drives me crazy too. It doesn't seem very fair toward one's interlocutors to me, rather underhanded in some way (or perhaps 'passive/aggressive' would be the right term). However, I suppose I just need to accept those things when they manifest themselves in others. Maybe you have your reasons. What do I know?

¯\_(ツ)_/¯