Truth versus Trueness

Originally posted by josephw
Help me with this if you will. The bible says that God created everything. How is it that one needs to epistemologically, or otherwise, prove it is true?

There's a saying that some believers use that goes, "If God said it, I believe it, and that settles it." My problem with that is, that it makes no difference whether "I" believe it or not in order for it ...[text shortened]... equence of the belief in God that truth be objective.

Anyway, if I'm way off topic....

Did you go to the soup kitchen today?

Originally posted by kirksey957
Did you go to the soup kitchen today?

I don't get it! 😕

A final attempt to break this down (and dropping the “truth” versus “trueness” language)—

(1) We utilize the grammar of our consciousness to read, structure, interpret the syntax of the world (the cosmos, the whole) in which we exist. Our ability to represent the world conceptually is limited by that grammar (or the architecture of our consciousness, if you wish). Every such grammatical venture is fudnamentally hermeneutical.

(2) Any aspect of the world that is not accessible to our grammar cannot be spoken of using that grammar.

(2)(a) How can we analyze that grammar itself, except in its own terms? How can we shine the light on the light?

(3) That our grammar is coherent with the syntax of the world from which we are born, in which we exist, and of which we are is not strange: what would be strange would be if our grammar were not so coherent, and we survived as a species.

(4) I see no reason to assume that we are the singular species whose grammar is somehow exhaustive of all aspects of the universe—that there are no aspects of the cosmos that transcend our conceptual/grammatical capabilities.

(5) I see no grounds for leaping from (4) to positing an extra-natural* category to explain what transcends our cognitive grammar. Nor do I see any grounds for subsequently positing an entity that either resides in or comprises such a category.

* Since the word “supernatural” seems to be used in alternative ways, I am substituting “extra-natural.”

If someone wants to make such a metaphysical leap, for whatever reason, fine. But it does create epistemological problems—such as, how could we know anything at all about such a category?

Some people (or various religions) posit divine revelation, but for such revelation to be understandable, it has to also be restricted to the limits of our grammatical capabilities. If, for example, “just” means something different to a being in the extra-natural domain, it has no meaning for us.

I think that a lot of our metaphysical/theological talk ends up being meaningless to the extent that it attempts to use the signs (signifier + signified) of our grammar in ways that beg the question of whether there is any referent, and how we could know. (Sometimes, I suspect the signified as well.)

(6) Non-dualism (with or without other metaphysical speculations) does not require the metaphysical assumption of an extra-natural category or domain or entity.

(7) Only our conceptual constructs of the world are dependent upon our conceptual grammar. There is no reason to think that the world itself is so dependent.

(8) There are not concepts without a conceptualizer—for simplicity, no thoughts without a thinker thinking. By the same token there is no thinker without thinking thoughts.*

Note the play on our subject-predicate linguistic structure.

* Krishnamurti would also say the same about “experience,” so you might consider that there are “ ” around every instance of my using that word, as well.

(9) It is not necessary that our mind always be in the mode of concept-making. (This is testable experientially, if you care; i.e., it is an empirical assertion).

(10) When we allow the concept-making mode of our brain/mind to relax or stop, we can become simply aware of the pre-conceptual / non-conceptual reality, of which we are. (This, too, is testable.)

(11) Whatever representations our concept-making mind constructs from this non-conceptual “experience” depends, once again, on the limits of our ability to “grammatize” such a non-conceptual “experience.”

(12) How the individual grammatizes such experience, in terms of mental representations or concepts, depends on many factors—social, psychological, religious, etc. The point is that no grammatization is possible that excludes the limitations and biases of the individual grammarian—whether that be Lao Tzu, or Moses, or me.

As Krishnamurti might put it: the thinker is as defined by her thoughts, as the thoughts are by the thinker.

(13) Therefore, there are no (other) epistemological statements that can be made about non-conceptual reality, that do not recognize the fact and the limits of the concept-making agent immersed in and part of that reality. Assumptions as to the extent of the factual correspondence between our grammatical constructs and the pre-grammatical quality of reality are just that. (And there may be valid pragmatic grounds for such assumptions.)

(14) Dualistic separability between the concept and the concept-maker (and the concept-making) is an illusion.

(15) Therefore, the least assumptive conclusion is that dualistic separability between the perceiving “subject” and the “objective” world is also illusory.

Note: None of this, to my mind, invalidates the pragmatic assumptions or procedures of scientific inquiry. After all, it is only within the constraints of our human consciousness (its grammar) that we can do science—I think that is so obvious that it would be silly for a scientist to append it to every statement.

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Aside:

Some people have testified about transformative experiences that have given them faith in a particular kind of God, and the revelatory writings that go with the particular religious paradigm in which such a transformation took place. I have little doubt that such transformations (I am being deliberately general here) occur in the crucible of a given religious expression. I would actually find it odd if such transformative events or processes did not occur. But I also find it odd that a person in one religious paradigm will disallow such transformations occurring in the crucible of other religions, or consider them thereby illegitimate. Inevitably, despite whatever testimony a person in another religion gives, we seem to have to argue that it “cannot be the same” as our own, or as valid.

Sometimes, the tack taken is that such transformative experiences may be valid in themselves, but do not lead to ultimate salvation in an after-life—which removes the whole issue to the extra-natural category again. Or else the arguments become circular, e.g.:

(a) Such an experience/understanding is not valid unless it come from the Holy Spirit;

(b) only Christians have the Holy Spirit;

(c) you are not a Christian;

(d) therefore, your experience/understanding is not the same (or valid, or correct, or whatever);

(e) I know because I have the Holy Spirit, so my experience/understanding is valid.

Lucifershammer some time back asserted, not only that satori—a word used for transformative experience in Zen Buddhism—could not be the same as metanoia, a word used in Christianity. He actually said that satori would be like the “dark side” of metanoia. I don’t know what he meant and he didn’t explain. Now I freely confess that I don’t know if they are the same or not—one would have to have experienced both, within the religious context in which they are defined and “certified.”