[coberst]

What is truth for…

I was recently watching a documentary on Discovery Channel about a man who found an infant cheetah alone in the veldt. It was obvious that Cat, our cheetah, could not survive under such circumstances. John, our man, took cat home and attempted to raise her until she could fend for herself in the wild.

After a short period John recognized that he must release Cat into the wild when she had grown sufficiently to fend for her self. Of course, it stuck him that the cat must receive some training before she would be able to kill prey and thus have food and survive.

John set about to train Cat how to stalk and kill prey. He was able to combine the innate ability of Cat with various training techniques to train the Cat to stalk, capture, and kill a running animal, at least in a rudimentary way.

However, training Cat to recognize friend from foe and prey from dangerous animal in the animal kingdom was another matter. It was obvious that John had little ability to ‘educate’ Cat in the subtleties of survival. This was the task that Cat’s mother would have done.

It makes sense to me to conclude that John could not readily teach Cat the truths of her world. Without her mother’s guidance Cat had little chance to survive in her wild world even though she had grown the strength and size necessary to do so. In Cat’s wild world truth is what is necessary for survival.

I would conclude that truth for any animal, including the human animal, is a matter of survivability. Evolution is a process for determining any creature’s ability to comprehend truth, i.e. survive in their particular world.

What is truth for humans? Cognitive science informs me that “truth depends on meaningfulness” and “truth is relative to understanding”. What is meaningful for humans? I would say that, just like Cat, survival is the ultimate meaning for humans just as for Cheetahs.

Cat is not a social animal to the extent that humans are. We can examine social animals such as wolves and apes and we can see that what the group decides is meaningful, i.e. true, determines truth for the individual as well as the group. Truth for humans becomes more complex because humans have created an artificial world of meaning that makes it more difficult to ascertain what is true and what will lead to the extinction of the species.

Isn’t scientific theory an example of truth for humans?

Quotes from “Philosophy in the Flesh” by Lakoff and Johnson

[Flowerr]

The truth is that there is no way all the 20 human amino acids could have possibly developed as only levo rotatory existing forms without premade levo producing enzymes before hand.

this is such truth that evolution could not have hapenned.
Inconceivable even in an infinity of universes. Every creature every from every molecul all left rotatory Levo amino acids and the DNA is right rotatory. no possible way random, impossible.

When truth becomes so powerful that it blows away every theory you ever had, you have nothing left.

The only answer is to reject truth
and keep hanging on to evolution, or loose your mind.

It is impossible for humans to anymore accept truth, they would loose everything, the whole education system and everything they learned.

So, they will reject it.

Nothing more to say about it.

It is better to be comfortable, than to be correct.

can't you see this in peak oil?

everyone is eager to know, when it dawns on them what this means
they
reject
it


so, basically

Men are going to be extinct very soon out of willful ignorance.

The only way to survive they have rejected it.

sigh o nara.


(and the sun sets in another resplendant scene)

[Grifter]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Flowerr', 'T')he truth is that there is no way all the 20 human amino acids could have possibly developed as only levo rotatory existing forms without premade levo producing enzymes before hand.

this is such truth that evolution could not have hapenned.
Inconceivable even in an infinity of universes. Every creature every from every molecul all left rotatory Levo amino acids and the DNA is right rotatory. no possible way random, impossible.

[BigTex]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Flowerr', 'W')hen truth becomes so powerful that it blows away every theory you ever had, you have nothing left.

The only answer is to reject truth
and keep hanging on to evolution, or loose your mind.

It is impossible for humans to anymore accept truth, they would loose everything, the whole education system and everything they learned.

[BigTex]

The only truth is this moment.

The past and future are distorted fantasies.

How we got here and where we are going are outside the realm of truth. Even if we had perfect explanations, the inability of the human mind to accurately reconcile the past and future with the present would bend the "truth" to the breaking point. The past and future are being endlessly re-interpreted based upon the point in time from which they are being viewed.

The good news is that there is this moment, and it is utterly saturated with truth, and it will last for as long as you want it to.

The answer to "what is truth?" is not intellectual. You can beat your head against the wall of intellectual analysis as long as you like and no suitable answer will appear.

Just relax, breathe, and occupy this moment. That is all the truth that there is.

[Don't flame me while I am meditating.]

[Ang]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('BigTex', 'A')re you mis-spelling lose just to mess with me?

[bobaloo]

Reminds me of a couple of old adages I like...

"Reality is what's still there even when you quit believing in it."
"Reality is what you trip over in the dark."

[coberst]

That which is meaningful for me is that in which I am in the picture. When I create something meaningful I am creating a concept that includes me. When I study a painting if I really “get-into what the artist is “saying” I am making that painting meaningful for me. When I empathesize with another person I am trying to make that person meaningful to me.

Meaning is not an object but is a concept created by the individual. Meaningfulness is created in certain kinds of experiences in certain kinds of environments. Meaning is subjective. When many others share that same feeling then one might say that the meaning is “objective”.

Iraq becomes very meaningful for me if my grandson goes into the army. Meaning is a creation of the individual.

That which is meaningful certainly would not be considered objective in any form that I would understand. I would say that objectivity is shared subjectivity.

[BigTex]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('coberst', 'T')hat which is meaningful for me is that in which I am in the picture. When I create something meaningful I am creating a concept that includes me. When I study a painting if I really “get-into what the artist is “saying” I am making that painting meaningful for me. When I empathesize with another person I am trying to make that person meaningful to me.

Meaning is not an object but is a concept created by the individual. Meaningfulness is created in certain kinds of experiences in certain kinds of environments. Meaning is subjective. When many others share that same feeling then one might say that the meaning is “objective”.

Iraq becomes very meaningful for me if my grandson goes into the army. Meaning is a creation of the individual.

That which is meaningful certainly would not be considered objective in any form that I would understand. I would say that objectivity is shared subjectivity.

[katkinkate]

You want the truth? You can't handle the truth!

[coberst]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('BigTex', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('coberst', 'T')hat which is meaningful for me is that in which I am in the picture. When I create something meaningful I am creating a concept that includes me. When I study a painting if I really “get-into what the artist is “saying” I am making that painting meaningful for me. When I empathesize with another person I am trying to make that person meaningful to me.

Meaning is not an object but is a concept created by the individual. Meaningfulness is created in certain kinds of experiences in certain kinds of environments. Meaning is subjective. When many others share that same feeling then one might say that the meaning is “objective”.

Iraq becomes very meaningful for me if my grandson goes into the army. Meaning is a creation of the individual.

That which is meaningful certainly would not be considered objective in any form that I would understand. I would say that objectivity is shared subjectivity.

[shakespear1]

Double Post

[shakespear1]

In the Physical World I would argue truth is relative. It is shaped on what is perceived as being meaningful. To my mind comes the pre and post Copernican World.

Pre-Copernican time, meaning was given to the students through then know data that the Sun revolved around the Earth. That was taken as the Truth. This Truth changed in the post-Copernican time as NEW data was obtained.

No guarantee that this will not happen again and the Truth of Today will not change.

Meditation in the moment is the ultimate Truth.

[Dukkha]

As Rorty said, "Truth is a compliment we pay to sentences that earn their keep."

[paimei01]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'H')akuin used to tell his pupils about an old woman who had a teashop, praising her understanding of Zen. The pupils refused to believe what he told them and would go to the teashop to find out for themselves.

Whenever the woman saw them coming she could tell at once whether they had come for tea or to look into her grasp of Zen. In the former case, she would server them graciously. In the latter, she would beckon to the pupils to come behind her screen. The instant they obeyed, she would strike them with a fire-poker.

Nine out of ten of them could not escape her beating.

[shakespear1]

To experience reality can be painful

[mmasters]

The truth is outrageous conspiracy theory. In a nutshell.