Not that kind of a "god" creative. This is the "god" that Einstein spoke of. It's just a metaphor for the vantage point of the universe herself. It's no where near the kind of Zeus-like fairy tale of Christianity.

Einstein saw the universe form the point of view of the universe herself. And that's a perfectly legitimate philosophical point of view. In fact, it even panned out scientifically and gave us both Special and General Relativity. Both of which have been a cornerstone of Modern Physics ever since.

Besides, who are you to decide what should be considered to be "junk".

Clearly Einstein's insights are a bit beyond your grasp.

Right, besides, Christianity does not own the "God" concept. geeeeeze

I know precisely what it takes for my own claims to be true. In fact, I know it so well that I don't make any claims that I can't back up. No one has ever been able to invalidate my claims. Nor is it likely that they ever could.

What I find is that the overwhelming majority of humans will usually jump to profoundly incorrect conclusions and/or misunderstandings about what they think my 'claims' are about.

For example, I spoke about a point of view from a hypothetical universal consciousness. Speaking from Einstein's point of view from how the universe itself would see things if it had a consciousness.

You instantly equate that to "Christianity" and call it "Junk".

That's about as far removed from the actual philosophical concept that I presented as a person can be.

Creative (or Wux) here are two questions that seem reasonable to me.

Can you respond to this post by giving me an example of a truth?

Can you explain why your example is true?

Let's look at the treatment of truth...



1. Defining objective truths is not the basis of the scientific method. Our awareness of human perceptual bias and the removal of it is. Fact is the basis for the scientific method.
2. "A thing" or "a truth", in the above context, is properly called a hypothesis, a conclusion, a truth claim, a claim about the way things are.
3. As a result of following from the above mistakes, the third claim conflates "defining objective truths" with fact, method with conclusion, and calls a conclusion following from the scientific method "a truth".

If it is corresponds to fact/reality then it is called "true". Truth is that correspondence.



4. Phenomena are not true or false, nor are they "determined to be absolutely true or false". People do not determined truth, correspondence does. Phenomenon is appearance in space and time. Positive claims about the way things are(truth claims) are true or false.
5. The last statement invokes the fallacy of anthropomorphism in a rather self-defeating manner. It was the author's definition to begin with.

--

So, let's look at what it would take for these claims to be true...



In order for the above to be true, first "objective truths"(whatever those are) would need to be easy to define. Such a definition has not been forthcoming. Secondly defining "objective truths" would need to be the basis for scientific method. It is not. The basis of the scientific method is observation of fact(universal states of affairs).

The above claim is false.



If "a thing" is a hypothesis/theory following from observation of facts meant to explain those facts and/or make further predictions based upon those facts and those predictions are accurate, then the hypothesis has been verified. If subsequent observation does not support the predictions, then the hypothesis has been falsified.



For this to be true, we would need for "this definition" to be the definition which science uses for it is a claim about science being made in order to support the author's own conclusions regarding truth. We don't have that correspondence - the definition belongs to the author, not science. Phenomena themselves would need to be able to be determined true or false, which they aren't.

I conclude that the above treatment of truth is a display of mental confusion, a successive snowballing of a mistake in thought. It is the logical consequence of holding a subjective truth position. Such a position is incoherent. Such a position cannot even support itself.

--

If we remove the obtuse context and look directly at what truth being subjective would entail, we avoid much unnecessary time being spent upon dissecting personal meaning... which has little or nothing to do with truth.

If truth is determined by a thinking subject, then all truth claims - about the way things are - would be true.

That is clearly not the case. We need go no further to know that.

There is no such thing.



"There is no such thing(as a truth)" IFF there is no such thing as a truth.

Translation requires understanding.

Truth is autonomously engaged and enacted.<-------That is my claim.

In order to form thought/belief, 'loose' truth/reality correspondence is necessarily presupposed within it.



No, I didn't. It cannot be independent of thought/belief, which is exactly why objective truth is a misnomer.

Truth presupposition is a necessary element of thought/belief and as such it requires a thinking agent for it's instantiation. Thought/belief are autonomous, we do not turn them on. Therefore, we engage truth autonomously. I believe X necessarily means I believe X is true... without exception.

Truth is not a man-made concept, rather all human conceptions presuppose truth/reality correspondence.

In order for this to be true...

1. the universe would have to be of the female persuasion
2. the universe would need to have a point of view
3. Einstein would need to be able to acquire 2

None of this logically follows from any basis in fact.

Creative,

autonomously means "independently."

engaged means "involved."

Truth is autonomously engaged and enacted.
translates to:


"Truth is independently involved and enacted."

"Independently" and "autonomously" are adjectives.
"Involved" and "engaged" could be verbs or adjectives.

"enacted" seems to be a verb.

Enacted what?

Your "claim," as it stands, does not make much sense. Could you please restate your claim so I can understand it?

Well, if you prefer to be cold you can refer to the universe as "itself". I was just giving the universe a warm empathic reference, not meant to be taken literally.

The universe does have a point of view, whether conscious or not. And this was indeed the perspective that Einstein revealed to us. We can actually see that perspective ourselves. The universe does have a point of view, whether conscious or not.

Einstein did acquire #2 by simply stepping outside the box of his own personal experience as a human being and taking on the perspective that would be seen by the universe as a whole.

All of these things are reasonable to a mind that is capable of stepping out of the narrow box of personal and traditional perspectives.

It may seem illogical to you if you are incapable of doing this, but to those of us who are capable of doing it, it's not a problem.

Besides, none of the discoveries that Einstein found seemed logical to us at first because they conflicted with what we consider to be common sense.

Who would have thought that time is actually physical?

Who would have thought that time is not the same for every observer?

Who would have thought that the speed of light is a constant for everyone one no matter how fast they are traveling.

In fact, when most people learn of the "truths" revealed by Einstein's discoveries they find them extremely difficult to believe and accept. They usually fight it tooth and nail trying to make 'sense' of it. In fact, many people who have actually accepted it don't even truly understand what Einstein truly saw.

Most highly educated professional physicists will tell you that as we learn more about the universe we need to change what we consider to be "logical".

Was relativity logical in the days of Classical physics?

No, the idea that time could be different for everyone was not considered to be logical.

We actually had to change what we consider to be logical in order to accept the observations of Relativity.

Logic itself is nothing more a formal language that allows us to set up statements of hypotheses and conclusions, based on various premises that we have accepted to be true as part of what we consider to be our logical system.

In the days of Classical Physics it would have been considered to be illogical to assume that time flows differently for different observers.

We simply would have said, "No that's illogical".

But today we accept this as being a confirmed property of our universe, thus today we consider the idea that time is different for different observers to be quite logical.

So even what we call logic itself is not carved in stone but changes as we change our foundational premises of what we consider to be logical.

You speak of logic itself as though it has some core foundational unchanging rock-solid basis. But that, my friend, is itself a totally false notion.

Our very notions of logic are quite subjective and malleable.

The Mathematicians have clearly pointed this out to us quite elegantly with the different kinds of geometries. Change which premises you are willing to consider at the outside, and the entire logic of the geometry changes right along with it.

In fact, they take this to extremes in modern topologies. You should see what's going on in mathematics today. They are constantly considering new premises and basis for various geometries. It's pretty wild stuff.

So there isn't even any concrete notions of "logic". That too is quite illusive and subject to which premises you are personally willing to accept.

So logic itself can be quite subjective.

Jb,

See the last post I made concerning that.

And rather than choosing common uses that do not make sense... use Merriam Webster's and choose the definitions(uses) that do.

Nevermind.

If you can't restate your claim in simple language just forget it.

It's too much work for me to decipher your claims and interpret your words if I have to look everything up in Webster's dictionary.

It's very nice that you have such a great vocabulary, congratulations, but that is probably why a lot of people don't understand you.

That was my guess.

Here is my confusion:



That is the beginning of the OP - how can it be subjective, objective or even independent is there if there is no such thing?

So NOW let me ask you

Is a truth claim subjective

I would error on the side of Yes until after it has passed some kind of standard (like a scientific study, which validates or falsifies the claim. At that point it may be validated or falsified but it cannot be truth because truth does not exist.

It can however, be a building block for future truth claims. Is that right?

There is such a thing as truth, truth is correspondence; a matching up to the way things are. I was objecting to "a truth" being confused with truth.



Truth claims come through a thinking subject capable of complex thought/belief and language. I am making a distinction here between a truth claim and truth. "A" truth does not exist, unless we call a true claim "a truth" which is common use, but it is exactly what I'm rejecting. That treatment of truth causes confusion and is a case of mistaken identity. Truth is what makes the claim true. Calling a true claim "a truth" equates a true claim with that which makes it so.



Here, we again see the differences between our uses. I would say that a verified claim cannot be truth because truth presupposition is what connects all claims to reality and truth is what connects true claims to reality. True claims correspond to fact/reality. Truth does not correspond, it is the correspondence itself.



Truth is central to everything thought/believed and or known.

The above is a truth claim. It is a claim about the way things are. It does not, however, correspond to or necessarily follow from known fact. It is to say that a point of view does not require a thinking subject. All relevant facts suggest otherwise.



This claim is completely unjustifiable. Einstein cannot acquire a point of view that does not exist. When we are contemplating new information we are thinking. While thinking we cannot be outside of thinking. Einstein cannot step outside 'the box' of his own thought/belief. The claim is - quite literally - nonsense.

Clearly Einstein did step out of the box of conventional viewpoints or he would have never made the realizations that he made.

Just because you say that something is nonsense doesn't make it so Michael.

I do believe, however, that you are indeed very limited in the your ability to grasp various viewpoints. So I fully understand that from you limited viewpoint other viewpoints do appear as nonsense to you.

I've personally grown beyond those kinds of petty restrictions, and there's no going back once you've seen the bigger picture.

There is no question at all that Einstein saw the universe from a viewpoint that no one had previously considered. Or at least if they did, they weren't fortunate enough to be a position to convince others and thus become recognized and famous for their insights.

Einstein saw reality from a different perspective from the normal human perspective based on immediate experience.

That is a 'fact' Michael.

You stated:



No, you're wrong. All relevant facts suggest precisely what I am saying. That Albert Einstein took the time to contemplate a point of view that is not innate to human experience. He actually did this in several different areas. And that is how he came to see the insights that he realized.

In the case of Special Relativity he imagined that he was a beam of light. He viewed the universe from that "point of view". From the point of view of a photon.

Does a photon need to be conscious to have a "point of view"?

No it does not! The "point of view" exists whether there is a conscious mind currently experiencing it or not. Einstein became the conscious mind that experienced that point of view.

It's a point of view that would not have naturally been experienced had Einstein not "stepped out of the box" of conventional thinking.

Apparently you are incapable of stepping out of that box, "The cup is still on the table!", and this is why things outside of that box appear to be nonsense to you.

However, they are not nonsense for people who are capable of stepping out of that conventional box (i.e. conventional point of view).

All you're doing is demanding that everyone limit themselves to your restricted point of view, otherwise you'll label them as having a point of view that is nonsense and proclaim them to be illogical.

But in truth Michael, you are the one who is being nonsensical in thinking that other people should restrict their minds to your limited point of view.

Just because you claim that your point of view represents perfectly flawless "logic" doesn't make it so.

On the contrary Micheal I'm personally not impressed with your personal subjective sense of logic. From everything you post you appear to have an extremely limited sense of what you deem to be logical, and far more importantly, I have never seen you produce anything significant using your line of thinking.

All you seem to do is complain that many of the things that other people consider appear to be illogical to you.

Had you been around when Einstein was first thinking about Relativity you probably would have told him that his ideas are illogical as well.

But the 'fact' is that his thinking panned out and has since been observed to correctly reflect the actual behavior of the universe herself. So clearly Einstein did see something profound when he looked at things from the Point of View of the universe herself.

These are undeniable facts. Historical water over the dam.

You can kick and scream about them until you are blue in the face, shake a stick at them and scream, "It's nonsense!", but it doesn't change the 'facts'.

Einstein chose to look at things from the point of view of the universe herself and when his consciousness realized that point of view he was rewarded with great insights into the true nature of physical manifestation.

It's water over the dam Micheal.

It's history.

Calling it nonsensical at this stage is itself nonsense.

Imagination rules the world.

~ Napoleon Bonaparte

Abra in the same post you are using two different definitions for "view point" without even being conscious of it.
You are using the "point of viewer" as in a position within a given set of dimensions.
You are also using the colloquial version which really just means the way I see it.
It is this kind of sloppy language that pervades these threads and get the less rigorous of us into faulty thinking.