Does the observor create his own knowledge?

[mindlight]

Does our own psyche/philosophy/neurochemistry form the basis of what we see and how we categorise it or is it possible to base knowledge on an idea of correspondence to reality. Or is it merely the product of language games associated with our particular cultures. Or is the only true knowledge revealed knowledge?

In brief is what we know
1) Created by who we are?
2) Correspond with whats out there
3) Or is knowledge the product of language games
4) Is the only reliable knowledge revealed to us by a higher being.

If 1) How is it that so many people of such different configuration seem to share revealed understandings of reality.

If 2) - can we really ever say we truly see or sense what is out there or are we kidding ourselves. e.g. we observe the universe on the basis of calculations made concerning the electromagnetic spectrum but according to modern physicists that may represent only 3 % of the known universe. dark matter and energy accounting for the unseen and unknown rest.

If 3) How do we know we are playing the right game?

If 4) How do we know we have the right higher being informing us?

 

[Gracchus]

Does our own psyche/philosophy/neurochemistry form the basis of what we see and how we categorise (sic) it or is it possible to base knowledge on an idea of correspondence to reality.

Yes, to both.

Or is it merely the product of language games associated with our particular cultures.

It can be, particularly among those whose social conditioning has been very intense.

Or is the only true knowledge revealed knowledge?

“Revealed knowledge” may or may not be “true knowledge”.

In brief is what we know

1. Created by who we are?

Partially! Our minds have a tendency to “fill in the gaps”. If we hear or smell a lion, it is good policy to leap to the conclusion that there is a lion around.

2) Correspond with whats out there

Knowledge may bear some resemblance to what is real. It is doubtful that any knowledge corresponds exactly to reality. If knowledge and reality are too dissimilar, the knower is often locked up in a rubber room with some soft, non-toxic crayons.

3) Or is knowledge the product of language games

More likely, “knowledge” is the product of intense social conditioning.

4) Is the only reliable knowledge revealed to us by a higher being.

The question that must then be asked is how you know that it is a “higher being”?

If 1), How is it that so many people of such different configuration seem to share revealed understandings of reality.

We are very closely related to each other, so there are family resemblances.

If 2), - can we really ever say we truly see or sense what is out there or are we kidding ourselves. e.g. we observe the universe on the basis of calculations made concerning the electromagnetic spectrum but according to modern physicists that may represent only 3 % of the known universe. dark matter and energy accounting for the unseen and unknown rest.

Some of us keep checking our observations. If we see something new, that defies our “knowledge” we revise what we know, and search further. Others just deny the observation and scurry under their religious texts like cockroaches hiding from the light. (“Reality can take a hike!”)

If 3), How do we know we are playing the right game?

Well, if you aren't winning and you're not having fun ...

If 4), How do we know we have the right higher being informing us?

There is no way to tell about that, especially if the “higher being” is invisible and otherwise undemonstrable.

 

[mindlight]

Yes, to both.

It can be, particularly among those whose social conditioning has been very intense.

“Revealed knowledge” may or may not be “true knowledge”.

Partially! Our minds have a tendency to “fill in the gaps”. If we hear or smell a lion, it is good policy to leap to the conclusion that there is a lion around.

Knowledge may bear some resemblance to what is real. It is doubtful that any knowledge corresponds exactly to reality. If knowledge and reality are too dissimilar, the knower is often locked up in a rubber room with some soft, non-toxic crayons.
More likely, “knowledge” is the product of intense social conditioning.

The question that must then be asked is how you know that it is a “higher being”?

We are very closely related to each other, so there are family resemblances.

Some of us keep checking our observations. If we see something new, that defies our “knowledge” we revise what we know, and search further. Others just deny the observation and scurry under their religious texts like cockroaches hiding from the light. (“Reality can take a hike!”)

Well, if you aren't winning and you're not having fun ...

There is no way to tell about that, especially if the “higher being” is invisible and otherwise undemonstrable.

So if it is the case that our cognitive models are shaped in part by ourselves, in part by the realities they purport to describe and in part by the social condiitoning of the language games we grow up with, then the way we approach revealed knowedge may have already predisposed us to accept or reject the texts.

Understanding the ways in which our perspectives have been presupposed by factors outside our control must therefore be a part of the process of assessing the validity of revealed knowledge and whether we truly have an open mind when it comes to this knowledge.

But even then the task is complicated and may involve painful decisions about what is real or not in our cognitive makeups. Indeed there is a considerable element of uncertainty as to whether we will ever arrive at certainty by this route. Indeed the only certainty we might discover in this way may be the consciousness of our inexactitude when it comes to describing ourselves and the universe we live in.

The Christian cognitive model offers a solution to this dilemma. A super being (God) capable of understanding everything and describing it in a way that resonates with our deepest being enters into the human matrix as one of us. He describes the human way to God and opens our understanding to what is revealed about him in scripture by being one of us, living as one of us and talking inside our language games. His message resonates with us because it is what we were designed for, is perfectly communicated and because he provides a mechanism whereby we can be redeemed from the imperfections that have developed inside this matrix. His transcendence from our cognitive models guarantees his authority, his immanence in our situation guarantees the possiblity of understanding.

 

[Tinker Grey]

The other solution to the dilemma (if it may be properly called such) is to accept uncertainty.

 

[mindlight]

The other solution to the dilemma (if it may be properly called such) is to accept uncertainty.

In the long term for the broad mass of people that is not a sustainable cognitive model. Which I think says something about its validity as a choice. People need to believe they have some kind of handle on reality. If you dissolve all the reference points to your sanity like Nietzsche you simply end up mad.

 

[Gracchus]

In the long term for the broad mass of people that is not a sustainable cognitive model.

So, a cognitive model that is consistently adjusted to conform to reality is not sustainable? Why not?

Which I think says something about its validity as a choice.

You seem to be saying that we should accept falsehoods because we can then have the comfort of certainty.

People need to believe they have some kind of handle on reality.

People need to learn to live with reality. Basing decisions on known falsehoods is bound to get you into trouble.

If you dissolve all the reference points to your sanity like Nietzsche you simply end up mad.

I do not know the nature of Nietzsche's "madness", nor its genesis. But, to live your life based on known falsehoods is delusional, and if you do so you are already mad. If most human beings did that then history would be a long tale of horrors and moral failures. Oh wait ...

 

[Tinker Grey]

According to wiki, Nietzsche's madness is generally attributed to tertiary syphilis--not because of his philosophical leanings,

 

[Davian]

...
I do not know the nature of Nietzsche's "madness", nor its genesis. But, to live your life based on known falsehoods is delusional, and if you do so you are already mad. If most human beings did that then history would be a long tale of horrors and moral failures. Oh wait ...

lol!

Quoted for truth.

 

[mindlight]

According to wiki, Nietzsche's madness is generally attributed to tertiary syphilis--not because of his philosophical leanings,

Actually the jury is still out on the medical cause. But his nihilism definitely did not help him.

Cybulska EM (August 2000). "The madness of Nietzsche: a misdiagnosis of the millennium?". Hospital Medicine 61 (8): 571–575. PMID 11045229.

Schain, Richard (2001). The Legend of Nietzsche's Syphilis. Westport: Greenwood Press. ISBN 0313319405.

Nietzsche 'died of brain cancer'". The Sydney Morning Herald. May 6, 2003.

 

[mindlight]

So, a cognitive model that is consistently adjusted to conform to reality is not sustainable? Why not?

We can try to be a real as possible and this a worthwhile and continuous part of simply being honest about ourselves and the universe we inhabit.
But without revealed certainties there is no certainty and what we say and believe will always be inexact.

You seem to be saying that we should accept falsehoods because we can then have the comfort of certainty.

I am saying that you may well approach revealed knowledge with false presuppositions that you have yet to clear from your consciousness. Indeed the portrayal of them as falsehoods seems to confirm that.

People need to learn to live with reality. Basing decisions on known falsehoods is bound to get you into trouble.

I do not know the nature of Nietzsche's "madness", nor its genesis. But, to live your life based on known falsehoods is delusional, and if you do so you are already mad. If most human beings did that then history would be a long tale of horrors and moral failures. Oh wait ...

People need above all to reckon with the heart of reality and the one who made them and who sustains their very existence. Our consciousness of reality is finite , imperfect and even with total honesty inexact and incomplete. With revealed knowledge certainties are back into the system and what we know of the world we inhabit can be tested against this reference point along with our sanity. The alternative is the moral relativism that plagues the modern Western world.

 

[Gracchus]

We can try to be a real as possible and this a worthwhile and continuous part of simply being honest about ourselves and the universe we inhabit.
But without revealed certainties there is no certainty and what we say and believe will always be inexact.

That is correct.

I am saying that you may well approach revealed knowledge with false presuppositions that you have yet to clear from your consciousness. Indeed the portrayal of them as falsehoods seems to confirm that.

I do not portray them as false, but I note that they were promulgated by financially interested parties trying to fill the collection plate, and as such worthy of intense scrutiny. And when observation indicates that they are false, they become even more improbable.

People need above all to reckon with the heart of reality and the one who made them and who sustains their very existence. Our consciousness of reality is finite , imperfect and even with total honesty inexact and incomplete. With revealed knowledge certainties are back into the system and what we know of the world we inhabit can be tested against this reference point along with our sanity. The alternative is the moral relativism that plagues the modern Western world.

I used to work in a mental hospital, and one thing common to delusional patients was the certainty that their delusions were real.
So, when I encounter people who are certain of very unlikely events which they did not even witness themselves, I draw my own conclusions, using my God-given powers of reason. Or as a much smarter man than I put it: "I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with senses, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use and by some other means to give us knowledge which we can attain by them."

So I have to ask myself, what is more likely: That you have believed a con-man trying to hustle a buck, by selling you false comfort, or that really improbable things that were witnessed by no living human actually happened?

Of course, it is possible that that mental patient with his Bible really was Jesus Christ and not Jesus (hay-soos) Morales as his admission papers said. And maybe the meds they put him on gave him the delusion that he wasn't Jesus Christ.

I dont' think so, but I could be wrong. It is no problem for me to live with that degree of uncertainty.

 

[quatona]

But without revealed certainties there is no certainty and what we say and believe will always be inexact.

Yes. I am not sure, though, I have understood how Christianity solves this problem. How do you determine with certainty that the "revealed" stuff is "knowledge" and not falsehood, other than by preassuming it is? "Revealed certainties" are subject to the very same mechanisms and epostemological problems you have analysed fairly accurately.

 

[GrowingSmaller]

Yup there are psychological certainties on the one hand (subjective states of being totally convinced) and philosophical certainties on the other ("absolute certainties" it is held, are ideas about which we cannot be wrong). Being convinced in religious dogma may be an instance of the former, but not of the latter. I remember talking to a friend who said that his inner certainty was proof that Islam was true, but I had to point out that the truth of a belief is logically independent to the certainty with which it is believed, which means that the truth of x (e.g. "Islam is true") does not logically follow merely from someone being certain that x ("Islam is true") is the case.

 

[GrowingSmaller]

If reality is defined as "subjective view of what is real" than we might create our own realities to some degree. But if it is defined as "objective fact of what is real" then reality is simply speaking mind independent. IIRC the yogachara school of buddhists (e.g. Vasubhandu and Asahnga (4th C)) believed that reality was mind dependent, like a dream, and what we experience results from our karma from past lives but has no objective existence. This idealism predated Bishop Berkley (18th C), the famous Irish idealist, by 1400 years, and people still teach and believe it to this day.

 

[mindlight]

I do not portray them as false, but I note that they were promulgated by financially interested parties trying to fill the collection plate, and as such worthy of intense scrutiny.

That's a unique view of the formation of the canon or history of the early church. It was not really a way to make money and Bible texts were hardly selected on the basis of their ability to fill collection plates. In fact I have never heard that argued before - do you have any sources for that argument.

And when observation indicates that they are false, they become even more improbable.

So are you saying that Bible texts were manufactured according to the observors agenda, that they do not correspond to certain realities, or is this commentary a rehash of some kind of untested liberal humanist language routine about scripture.

I used to work in a mental hospital, and one thing common to delusional patients was the certainty that their delusions were real.
So, when I encounter people who are certain of very unlikely events which they did not even witness themselves, I draw my own conclusions, using my God-given powers of reason. Or as a much smarter man than I put it: "I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with senses, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use and by some other means to give us knowledge which we can attain by them"

So I have to ask myself, what is more likely: That you have believed a con-man trying to hustle a buck, by selling you false comfort, or that really improbable things that were witnessed by no living human actually happened?.

I think you also have to ask questions about how the stories of these improbable things in scripture seem to have endured while other made up stories from other religions have not. The enduring quality of these stories is that they seem to have convinced enough people deeply enough to have permanently altered the cognitive models they use and to pass on that conviction to future generations also. Lies do not last cause the inauthenticity cannot be convincingly passed on. This is also a question of trust, There was no financial motive in the growth of the early church indeed quite the opposite given the marginal nature of Christianity in society. People offered the gospel often at the risk of their lives. many were converted by the courage of Christians as they faced death.

A mad man may think he is the prophet of some super duper new religion, but unless he pulls off a few miracles, a stunt as cool as the resurrection etc he makes no impact on the broad mass of people and his story dies with him. This is not what happened with Christ. We still feel the aftershocks of a cognitive earthquake of a man who impacted our forefathers 2000 years ago.

Of course, it is possible that that mental patient with his Bible really was Jesus Christ and not Jesus (hay-soos) Morales as his admission papers said. And maybe the meds they put him on gave him the delusion that he wasn't Jesus Christ.

I dont' think so, but I could be wrong. It is no problem for me to live with that degree of uncertainty.

No it is not possible that this mad guy was Jesus Christ and anyone familiar with revelation could have told you this. Christ is not physically present on earth right now and his return will be unmistakable. I could have used the same revealed understandings to refute a very large number of cult leaders who claimed to be the messiah.

From within the closed nexus of mere consciousness a man like David Koreth for instance would have been very convincing as a Jesus wannabe. It takes revelation to restore sanity.

 

[mindlight]

Yes. I am not sure, though, I have understood how Christianity solves this problem. How do you determine with certainty that the "revealed" stuff is "knowledge" and not falsehood, other than by preassuming it is? "Revealed certainties" are subject to the very same mechanisms and epostemological problems you have analysed fairly accurately.

The determination of certainty was achieved with the experience of Christ. People saw miracles, saw the fufilment of prophecy, saw the man in whom God dwelt, saw him die and rise again. The conviction of truth also entered humanity at the deepest level at this point. It was not manufactured with the text but rather described in them. The revealed understandings resonate with that quality of authenticity and that certainty is passed on because of its reality.

Believers who walk with God also experience this same enduring presence in the texts as in their lives. So the quality of the actual life that causes us to trust the text has not been withdrawn.

Those who do not know God however probably do approach the text seeing the authors role in shaping the text, checking the correspondence with known facts and as a contextual language game who signs and rules need to be reinterpreted in the modern age.

 

[mindlight]

I am not sure how authentic it is to separate objective from subjective when discussing religious experience in the Christian context. We believe in a transcendent God who entered into his creation. He experiences our reality to its deepest depths and yet somehow preserves the status of awesome almighty God.

Better is a commitment to be honest in ones own declarations. There are Christians who believe one thing and Christians who believe another and yet we share the same God. This contradiction seems to be a problem to a non Christian but it is not to Christians concerned with the calling God gives them and simply trying to be honest to that.

 

[quatona]

The determination of certainty was achieved with the experience of Christ. People saw miracles, saw the fufilment of prophecy, saw the man in whom God dwelt, saw him die and rise again. The conviction of truth also entered humanity at the deepest level at this point. It was not manufactured with the text but rather described in them. The revealed understandings resonate with that quality of authenticity and that certainty is passed on because of its reality.

Yeah, I have no doubt that that´s what you believe.

 

[KCfromNC]

The determination of certainty was achieved with the experience of Christ. People saw miracles, saw the fufilment of prophecy, saw the man in whom God dwelt, saw him die and rise again.

I thought the whole point of this exercise was that human observations were based on an inherently flawed foundation. Why bring them up as evidence now?

The conviction of truth also entered humanity at the deepest level at this point. It was not manufactured with the text but rather described in them. The revealed understandings resonate with that quality of authenticity and that certainty is passed on because of its reality.

How do you explain the fact that the majority of humanity rejects this "truth" if it is so ingrained in our being?

Believers who walk with God also experience this same enduring presence in the texts as in their lives. So the quality of the actual life that causes us to trust the text has not been withdrawn.

Will you convert to another religion if I can find they have satisfied believers?

Those who do not know God however probably do approach the text seeing the authors role in shaping the text, checking the correspondence with known facts and as a contextual language game who signs and rules need to be reinterpreted in the modern age.

In other words, if you don't already believe, you'll not see the Bible as overwhelming evidence for god.

 

[KCfromNC]

Yes. I am not sure, though, I have understood how Christianity solves this problem. How do you determine with certainty that the "revealed" stuff is "knowledge" and not falsehood, other than by preassuming it is? "Revealed certainties" are subject to the very same mechanisms and epostemological problems you have analysed fairly accurately.

Not only that, but how does adding an all-powerful being with totally mysterious and unknowable motives make us more certain about what's going on? It seems that adding a being who could change the entirety of history and everything we know without breaking a sweat should make us more uncertain about the world, not less, since anything we know could change at a moment's notice on a whim of that particular god.