I have recently seen some very significant life improvements, money, health, etc. they have been considerable in proportion and if I may brag on myself a bit is because of some serious levels of resilience and discipline over a long period of times. An additional product of my success is some incomplete thoughts at the moment bouncing around in my head. I figured this would be very fun to do in order to perhaps help complete them. Philosophy imo is as useless and it is useful. But I can’t help but think this may have use as a strategy to help. Below is a couple quotes, bonus points if you know from where, and I would like to hear peoples thoughts on what exactly comes to mind when you hear them. What do they mean to you? “Nothing is true, everything is permitted.” “How could I regret the only life I have ever known?”
Ok, not a huge amount to go on, so I guess I'll freestyle. In both cases, they're quite vague, and more sound-bite-y than profound. I didn't know where they were from, but I googled it. It is in fact very easy to regret the one life one has ever known, if you think you should have lived it differently. There are in fact true things. There are plenty of things that are not permitted. You could argue things like being permitted means that there is someone somewhere that permits it, or that nobody has the authority to un-permit things, or things like that, but at that point, there isn't really wisdom or philosophy in the phrases, but we're just picking interpretations of words to match thoughts that we already like.
Congratulations on your successes...but remember that life is a sine curve, not a hockey stick. Just the same, keep up the hard work and you'll have the energy and resources to keep your ship afloat during the inevitable stormy seas to come.
Perhaps. But that’s partly why I have always found philosophy exactly as useful as it is useless I suppose. But mostly the first is a reference to there essentially not being any truth beyond the natural laws that exist. That truth itself beyond those laws is completely subjective. That perhaps the truth is created by the stronger person or group. Seems true atleast at face value. I’m not sure yet, as I said it’s an incomplete thought. Still fleshing it out, and articulating it in my head. And for the second…simply trying to flesh another incomplete thought out as well. About understanding other peoples lives, despite only truly knowing my own.
You might wish to consider that there are many truths...one being society's truth [principally made by those who control it], one's personal truth [what comes through your perception and processes in your brain, and the actual Truth [things are they truly are, no commentary necessary].
Seems to me there is only the truth. Personal truth is just personal perspective. Same thing with society. And “the” truth, is basically natural law.
So you are saying that everybody has their own truth? And society has their truth? How do you figure? Who determines natural law?
Well, I'd say philosophy done well can be useful. Philosophy done badly may turn out as beautiful poetry, but still be meaningless sophistry. The phrasing is still a bit vague. There are positive statements, they have truth values, there are normative statements that do not. What makes a normative statement true can be dictated by a strong group, but it might not be accepted. Well, it might be worth trying to find good thoughts and put them into words, instead of finding words that sound good and try to cram some meaning into them.
No I’m saying everyone has their own perspective, or perception, and there is only one truth. No one does. Natural law simply exists. I may be using the term incorrectly, but there is truth to the world around us that is true regardless of perspective…that is what I’m referencing.
I don’t think doing the latter. But i simply have some incomplete thoughts going on and trying to see the perspectives of others to see if that helps complete them. I’m being vague on purpose.
If there was no life in the Universe capable of conceiving any of this, would natural law still exist? Is not "natural law" wholly dependent on our perception/cognition?
The term natural law may not exist but events in the universe would still occur based on what we call natural laws. For example the planet Neptune existed before we discovered it. Mathematicians could use the laws of gravity to calculate its affect on the other planets and the sun. Then one day, based on mathematical prediction, it was observed via telescope. Its existence was completely independent of our observation of it for billions of years but now we see it. Newton’s mathematical discoveries are a way of describing what is observed.
I get that POV, but that's doing quite a bit assuming...for one thing, that we have any clue as to what's going on. One could make a MUCH better case that these natural laws are just so much non-sense made up to some sanity to our intellectual take on the world. IOW, the chance of anything we believe as a natural law being correct is zero. And nothing against Newton but eventually all of his work will be for naught once a new and improved systems of thought are discovered and anointed as scientific truth. Btw, what exactly did you want me to address [from previous discussions]. Sorry.
Hey you responded to me! Thanks doc! I think that Newton’s Principia has held up to great scrutiny but it is true that Einstein has built upon what he discovered. I love math because it is the language of truth and reason.
Truth and reason? Consider the following... You might agree that all matter occupies a unique three [or four, if you like] dimensional coordinate in space. This makes each particle of matter [or object] unique as it is subject to unique forces determined by its location. If this is the case, then all particles of matter are [technically (which is an appropriate condition in this discussion)] unique, right? If this is correct [and I believe this to be the case], then exactly what does the number 2 mean? IOW, if all objects are unique, what does 2 or 3 or... mean? You can see where injecting a bit of reality into the equation has a tendency to gum up the mathematics works a bit. What say you?
The number 2 is the word we assign to signify that there is more than one of something and less than three while still being a whole number. Oh! It’s also the only even prime number!
I get the usage, but what do you say to the suggestion that all things are unique and that there does not exist 2 of any thing. That 2 is meaningless, similar to saying 2 Earths, or 2 Pacific Oceans.
you must really be bored if you're basing a thread on stolen quotes from assassin's creed. whether anyone is capable or willing to discern it, there is a truth behind it all. many prefer the notion that there is no truth because the alternative is to admit our own defeat. the only things permitted are those allowed by our own morality or the ethos of our society. my alternative to your rather trite saying - "reality consists of the lies we tell ourselves to avoid the pain of uncertainty".
I say that it’s a pretty silly claim. I have two legs, two arms, two eyes. My wife is a twin, god help me, its like I have two wives. Not in a good way. Never marry a twin Doc! If you have two coins of equal value and each of them are valued at a dollar, you have two dollars.
Women are not so easy to deal with these days. I feel your pain. The fact that you can say, "I have two dollars," doesn't change anything, as apparently people can change their gender with just a wave of their magic wand. The convention is to say two, but so what. No two coins are the same. You can place the same value on them, but even that value is always changing [technically]. Mathematics is simply a made up system. The fact that it breaks down at either end of the number line reveals this pretty clearly. Of course, that's not to say that it doesn't have utility, but you can infer that on all kinds of things that aren't real.
I guess it's about as close as you're going to get. As an aside, I used to really love math but the more I began to explore thought, the more I began to see how math was method the intellectual elite used to pull a fast one across the common folk [as the they are essentially math-illiterate]. It's the same way [substitute techno-jargon for math] that Medicine keeps much of the important [research and clinical] information away from the public, COVID being the poster child for such criminally negligent behavior.
There is no better way to find out when a train leaving Tallahassee at 7:15 going 60 kmh will meet up with a train leaving Memphis at 8:45 going 80 kmh.
