LDS Epistemology - What Can We Know? How Can We Know It?

[Bat-Man]

Holy cow, I mean why would you want to know this about me-- what is the point?

Did I touch a nerve, somehow?

Heh. Sorry, I'll back off a little bit now.

... but just so you know... the most we can hope to accomplish through these little discussions, one with another, is to get to know each other, personally.

When I ask you what you think, I am asking what you think, and believe, you know.

To get to know God, I get to know God personally, myself, one with another, with Him.

I want to get it right because I want to do and be the best I can.

Okay, so who do you go to to get it right?

I go to God, myself, because I know He is good, and right.

I distrust people because my mother always told me how great I was, and she was a manipulative person.

Do you include "God" in your idea of other "people" ?

I hope you do, or that you will, trust God.

If you do trust God, you will also trust me when what I tell you is the same thing that God has told you, or will yet tell you in the future.

So now are you my shrink?

No, just someone who is trying to get to know you, just like I try to get to know all other people... including all people who are God... by communicating with them myself, personally.

[mfbukowski]

Not in my math classes. You might want to edit this. 18/32 is not the same as 1/2. I'm sure it was a typo

Man it's a good thing I didn't choose to make it more complicated. What would I have done then??? 18/36!

[mfbukowski]

Not in my math classes. You might want to edit this. 18/32 is not the same as 1/2. I'm sure it was a typo

Done! thanks.

[mfbukowski]

To get to know God, I get to know God personally, myself, one with another, with Him.

Okay, so who do you go to to get it right?

I go to God, myself, because I know He is good, and right.

Do you include "God" in your idea of other "people" ?

I have not objection to these questions, it's just kinda out of place I think here. It gives me '60's flash backs !

Yes I go to God to get it right.

I checked out your profile. I have been using oily polish remover for years, but it hasn't worked!

[mfbukowski]

I'm not all that familiar with Kierkegaard but I believe he took the second position. He essentially said that faith in God and such is unreasonable. He wasn't saying that we shouldn't have faith in God. In fact, I believe Kierkegaard would say we ought to have belief in God, namely, because God exists. But, he would say "ultimately my belief (or certainty or whatever) that God exists is unreasonable."

Really what he meant was that God is "outside" of reason. Not "unreasonable" in the sense of unfounded or irrational. God cannot be proven using reason. But neither can one prove a world outside of human experience.

That is because reason is essentially verbal, (uses propositions) and language can't "capture" God, just as it cannot capture experience. Again, describe color so that a blind person can understand it. Can't do it.

Explain God to an atheist. Can't do it. Either you know it or you don't.

[Bat-Man]

I have not objection to these questions, it's just kinda out of place I think here.

Hmm. I find it interesting that you would think so, considering that I think this thread is about what we know and how we know it.

It gives me '60's flash backs !

Memories.

Light the corners of my mind

Misty water-color memories

Of the way we were...

Yes I go to God to get it right.

That's good to hear.

I checked out your profile. I have been using oily polish remover for years, but it hasn't worked!

Spray some Windex.

Give me a word... any word... and I will show you how it is Greek!

[Brade]

Well we certainly speak that way, but I think the meaning is different than what you are asserting it means. I am actually beginning to agree with JS Mill on something which is that what you seek may be illusory.

To me, "without a doubt" means something like "I have no doubt (now) that this is the case". It means what it says, nothing more nothing less. At this time I have no doubt that something is the case. It does NOT mean "this is absolutely true and will remain so forever". If I ever mean to say "this is absolutely true and will remain so forever" (which I personally probably would never say) I would put it that way.

First, I'm not seeking for absolute certainty. I happen to believe, right now, that it is illusory and I'd like to explain why. In an earlier post I described more clearly what it is I am arguing against. I'm arguing that it is not alright to have the strongest epistemic attitude about religious propositions. If, when you say, "I know without a doubt" you actually mean that you know with a high "degree" of certainty but still hold open the possibility for error in your view then I don't believe you are saying that you have the strongest epistemic attitude. You're just saying you have a very strong epistemic attitude.

Would virtually everyone say that they have "no doubt" that the pyramid of Cheops will still exist in a hundred years? I think we might all say that. I will. I have not doubt that it will be there. But I could be mistaken.

I have to admit, it's difficult for me to understand how speaking in terms of "no doubt" can mean that you still entertain the possibility of being wrong. A doubt, it seems to me, is just a possible scenario in which you could be wrong. Therefore, if you can imagine a possible scenario in which you could be wrong then it seems inconsistent to speak in terms which assert that you do not recognize that there are possible scenarios in which you could be wrong.

You don't even have to grant this principle to an extreme skeptical degree. Just consider your own pyramid example. I don't need to imagine evil demons or that I might be dreaming to come up with a possible scenario in which the Cheops pyramid will not exist in 100 years.

But, I recognize a distinction you're making right now. You're saying that when you utter "I have no doubt" you mean "I have no doubt at this time" or something of that sort. What you're saying is that you're not seriously considering any possible defeaters of your claim at this moment even if you recognize that there are possible defeaters that cannot be logically ruled out.

But then I wonder, if that's what you're saying, is it right to use terms like "I know" and "I'm certain." At first, it would seem perfectly consistent with saying "I have no doubt" to also say "I know" and "I'm certain." But that only works if having "no doubt" is the same as ruling out even logical possibilities. To say you are "certain" there is a cat on the table is just the shorthand of saying you are certain what is not on the table is a dog, or a pen, or a man, or nothing at all...and so on.

We can probably imagine a future situation which could negate practically anything. So what?

Good question. So what? In practical terms the fact that we can imagine possible scenarios ought not keep us from behaving and believing the way we do given the evidence we have at the time. I'm not arguing it should keep us from behavior and belief. I'm arguing that it should keep us from claiming we are certain. That's it.

There are two negative effects in religious contexts (particularly Mormonism) I can see, and have seen, resulting from claiming certainty when you are not justified to make that claim. First, in Mormonism, to have certainty (perfect knowledge or whatever you want to call it) is, in our literature, described in terms of being an ultimate goal. If I mistakenly believe I have achieved that before I actually have I may personally damn my own progress. Additionally, if we teach people through the missionaries or whatever (and I believe we do teach this) that once that have a good feeling associated with a "Mormon" activity then they will have achieved certainty about some Mormon proposition, we will possibly engender this bad attitude in them and frustrate their progress.

Second, when we speak in terms of certainty before we are justified in doing so we add to the religious confusion in the world by creating a stronger tension between things we believe we know for certain and things others believe they know for certain by virtue of the same method.

I just received my copies of Warranted Christian Belief by Alvin Plantinga and Perceiving God by William Alston. I'll be going through them both in the next month and will post thoughts as I go along.

[Bat-Man]

ba81,

You brought up some good points in your last post, and I agree that we should be careful about stating what we know without a doubt, but I think it's also important to note that it is actually possible to know something without a doubt and that level of certainty should be our goal.

Personally, at this time, I do know many things are true beyond even a shadow of doubt, and when I share what I know about those things with other people I have a clear idea about what I mean in my own mind, even though it may not come across that way to other people. And I think it works for everyone else in pretty much the same way.

Example: Someone else (a woman, for example) says:

I know the Church is true.

How many times have you heard a woman say that while thinking, in your own mind:

What the heck is she talking about?

I'm pretty sure the woman who is saying that understand what she is saying when she says that, but is what she is thinking when she says that necessarily coming through to someone else who is listening to her say that? I say No, not necessarily, but I do believe it can, though, at least sometimes.

Now try the same thing in reverse, but instead of someone else saying something, YOU are the one who is speaking.

Have you ever said something like: 'I know the Church is true' while knowing what YOU mean when you say that? I would hope so, but still that doesn't necessarily mean that someone else is going to understand you or what you mean when you say that.

What we know and how we know what we know is a very personal process, and I hope that all of us can somehow learn something from each other by communicating with each other in some kind of understandable way.

[mfbukowski]

First, I'm not seeking for absolute certainty. I happen to believe, right now, that it is illusory and I'd like to explain why. In an earlier post I described more clearly what it is I am arguing against. I'm arguing that it is not alright to have the strongest epistemic attitude about religious propositions. If, when you say, "I know without a doubt" you actually mean that you know with a high "degree" of certainty but still hold open the possibility for error in your view then I don't believe you are saying that you have the strongest epistemic attitude. You're just saying you have a very strong epistemic attitude....

But, I recognize a distinction you're making right now. You're saying that when you utter "I have no doubt" you mean "I have no doubt at this time" or something of that sort. What you're saying is that you're not seriously considering any possible defeaters of your claim at this moment even if you recognize that there are possible defeaters that cannot be logically ruled out.

But then I wonder, if that's what you're saying, is it right to use terms like "I know" and "I'm certain." At first, it would seem perfectly consistent with saying "I have no doubt" to also say "I know" and "I'm certain." But that only works if having "no doubt" is the same as ruling out even logical possibilities. To say you are "certain" there is a cat on the table is just the shorthand of saying you are certain what is not on the table is a dog, or a pen, or a man, or nothing at all...and so on....

Good question. So what? In practical terms the fact that we can imagine possible scenarios ought not keep us from behaving and believing the way we do given the evidence we have at the time. I'm not arguing it should keep us from behavior and belief. I'm arguing that it should keep us from claiming we are certain. That's it.

There are two negative effects in religious contexts (particularly Mormonism) I can see, and have seen, resulting from claiming certainty when you are not justified to make that claim. First, in Mormonism, to have certainty (perfect knowledge or whatever you want to call it) is, in our literature, described in terms of being an ultimate goal. If I mistakenly believe I have achieved that before I actually have I may personally damn my own progress. Additionally, if we teach people through the missionaries or whatever (and I believe we do teach this) that once that have a good feeling associated with a "Mormon" activity then they will have achieved certainty about some Mormon proposition, we will possibly engender this bad attitude in them and frustrate their progress.

Second, when we speak in terms of certainty before we are justified in doing so we add to the religious confusion in the world by creating a stronger tension between things we believe we know for certain and things others believe they know for certain by virtue of the same method.

Well there is the long answer and the short. I think for now the short will be better because it will emphasize the points I am trying to make.

I am not sure what you want here. On one hand you appear to want the "highest epistemic attitude", but then you say it is "illusory".

I think that the notion of the "strongest epistemic attitude" exists only on a priori propositions and no others, because those a priori propositions are self-defining. I am absolutely certain that a=a because that is what I mean when I utter the proposition in the first place. It means what it means. But these propositions do not convey any real information. They are the rules by which information is conveyed, so of course they are "perfect". They are "hard wired" into us, and we cannot go beyond our programming. We cannot conceive of situations beyond which we can conceive. We have limits.

The problem with any scale is that it has to be calibrated. If we were making a primitive thermometer we might freeze water, and put our thermometer to it and call its reading "zero". But in this case, your "certainty thermometer" is being read from the top down -- from the most certain to the least certain. But you have set your "highest setting" too high. It is an unachievable objective. You will never get ANY proposition to measure up to it, so why call this abstraction which you can verbalize "the hightest epistemic attitude"? It is off the charts on the real curve of possible proposition certainty for religious or really any propositions other than a priori ones.

I have an engineer friend who would call this trying to "machine butter". In a machine shop, you can only get the finest tolerances in the hardest materials. If you want perfect tolerances in all situations ideally you would need a material which does not expand or contract, wear down or ever alter its shape in any way. You are looking for "higher tolerances" in propositions than exist.

I think the problem is that you are trying to live up to an absolute ideal which does not exist linguistically. Language is the butter you are trying to machine to tolerances which are too close, to carry the analogy further. Language just cannot handle the tolerances you expect of it. Language itself is too ambiguous and dependent on context to get that level of certainty out of any proposition.

"The sky is blue" What shade? Pale blue? But here it is more blue than there, so are both blues true? But there are some clouds way over there- do they count? And what is the sky really except the atmosphere -- it is a colorless gas, so why does it appear blue? But it is not blue in itself. So what do you mean by "sky" in the first place? "the sky" is nothing real, so you are lying about something which does not really exist etc etc. Language is limited to what is meant, to its context. Read some later Wittgenstein if you haven't and you will see what I mean. Philosophical Investigations would be a good start. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophical_Investigations

So why are you worried about your certainty level being too "low" for "religous certainty" when in fact, it is as high as it can get?

I disagree that we teach that a "good feeling" is as "high as we can get" in a testimony. Seeing the face of the savior is a tad above that, and I think there are plenty of references to that as an objective. And you hear all the time people saying things like "I was sure when I joined the church that the church was true, but I know so much more now".

I don't know if you are married, but I know you are relatively young and probably wise beyond your years, but what you haven't learned yet (maybe - I don't really know) is that certainty and love can continue growing even from the time you think that you are at the top of both. I loved my wife as much as I could the day we were married, but now 28 years later, I love her more than - I would say a hundred fold insofar as that makes sense. And every day as I experience more, my testimony grows too. So my advice is don't get too hung up on the words when we are talking about organic growth. While you are growing the proposition "I am the tallest I can be (for now)" is always true, even as you grow in size.

I am as certain as I can be about these things.

PHEW I'm glad I didn't go for the long answer! I am sure you are too!

[mfbukowski]

Hmm. I find it interesting that you would think so, considering that I think this thread is about what we know and how we know it.

Memories.

Light the corners of my mind

Misty water-color memories

Of the way we were...

That's good to hear.

Spray some Windex.

Give me a word... any word... and I will show you how it is Greek!

It's all greek to me!

[Bat-Man]

It's all greek to me!

... to me too, including the Word, Jesus Christ.

... and, fortunately, I do understand at least a little bit of Greek.

And btw, to get back on the topic of this thread:

Have you ever tried conveying your sense of humor to someone else who just doesn't get it?

I'm not trying to imply anything sinister by this question. I'm just wondering if you know what I mean.

I believe the ability to convey humor is practically mandatory for all in intelligent conversation.

... which helps explain, at least to me, why everyone really does want to be a Comedian.

p.s. (or maybe p.p.s.) If you haven't seen it, my last couple of lines in my last post were from 'My Big Fat Greek Wedding' and I recommend that you see it, if you like to watch good movies.

[Brade]

I think we might be talking past each other. Perhaps, I think you may think I'm espousing the view that I'm actually trying to argue against. Hopefully I can make this clear in my response to your last post. Let me know if I've succeeded in doing so.

I am not sure what you want here. On one hand you appear to want the "highest epistemic attitude", but then you say it is "illusory".

Just to be clear, I don't "want the highest epistemic attitude." In fact, I'm trying to argue that we can't have the highest epistemic attitude.

I think that the notion of the "strongest epistemic attitude" exists only on a priori propositions and no others, because those a priori propositions are self-defining. I am absolutely certain that a=a because that is what I mean when I utter the proposition in the first place. It means what it means. But these propositions do not convey any real information. They are the rules by which information is conveyed, so of course they are "perfect". They are "hard wired" into us, and we cannot go beyond our programming. We cannot conceive of situations beyond which we can conceive. We have limits.

The problem with any scale is that it has to be calibrated. If we were making a primitive thermometer we might freeze water, and put our thermometer to it and call its reading "zero". But in this case, your "certainty thermometer" is being read from the top down -- from the most certain to the least certain. But you have set your "highest setting" too high. It is an unachievable objective. You will never get ANY proposition to measure up to it, so why call this abstraction which you can verbalize "the hightest epistemic attitude"? It is off the charts on the real curve of possible proposition certainty for religious or really any propositions other than a priori ones.

I understand from your last post that you don't believe you have the highest epistemic attitude toward your religious beliefs. However, many people do. I"m merely setting out to show why it's wrong to have the highest epistemic attitude. That, in no way, is to say that I think people have no good reason to believe religious things very strongly. The answer seems obvious enough to me and apparently to you too. But, many people believe that when they say "I know without any doubt" they actually mean they have ruled out every logical possibility. More on this below.

I have an engineer friend who would call this trying to "machine butter". In a machine shop, you can only get the finest tolerances in the hardest materials. If you want perfect tolerances in all situations ideally you would need a material which does not expand or contract, wear down or ever alter its shape in any way. You are looking for "higher tolerances" in propositions than exist.

I think the problem is that you are trying to live up to an absolute ideal which does not exist linguistically. Language is the butter you are trying to machine to tolerances which are too close, to carry the analogy further. Language just cannot handle the tolerances you expect of it. Language itself is too ambiguous and dependent on context to get that level of certainty out of any proposition.

"The sky is blue" What shade? Pale blue? But here it is more blue than there, so are both blues true? But there are some clouds way over there- do they count? And what is the sky really except the atmosphere -- it is a colorless gas, so why does it appear blue? But it is not blue in itself. So what do you mean by "sky" in the first place? "the sky" is nothing real, so you are lying about something which does not really exist etc etc. Language is limited to what is meant, to its context. Read some later Wittgenstein if you haven't and you will see what I mean. Philosophical Investigations would be a good start. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophical_Investigations

So why are you worried about your certainty level being too "low" for "religous certainty" when in fact, it is as high as it can get?

I may grant that my attitude about my religious beliefs is as high as it can get. The problem then is that I have no way of actually knowing if my religious beliefs actually tell me something true about the world. I say "problem" but I don't really see this as a problem. This is a problem for people that believe they have the highest epistemic attitude. My attitude is this. My best evidence (what I believe about the world, my experiences and so on) give me good reason to be Mormon and believe in Mormon doctrine. But, I don't believe I have, yet, any way of knowing whether or not those beliefs correspond to the way the world really is. I'm fine with that and I go about testifying in accordance with that belief. I'm working under the premise of faith and my hope is that if this stuff is true, one day, either in this life or the next, God, assuming He does in fact exist, will grant me "perfect knowledge" of these things.

I disagree that we teach that a "good feeling" is as "high as we can get" in a testimony. Seeing the face of the savior is a tad above that, and I think there are plenty of references to that as an objective. And you hear all the time people saying things like "I was sure when I joined the church that the church was true, but I know so much more now".

Ah Ha! This touches on exactly the reason I've set out to study this problem. I was teaching an EQ lesson one Sunday and, owing to my philosophical training, I thought I'd raise the question of epistemology in religion in a non-technical way just to see what people's intuitions were. I asked how many people felt that they were absolutely certain such and such Mormon proposition was true (i.e. Joseph Smith saw God, the Book of Mormon is an inspired work of God, and so on). Virtually everyone believed they were absolutely certain of it. They had no doubt and further questioning established that most of those people believed they knew in such a way that no logical possibility (the evil demon or brain in a vat), were it to occur, would be evidence against what they claim to know. I asked for a reason in support of their attitude. Virtually all of them gave an account of the experience of the Holy Ghost and described feelings associated with religious behavior. You see where this is going.

I then asked the following. "If God were to physically appear to you tonight while you were praying before going to bed and were to communicate to you the truthfulness of His own existence and the truthfulness of X and Y, would you be more sure than you are now?" Many of them claimed that they would be in spite of the fact that they just made the claim that they already were as certain as anyone can possibly be about anything. This is strange. For if you possessed the highest degree of certainty anyone can obtain how could it be that given some new evidence you could be more certain about the same propositions?

But then many of those people who said they were as certain as they could be, recognizing what they were just saying, admitted that they would not be any more certain in the presence of God of His existence than they are now having never been in His presence. And this too is a strange result. Many of those people claimed to be justified of the factual nature of their claims by Holy Ghost experiences they themselves described as good feelings associated with religious behavior.

So, on the one hand we have people contradicting themselves. On the other hand we have people that believe good feelings tell them exactly what is true about the world. The further problem is that by very similar, if not exactly the same descriptions of experiences, we have people claiming some other proposition is really how things are and that proposition contradicts these other propositions that somebody else asserts on the basis of the same sort of experience. This is the problem of religious diversity.

Now, it should be very obvious that the fact of somebody else claiming something contradictory to what I claim that would not in anyway change the fact that what I believe is true if it is actually the case that what I believe is true is true (phew). The problem, however, is that I have no way of knowing that what I believe is true even if I do have good reason for believing it. My position is that I ought not worry about the truth value of my religious belief if I believe it based on the best evidence available to me. Perhaps I'm taking a pragmatic approach here. But, many people are insisting, many in my EQ for example, that not only do they have good reasons to believe as they do but they also know a further fact about their beliefs and that is that they are, in fact, true. And, no matter how the table turns, I simply cannot see any good reason by which they would be able to make this further claim.

I don't know if you are married, but I know you are relatively young and probably wise beyond your years, but what you haven't learned yet (maybe - I don't really know) is that certainty and love can continue growing even from the time you think that you are at the top of both. I loved my wife as much as I could the day we were married, but now 28 years later, I love her more than - I would say a hundred fold insofar as that makes sense. And every day as I experience more, my testimony grows too. So my advice is don't get too hung up on the words when we are talking about organic growth. While you are growing the proposition "I am the tallest I can be (for now)" is always true, even as you grow in size.

For what it's worth I am married. I'm also relatively young. Whether I'm wise beyond my years is debatable. In any event, what you just described sounds exactly like the approach I'm trying to take. I'm trying to argue against the view that states that I do have the ultimate goal right now based on the evidence I have right now. My hope, as I expressed it further, is that I will come to know (without any doubt) that these things are true. I'm fine with not being able to know that my beliefs are true right now. I believe this, in fact, is what the Gospel teachings.

[JDave]

Some questions for ba81:

Can someone have the HEA in this life regarding something other than a priori propositions?

Did Joseph Smith have the HEA with respect to the existence of God and Jesus Christ?

Are you basically arguing that we are meant to live by faith in this life?

[Brade]

Can someone have the HEA in this life regarding something other than a priori propositions?

Yes, I think so.

Did Joseph Smith have the HEA with respect to the existence of God and Jesus Christ?

Yes, I think so.

Are you basically arguing that we are meant to live by faith in this life?

I believe that's right. I believe such a view is supported strongly by the Book of Mormon. But, in saying that, I don't think I'm committed to the view that we can never have the HEA in this life.

Also, I mentioned before that I am now going through William Alston's book Perceiving God. Just from what I've read so far I'm going to say it is a masterpiece of religious philosophy. I think anyone involved in religion, philosophers and non-philosophers alike, ought to check it out. As I get a firmer grasp on what he is saying I'll post thoughts here for discussion. For now I will say this. It provides the strongest case I've come across for the rationality of religious belief based on religious experience. However, Alston appears to recognize the problem of religious diversity and I believe he's going to end up saying something similar to what I've outlined in this thread. Which is to say, we are sometimes justified in our beliefs based on our religious experiences, but not clearly justified in the further claim that we know our beliefs are true.

An interesting upshot of Alston's claim, if I've got it right, is that I might not be able to make the claim that it is ever possible to know one's beliefs are true even if one is as justified as can be to claim they believe them. This is because Alston seems to speak broadly about all religious experience (he calls is Mystical Perception). This means I might be forced to claim that even experiences like Joseph Smiths would not justify Smith to make the claim that he had the HEA. Now, I might be inclined to go along with that. I think I'm comfortable with the idea that we can't ever be as sure about our experiences as we can be about the fact that, for example, I'm thinking.

So, perhaps a more interesting thesis would be to try to show how Mormons, due to their doctrines on the physicality of God, are in a unique position to be able to claim that it is possible to have religious experiences of a sort that would justify the HEA. I would have to borrow on the philosophy of those that claim we can be just as sure of our physical experiences as we can about analytic truths. Given that, I could make the move that only Mormons have a world view sufficient to allow one to obtain, in this life or the next, the HEA. I haven't thought this through. It's sort of a recent train of thought based on some of my Alston reading. On the face of it, it sounds like a more interesting and more controversial paper than what I originally proposed at the beginning of this thread.

Any thoughts on the matter would be appreciated.

[JDave]

Yes, I think so.

...

Thanks. I think I have a better handle on your angle.

[Brade]

Thanks. I think I have a better handle on your angle.

[mfbukowski]

... to me too, including the Word, Jesus Christ.

... and, fortunately, I do understand at least a little bit of Greek.

And btw, to get back on the topic of this thread:

Have you ever tried conveying your sense of humor to someone else who just doesn't get it?

I'm not trying to imply anything sinister by this question. I'm just wondering if you know what I mean.

I believe the ability to convey humor is practically mandatory for all in intelligent conversation.

... which helps explain, at least to me, why everyone really does want to be a Comedian.

p.s. (or maybe p.p.s.) If you haven't seen it, my last couple of lines in my last post were from 'My Big Fat Greek Wedding' and I recommend that you see it, if you like to watch good movies.

Yes, I got it! Windex -the universal cure!

I agree that humor is one of those mysteries of life. It's like a testimony. Either you get it or you don't. Why don't we talk about the theology of humor? Or better yet, the humor of theology which is HIGHLY relevant here!

[mfbukowski]

So, perhaps a more interesting thesis would be to try to show how Mormons, due to their doctrines on the physicality of God, are in a unique position to be able to claim that it is possible to have religious experiences of a sort that would justify the HEA. I would have to borrow on the philosophy of those that claim we can be just as sure of our physical experiences as we can about analytic truths. Given that, I could make the move that only Mormons have a world view sufficient to allow one to obtain, in this life or the next, the HEA. I haven't thought this through. It's sort of a recent train of thought based on some of my Alston reading. On the face of it, it sounds like a more interesting and more controversial paper than what I originally proposed at the beginning of this thread.

Any thoughts on the matter would be appreciated.

Well it took some hassling to figure out, but I think we are pretty close to agreeing! My condolences! I think you are right on the money.

Here's what I think the problem is:

I absolutely agree that we as Mormons do not know what we have philosophically, and how this world view can unify everything from cutting edge physics to many if not all traditional philosophical problems. And the direction I would suggest you go is through William James, John Dewey and Ludwig Wittgenstein.

I will spill the beans and tell you what I really think

The problem is that you think that there is an "outside world" out there that our experiences correspond to. Those not acquainted with philosophy might think I just confirmed my wife's enduring confidence in my craziness, but let me continue.

Since all we can know of the world is experience, forget the "fact" that there is an "outside world" at all. This instantly does away with metaphysics and reduces epistemology by a big chunk. Most of the problems go away.

Ultimately what it gives us is what I call a "theistic relativism". Man is the measure of all things, but God is a man. Humanism as a philosophy becomes theistic. There is no absolute except God in a sense. But He progresses eternally, which means He changes. There is an interaction between God and man that produces that change in both of us.

It is the intereaction between people and experience which produces culture. I am on a desert island. I am cold. I am hungry. I make a shelter. I make some weapons to kill food. I have affected the enviroment and it has affected me.

Fast forward a couple of thousand years, and the shelter has become architecture and cities. Quest for food has become agriculture. In another couple of thousand years, I rarely interact with "nature" at all.

I sit on a computer and order stuff on ebay and pay with plastic. I grab a burger and go fill my tank. I make my living online. Checks come in the mail, or are directly deposited to my account. The only "reality" I experience is cultural. Culture has replaced nature in my interactive life. This is a very Deweyian notion.

Culture and language program the way I think, and we as a race produce culture. Reality is human reality. Everything is experience. Organic models replace the "cut in stone" absolutism of Plato, and its inherent dualism. "Perfect" no longer means "completed" because nothing is ever completed. Think of life and growth and development instead of truth as absolute. Truth is about propositions, not about absolutes.

But can we have the HEA in a world of experience only? Of course! Your EQ informal survey proved that! We can be "certain" but yet get more certain if we have an experience which causes us to do so (the appearance of God himself in your example) Certainty itself is relative, but is still produced by experience. So I think we need a "sliding" HEA scale

The reason Mormons don't understand this stuff is that they are still trying to force God into some greek philosophical ideal of The Absolute. Not to say He is not Asolute. But He is not the Greek ideal!

We create reality with Him. In culture, we partake in creation of a human reality, with God at its head as our ultimate model and goal -- to be like him. Man, including God, is the "organizer" of reality. In our cultural perceptions we do that every moment as we sit at our computer screens and organize -- two ways-- inputting and outputting -- pixels of light and dark into worlds of thought. That is what we are doing at this very second. Creating a world out of the chaos of perception.

The only other philosophy which has made man God was, unfortunately, Marxism. Obviously, it was a counterfeit version of the truth. But that is why Mormons have missed what value there is in the Marxist philosophical heritage, through Hegel. So to get into this you have to sift throught mountains of leftist social theory to get at the good stuff.

What is "eternal progression" if not a Hegelian notion? When Nietzsche makes the Ubermensch God, he unwittingly falls into the truth of Christianity! It is the ultimate irony!

When I came to Mormonism from being a communist social theory guy 30 years ago, I instantly recognized the theory. It was the same, but it included God. I surrendered. How could I NOT?

We are so boxed into making sure we fit with what has been erroneously defined as "mainline Chrstianity" with their Greek dualism, we just don't even get it.

So experience is primary. Certainty is a greek bugaboo. Give it up! Read Dewey's Quest for Certainty, and Wittgenstein's On Certainty.

This is why there is so much of Whitehead and process philosophy in late Mormon thought. It is all really Hegelian! Man is the measure of all things becomes God is the measure of all things, when God becomes human.

And that, grasshopper, is your problem!

Here's one link:

http://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/...ks/us/dewey.htm

I hate the title of the website but there's great stuff here. Read Rorty's stuff here too. You are a "pragmatist" after all. Welcome to the club.

[Bat-Man]

I agree that humor is one of those mysteries of life. It's like a testimony. Either you get it or you don't.

Exactly.

... and I'm sure you know at least a few people who it seems just don't ever really get it.

Why don't we talk about the theology of humor?

It does come up, now and then, but it seems that some people just don't get it... yet again.

Or better yet, the humor of theology which is HIGHLY relevant here!

I have found the use of humor to be very helpful in the study of God and things of God including people who seek to gain knowledge of God, but still, yet again, it seems that some people just don't get it... which actually makes it even more humorous in my own perspective.

[mfbukowski]

This then is the fundamental issue for present philosophy. Is the doctrine justified that knowledge is valid in the degree in which it is a revelation of antecedent existences or Being? Is the doctrine justified that regulative ends and purposes have validity only when they can be shown to be properties belonging to things, whether as existences or as essences, apart from human action? It is proposed to make another start. Desires, affections, preferences, needs and interests at least exist in human experience; they are characteristics of it. Knowledge about nature also exists. What does this knowledge imply and entail with respect to the guidance of our emotional and volitional life? How shall the latter lay hold of what is known in order to make it of service?

These latter questions do not seem to many thinkers to have the dignity that is attached to the traditional problems of philosophy. They are proximate questions, not ultimate. They do not concern Being and Knowledge "in themselves' and at large, but the state of existence at specified times and places and the state of affection, plans and purposes under concrete circumstances. They are not concerned with framing a general theory of reality, knowledge and value once for all, but with finding how authentic beliefs about existence as they currently exist can operate fruitfully and efficaciously in connection with the practical problems that are urgent in actual life.

John Dewey "The Question of Certainty"

http://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/...ks/us/dewey.htm

[mfbukowski]

Exactly.

... and I'm sure you know at least a few people who it seems just don't ever really get it.

It does come up, now and then, but it seems that some people just don't get it... yet again.

I have found the use of humor to be very helpful in the study of God and things of God including people who seek to gain knowledge of God, but still, yet again, it seems that some people just don't get it... which actually makes it even more humorous in my own perspective.

If God is perfect in all things, he has to be the funniest being in the universe!

[Brade]

You've definitely given me quite a bit to think about. At least, I think I have a better understanding of where you're coming from. However, it's difficult for me to stay on board with the rejection of "the world out there."

I can appreciate that this philosophical move does resolve some perplexing problems. It's just so difficult to discard the idea of an "outside world." If I'm understanding you correctly then discarding the "outside world" idea isn't necessarily an assertion that there is no outside world, rather it's just a pragmatic move of "whether there is or there isn't, who cares?" But, I do care. Until I stop caring about whether my experience corresponds to what's "out there" I've got to deal with all these annoying problems.

But can we have the HEA in a world of experience only? Of course! Your EQ informal survey proved that! We can be "certain" but yet get more certain if we have an experience which causes us to do so (the appearance of God himself in your example) Certainty itself is relative, but is still produced by experience. So I think we need a "sliding" HEA scale

I'm not sure how the EQ experience shows that we can be more certain when we are already certain. It may show that. But it could also show that people are mistaken when the believe they are certain. Of course, which side you fall on can depend on what you believe about truth. It's obvious by now that I accept the correspondence theory of truth.

[Bat-Man]

If God is perfect in all things, he has to be the funniest being in the universe!

God is perfect in all "good" things, including all "good" humor, but there is such a thing as "dark" humor, and He is not good at that... because there is no way to be good at that... because it is dark, and not good.

Have you ever seen a good person respond to a "dark" joke?

What is funny to one isn't funny to the other.

... because you have to be on the corresponding side to "get it".

[Brade]

God is perfect in all "good" things, including all "good" humor, but there is such a thing as "dark" humor, and He is not good at that... because there is no way to be good at that... because it is dark, and not good.

Have you ever seen a good person respond to a "dark" joke?

What is funny to one isn't funny to the other.

... because you have to be on the corresponding side to "get it".

Since you insist on derailing my thread...

"A philosopher," said the theologian, "is like a blind man in a darkened room looking for a black cat that isn't there."

"That's right," the philosopher replied, "and if he were a theologian, he'd find it."

A philosopher went into a closet for ten years to contemplate the question, What is life? When he came out, he went into the street and met an old colleague, who asked him where in heaven's name he had been all those years.

"In a closet," he repied. "I wanted to know what life really is."

"And have you found an answer?"

"Yes," he replied. "I think it can best be expressed by saying that life is like a bridge."

"That's all well and good," replied the colleague, "but can you be a little more explicit? Can you tell me how life is like a bridge?"

"Oh," replied the philosopher after some thought, "maybe you're right; perhaps life is not like a bridge."

Descartes is sitting in a bar, having a drink. The bartender asks him if he would like another. "I think not," he says and vanishes in a puff of logic.

An angel came down for a meeting of the American Philosophical Association. Greeting the assembled philosophers, the angel offered to answer a single question for them. Immediately the philosophers set to arguing about what they should ask. So the angel said, "Alright, you figure out what you want to ask. I'll come back tomorrow." And he left the philosophers to deliberate.

Some of the philosophers favored asking conjunctive questions, but others argued persuasively that the angel probably wouldn't count this as a single question. One philosopher wanted to ask "What is the best question to ask?", in the hope that some day another angel might make a similar offer, at which point they could then ask the best question. But this suggestion was rejected by those who feared that no such opportunity would arise and did not want to waste their only question.

Finally, the philosophers agreed on the following question: "What is the ordered pair whose first member is the best question to ask, and whose second member is the answer to that question?" Satisfied with their decision, the philosophers awaited the angel's return the next day, whereupon they posed their question. And the angel replied: "It is the ordered pair whose first member is the question you just asked, and whose second member is the answer I am now giving." And then he disappeared.

[Bat-Man]

Since you insist on derailing my thread...

That was funny.

... the idea that I was derailing your thread.