Looking for Truth, a sure way out of Mormonism?

[_mfbukowski]

Like I said - cleverer than me. Like Bill Clinton is cleverer than me, perhaps.

But sometimes, when people try to get all clever about "what is truth" as MFB has ('I'm disagreeing with Plato - don't interrupt a conversation that is above your head"), I do sometimes consider alternative views. One of them is sheer bad faith, perhaps inadvertent:

Auditor: "Mr. MFB, your partner has transferred a large part of the business's fund to an offshore account by covert means."

MFB (picks up phone and dials partner) "The auditor says you have ripped me off. Have you? I want the truth now!"

Partner "Don't be so Platonic, MFB"

MFB: "Sorry, I see what you mean. Forget about it."

But perhaps in real life MFB does have a perfectly usable if philosophically vague concept of hard objective truth that serves him as well as it does the rest of us. If that is the case, what are we to make of all this oh-so-subtle word-juggling about truth when it comes to a religion that people solemnly and plainly proclaim they know to be true on F&T Sunday?

This is cute and would perhaps be telling if my concept of truth was my own as you are implying, when in fact I have lifted it virtually entirely from one of the, if not THE most important philosophers of the 20th Century, Wittgenstein.

If you don't believe me just google his name and look at his Philosophical Investigations.

If you want to talk about philosophical truth, you should learn something about it first.

[_Chap]

Like I said - cleverer than me. Like Bill Clinton is cleverer than me, perhaps.

But sometimes, when people try to get all clever about "what is truth" as MFB has ('I'm disagreeing with Plato - don't interrupt a conversation that is above your head"), I do sometimes consider alternative views. One of them is sheer bad faith, perhaps inadvertent:

Auditor: "Mr. MFB, your partner has transferred a large part of the business's fund to an offshore account by covert means."

MFB (picks up phone and dials partner) "The auditor says you have ripped me off. Have you? I want the truth now!"

Partner "Don't be so Platonic, MFB"

MFB: "Sorry, I see what you mean. Forget about it."

But perhaps in real life MFB does have a perfectly usable if philosophically vague concept of hard objective truth that serves him as well as it does the rest of us. If that is the case, what are we to make of all this oh-so-subtle word-juggling about truth when it comes to a religion that people solemnly and plainly proclaim they know to be true on F&T Sunday?

This is cute and would perhaps be telling if my concept of truth was my own as you are implying, when in fact I have lifted it virtually entirely from one of the, if not THE most important philosophers of the 20th Century, Wittgenstein.

If you don't believe me just google his name and look at his Philosophical Investigations.

If you want to talk about philosophical truth, you should learn something about it first.

No, I'd prefer it if you could just express yourself plainly and consistently here and now. This is a message board, no more. I go elsewhere if I want advice from professional philosophers about interesting reading.

You seem to be saying that you have a concept of truth that is in some way not your own, and that you are not willing to take responsibility for. That is plain bizarre.

[_Runtu]

Dang, I thought I came up with that one myself!

I guess it is a generalization, but that's what I do I guess. Most of philosophy is generalization.

Generalizations work when they aren't overgeneralizations.

So is it good or bad that I am "able to make that work in a Mormon context"?

I guess that depends on you. As I said on another thread, what I respect is that you have examined your faith and wrestled with the difficult questions. If maintaining faith is a net positive in your life, then it's a good thing. At least I think it is.

[_mfbukowski]

If anyone cares, here are two links.

If you have serious questions, you can find the answers here

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophi ... stigations

http://www.iep.utm.edu/dewey/

[_MrStakhanovite]

I don't think mfbukowski is saything "truth" is subjective and we each have our own "truth" but rather that "truth" is dependent on other factors. Specificly, it sounds like he means that "truth" is contextual, that truthful propisitions are true because they relate to a state of affairs and how use our language to describe that state of affairs.

For example, take his statement:

(P1) The Earth is round.

P1 is true now, but it wasn't always true in the past and it will not be true sometime in the future.

[_mfbukowski]

I don't think mfbukowski is saything "truth" is subjective and we each have our own "truth" but rather that "truth" is dependent on other factors. Specificly, it sounds like he means that "truth" is contextual, that truthful propisitions are true because they relate to a state of affairs and how use our language to describe that state of affairs.

For example, take his statement:

(P1) The Earth is round.

P1 is true now, but it wasn't always true in the past and it will not be true sometime in the future.

Exactly- actually even by today's science, the earth is not strictly speaking "round"- I believe it kind of squishes out around the equator so it is really kind of a rounded ellipse. But even that is not true, because it has mountains and oceans which also bulge out according to their mass. So is the earth round? is that true?

Is Pluto a planet? True or false? It was true, but no longer is! These are gross examples which make it obvious, but this is the nature of truth- it is entirely context dependent and depends on the proposition.

So in looking for "truth" (small t) we are always looking at contexts and who is saying what about whom (or what)

The answer to nearly every question is "it depends".

[_Euthyphro]

Look here, mfb, there can be no response like "it depends" to a question like: "Was there really a Lehi and his family, who left Jerusalem before it was sacked by Babylon, or did some 19th century man or men just make that story up?"

One thing or the other happened or some third thing, but in any case one can construct a statement that closely matches Truth suitable enough for human purposes. If you claim that since we cannot know which of these it was and therefore Truth does not exist and this is what Wittgenstein taught you then I am afraid I am quite disappointed.

[_Chap]

I don't think mfbukowski is saything "truth" is subjective and we each have our own "truth" but rather that "truth" is dependent on other factors. Specificly, it sounds like he means that "truth" is contextual, that truthful propisitions are true because they relate to a state of affairs and how use our language to describe that state of affairs.

For example, take his statement:

(P1) The Earth is round.

P1 is true now, but it wasn't always true in the past and it will not be true sometime in the future.

Exactly- actually even by today's science, the earth is not strictly speaking "round"- I believe it kind of squishes out around the equator so it is really kind of a rounded ellipse. But even that is not true, because it has mountains and oceans which also bulge out according to their mass. So is the earth round? is that true?

Is Pluto a planet? True or false? It was true, but no longer is! These are gross examples which make it obvious, but this is the nature of truth- it is entirely context dependent and depends on the proposition.

So in looking for "truth" (small t) we are always looking at contexts and who is saying what about whom (or what)

The answer to nearly every question is "it depends".

Sorry, that exit has already been covered:

You see, I can think of so many examples of unchanging truths: it is an unchanging truth, for instance, that for many millions of years before 2010 the shape of planet earth has been close to a spheroid. Or isn't it?

Similarly:

"Pluto is listed as a planet in documents up to a certain date, but it does not appear as a planet thereafter because of a change in the definition of planet." True, no?

One just has to choose words carefully, then one can state truths. Can't one?

[Alf'Omega]

Exactly- actually even by today's science, the earth is not strictly speaking "round"- I believe it kind of squishes out around the equator so it is really kind of a rounded ellipse. But even that is not true, because it has mountains and oceans which also bulge out according to their mass. So is the earth round? is that true?

Yes, the earth is round. I heard Neil Tyson say that if the earth were reduced to the size of a cue ball, it would be far smoother and more perfectly round. In others words, the imperfections on a cue ball are relatively greater than that on the surface of the earth.

I know that's irrelevant to the conversation, but I thought it was interesting.

Is Pluto a planet? True or false? It was true, but no longer is! These are gross examples which make it obvious, but this is the nature of truth- it is entirely context dependent and depends on the proposition.

Well, strictly speaking, it was never truely a planet. We just called it that.

So in looking for "truth" (small t) we are always looking at contexts and who is saying what about whom (or what)

The answer to nearly every question is "it depends".

OK, that's fine, but you can't extrapolate from this that "truth changes." Truth doesn't change. It's true that we considered Pluto a planet before. It's true that we don't consider it a planet now. The fact that we don't consider it a planet now does not change the truth that we did before, or the ultimate fact that it never was. It's the context that changes, not the truth. Half a pie is always half a pie, whether the pie is a pound or 10 pounds.

This is one of those meaningless philosophical distinctions which largely contribute to the fact that there's little money in philosophy.

[_MCB]

One just has to choose words carefully, then one can state truths. Can't one?

Or one can re-define words to suit one's personal perspective at the moment.

"It depends on what 'sex' is," said B.C. when asked about his relationship with M.L. And we won't even get into Joseph Smith!!!!!!!!!!!