The Non-Imperative for a historical Book of Mormon

[mfbukowski]

9 hours ago, Joshua Valentine said:

While there is much that is interesting here in light of the LDS Church, I will let that go and respond with more important things:

There´s some quote somewhere, I think, that says something to the effect that to try to represent God with anything is to try to represent God with what is not God and so to try to represent God (not just in image - wood, stone - idol-like) even with words, which are also not God, is to create something that is not God.  While this is not in itself wrong, it is the mistaking of what is made in material or in word for the God That Actually Exists wherein folly (and idolatry) lie.

As you said, mfbukowski: 

Many people may think that worshiping idols was wrong because it was the worship of ¨other gods¨, that it´s wrong because they are worshiping other gods (whether they exist or not)- but what they may miss is that worshiping anything other than the God That Actually Exists (even the God we think we ¨know¨) is worshiping an ¨other god¨, something not Actually God, and thus is idolatry and foolish. [Thank God for mercy!]

Lastly, I remember discussing with an LDS missionary his stated belief that God may lead people to other religions temporarily in preparation for eventually joining the true church in the LDS Church and my challenging him on if he believes that all other religions are preparation for his religion how does he know to stop at his church with the LDS Church and that the LDS Church is not simply another religion on the path to the ¨true one¨. At one point he asked me what I suggested he do, I told him that, rather than pray to the ¨LDS God¨ or any other God based on his knowledge or belief, he should pray to the ¨actual God¨ or ¨the God that actually exists¨ and ask for mercy and grace and help to learn true things and to believe true things about and to have faith in the Actual God and about the Actual God´s purposes for humanity and the missionary, himself.

I believe this is a practical outworking of the recognition that we don´t know God perfectly in total or even in any one respect. And something like you said:

 

 

Again, thanks so much for your open and personal reply, mfbukowski.

Thinking back I think you used to post here a bit and as I recall we hit it off pretty well then?  Could that be right?

Yes I agree completely with the spirit of this-  and I will go further here than I have before I think because this board is quite homogeneous in its set beliefs and doing so is usually pointless.

Rorty- one of my faves- sees speaking about God as identical to speaking about Cartesian "reality" as if both are talking about entities which cannot be "known" because both are beyond perception.  Some if not many physicists are anti-realists- using the philosophical term- and understand that "ultimate reality" is unknowable for many reasons, but to make it easy a good analogy is the Heisenberg uncertainty principle- that observation itself alters what is observed.  All this is cartoonish shorthand obviously to explain such complicated areas in a few words trying to speak to a general audience!

So Rorty connects the belief that science is a "mirror of nature" with the belief that God can be known as well and I think he is right.  One can never get "outside" perception to know ultimate reality in both arenas- so even scientists who actually believe they are studying "reality" are in fact creating something like idols reflecting more their own egos than anything else.  We look out into what we think is "nature" and simply see ourselves looking at nature and learning more about our own perceptions than what is "out there".

I think though like physics and the sciences, because we will never "get to" ultimate reality it is useful to consciously create paradigms according to what we find fits with our personalities and cultural concepts- as they evolve- to find what "works" to give ourselves individually and collectively meaning in our lives.

So I think ideas themselves evolve- and as I recall that idea itself was the original meaning of the word "meme" which recently I have only seen used to describe those silly little internet gif-thingies.  But originally as I recall, it meant an idea - which like a "gene"- evolved- using the similar sound between "mean" and "gene"- to give us meaning in our lives.   These "meaning genes" like genes themselves evolved because they had "survival value"- practical utilitarian ability to advance meaning in our lives.  At least that was my understanding.

So what is the "best" paradigm for humanity in general to give meaning to the lives of the most people?  What do human morals tell us about what the human race has found indispensable for its survival??

I would suggest the 10 commandments and the Golden Rule are pretty good starts in that direction with certain modifications of course- knowing that wars are sometimes necessary- so that "Thou shalt not kill" is not an absolute, and none of these beliefs are really ever "absolute" and must be adopted - as indeed courts do- for the circumstances at hand.  

And the legal system itself is a marvel in its evolution of what humans find to be "indispensable" to living peacefully.

So were I Emperor of the universe  and "Philosopher King" I would dictate that all obey the legal system, and the 10 commandments (as modified by the legal system) because principles have evolved to describe human morality- these "meaning genes"- have staying power. Philosophically at this point I am pretty much a Utilitarian- John Stuart Mill all the way.

Now to God.

Does God exist?  - Each person needs to develop their own spiritual experience pattern and modify it as necessary- and spiritual experiences like any experiences are "all we have to go on" as William James would agree- a good essay on this from James would be "Will to Believe" and/or "Radical Empiricism"- which essentially allows for meaning to be directly part of human experience.

And that is also Moroni 10: 4-6, Alma 32 starting around verse 25 or so, James 1:5 and many others.  You want to know about God??

Ask Him!!  And He will answer!

I kind of see James as one of the Heisenbergs of philosophy- the observer is now unified with the observation and becomes part of it-  because we can observe nothing without an observer!   I mean for me this is kind of a "duh" idea!   But frankly this is the hardest for most folks here to understand.  The observer is included in- and part of-  the observation.  There are no facts, only interpretations and paradigms- and this itself is a paradigm.  - that of course is a modification of Neitzsche.

So if you ask God and get a response- what does that tell you?

In the human way of seeing the world- that means that is an indication of "personhood" in my book.  I talk to the universe and it answers??  Meh.   Kind of vague.  I ask for something and the "Universe" tells me to fergitaboutit or "Explore further" or "Yes" or "No"? and it seems the advice I get from "the universe" is VERY personal?

THAT has been my personal experience.

So being a human I presume there is another human- or person of some kind- on the other end of that difficult to establish phone connection.  That is my personal spiritual experience which I get to count as "real" since the observer is now included in the observed in Radical Empiricism.

And so now we have a Personal God.

So is this Person a Trinity?   For me this never worked.  No, its a PERSON I talk to - it's not some vague three in one thingy made of "substance or "essence"- my poor little brain cannot even figure out what that "stuff" is or what the heck Plato is talking about with his Forms- and Aristotle and Aquinas with their "substance"

But yet Substance and Platonic Forms are better than nothing as paradigms- they have served as utilitarian ideas to give people joy for thousands of years.

So of course people are going to knock around trying to find the IDEAL PARADIGM in the same way science is trying to find the Theory of Everything

So what IS the "Ideal Paradigm" for Humanity?

If you want to somehow jam three or more people into your theory for whatever reason let's make it totally anthropomorphic and make it a "family"- unified by LOVE!  It says in some scripture "God is love", right?    So if three people are one- the only that makes sense to me is that they are one in LOVE or- if you want to get more people into that- make them one in "purpose" as well!   So now "Save the Whales" could be "one in purpose" or "stop global warming" could be one in purpose, but let's make it bigger!   Let's make the PURPOSE to be making the best POSSIBLE humans!

In fact let's make our PURPOSE of our Love Family - what is most JOYFUL in life.  What paradigms will make the best HUMANS and make humans the BEST?

Everyone wants to live forever- so let's throw that in!   Everyone wants to be with their families forever so let's throw that into our ideal paradigm!

If God is transcendent and busy being OTHER than we are- how can he communicate with us as a PERSON?  Can't do that,!  

So He's not transcendent, so he must be immanent in the Universe somehow to talk to us and communicate with us- in short he must also be a HUMAN?

And we are also saying that all on this planet are brothers and sisters?  How can we make that true?

How about if we make God our "FATHER"?

So that makes God able to understand us, and communicate with us, solves those philosophical problems, and if we make it all about the FAMILY we can visualize us all as being together forever!

But how can humanity be ONE with a human GOD if they don't know about all this?  EASY!  We teach them what they need in the afterlife!  Problem solved!  So finally everyone will get it and know the IDEAL PARADIGM FOR ALL TO FIND ETERNAL JOY!

And it all starts with ASKING GOD if he's out there and getting a spiritual answer!!

No history necessary- no perfect Apostles necessary- just wise men who buy into the paradigm overall but sometimes mess up on the details- NOT men who are "trained in the ministry" or brainwashed into one way of seeing the world- PERFECTION IN THE PRIESTHOOD is actually a detriment! 

They have to be real humans with real families with real personalities and differences!   There are NO perfect humans- only our IDEAL human Man of Holiness as a paradigm.

So for me that is how all the big pieces fit.

Long post but short on explanation.  There is a lot to fit into a tiny space. 

 

 

[clarkgoble]

On 3/30/2019 at 4:56 PM, mfbukowski said:

I know that is what you often post about Peirce- the utility of the possibility of something happening in the future which would make a statement more foundationalist and therefore in principle "verifiable" and I have criticized that in other posts pointing out that therefore pigs can fly because at some point in the future it may be possible to alter their genetics and give them wings and allow them to fly.

Just to be clear Peirce is discussing what people mean by truth by applying the pragmatic maxim. To claim at a given point that something is true is based upon ones present and past experiences. I've never tried to reduce justification to that indefinite future. However if truth is wrapped upon in the future, then knowing is a process essentially wrapped up as much in future experiences as past. This seems obvious when considering science and the influence of predictions, surprise and future confirmation. While Peirce lived before Einstein's big discoveries in quantum mechanics and relativity he was very much aware of how scientific knowing proceeded. That's behind his application of the pragmatic maxim to truth. However if was also aware of the problem of realism and convergence. So convergence isn't really part of his notion the way it was in turn of the century idealism vs. realism debates.

I raise all this just to emphasize that for Peirce verification is a process not a static analysis the way the logical positivists typically took it. There are problems with Peirce's verification, which is why Putnam went with his take on warranted assertability. Although I don't think Putnam was ultimately successful. But I think he illustrated a lot of interesting things along the way - most of which come out of Peirce. So the rise of semi-empirical methods in mathematics, for instance, is pure Putnam and happened before the rise of computer programs in mathematical proof. (Putnam was writing on it well before the computer based proof of the four color theorem in 1997)

Contra Putnam, who is returning to a more traditional epistemology, I think the deep insight of Peirce here is in emphasizing process and thus future experience, recognizing most doubt is "fake" and needs its own justification, and recognizing that ultimately what matters is real belief and real doubt.

On 3/30/2019 at 4:56 PM, mfbukowski said:

Regarding the problem of reductive physicalism about mental states (the belief that descriptions of mental states can be reduced to descriptions of brain activity) it is clear to most that Nagel has pretty much exploded that notion through logic and linguistic analysis as being a semantic problem.

I definitely like Nagel here, but I was more using Mirrors of  Nature as an example of Peirce's point about a difference without a difference not being a difference. I certainly agree with Nagel, but I think it's that question of difference when semantics are seen through the pragmatic maxim that is ultimately the most fruitful.

On 3/30/2019 at 4:56 PM, mfbukowski said:

But yet again what does this have to do with the Book of Mormon??

The thread has definitely expanded above talk about the Book of Mormon. I'd say though that first off the pragmatic maxim offers a lot to understand about Alma 32, which is also a process focused analysis of coming to know. The point I'd make though is that what gets tested is more than just ethical utility or even human flourishing. Further the very nature of testing requires we engage in the kind of investigation that some disparage either as apologetics or as missing the central point of the Book of Mormon.

 

Edited April 1, 2019 by clarkgoble

[clarkgoble]

15 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

How do we know it is pre processed in by what? How could such an assertion be shown to be true or false? Or even useful?

We know we don't just see colors and then process a conscious interpretation. We can do that sort of thing but it happens by attending just to that particular focus. When we experience things we don't experience that sort of interpretation most of the time. 

As for showing it true or false, just do the phenomenology. That's always key for reading Heidegger or any phenomenologist since they're giving phenomenological descriptions. So one can always conduct the experiment they are conducting. The point of phenomenology is to point at an experiment you can always conduct. This isn't traditional analytic philosophy.

15 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

At what does Clark actually think about these things? And how does Clark account for the truth value of personal revelation?

I ask you directly and use your name because typically your great knowledge of the history of philosophy would outweigh your discussion of what yourself think.

I would love to hear more about how Clark structures his personal world, without commentaries on others.

I point to others so as to show the differences I see between traditions so as to clarify my position. Or at least to point to the arguments.

[mfbukowski]

30 minutes ago, clarkgoble said:

Just to be clear Peirce is discussing what people mean by truth by applying the pragmatic maxim. To claim at a given point that something is true is based upon ones present and past experiences. I've never tried to reduce justification to that indefinite future. However if truth is wrapped upon in the future, then knowing is a process essentially wrapped up as much in future experiences as past. This seems obvious when considering science and the influence of predictions, surprise and future confirmation. While Peirce lived before Einstein's big discoveries in quantum mechanics and relativity he was very much aware of how scientific knowing proceeded. That's behind his application of the pragmatic maxim to truth. However if was also aware of the problem of realism and convergence. So convergence isn't really part of his notion the way it was in turn of the century idealism vs. realism debates.

I raise all this just to emphasize that for Peirce verification is a process not a static analysis the way the logical positivists typically took it. There are problems with Peirce's verification, which is why Putnam went with his take on warranted assertability. Although I don't think Putnam was ultimately successful. But I think he illustrated a lot of interesting things along the way - most of which come out of Peirce. So the rise of semi-empirical methods in mathematics, for instance, is pure Putnam and happened before the rise of computer programs in mathematical proof. (Putnam was writing on it well before the computer based proof of the four color theorem in 1997)

Contra Putnam, who is returning to a more traditional epistemology, I think the deep insight of Peirce here is in emphasizing process and thus future experience, recognizing most doubt is "fake" and needs its own justification, and recognizing that ultimately what matters is real belief and real doubt.

I definitely like Nagel here, but I was more using Mirrors of  Nature as an example of Peirce's point about a difference without a difference not being a difference. I certainly agree with Nagel, but I think it's that question of difference when semantics are seen through the pragmatic maxim that is ultimately the most fruitful.

The thread has definitely expanded above talk about the Book of Mormon. I'd say though that first off the pragmatic maxim offers a lot to understand about Alma 32, which is also a process focused analysis of coming to know. The point I'd make though is that what gets tested is more than just ethical utility or even human flourishing. Further the very nature of testing requires we engage in the kind of investigation that some disparage either as apologetics or as missing the central point of the Book of Mormon.

 

Ok good points, but let me be pedantic here, it's "mirror" of nature - the singular is important because it indicates science as a unified erroneous way of seeing.

It's also "distinction without a difference" not "difference without a difference" which is important because it indicates the separation between experience and language.

It is indicating a semantic distinction without a difference in experience.

In religious terminology I would see that as a change in" substance" with or without a change in what us experienced, the "appearances" or also the two "natures " of Christ.

Both of these are examples of semantic distinctions with no difference in what we experience, and therefore are irrelevant to pragmatists.

 

[mfbukowski]

1 hour ago, clarkgoble said:

We know we don't just see colors and then process a conscious interpretation. We can do that sort of thing but it happens by attending just to that particular focus. When we experience things we don't experience that sort of interpretation most of the time. 

As for showing it true or false, just do the phenomenology. That's always key for reading Heidegger or any phenomenologist since they're giving phenomenological descriptions. So one can always conduct the experiment they are conducting. The point of phenomenology is to point at an experiment you can always conduct. This isn't traditional analytic philosophy.

I point to others so as to show the differences I see between traditions so as to clarify my position. Or at least to point to the arguments.

This is straight Kant.

Synthetic a priori. Not the same as an "interpretation"

Again, from my Kant prof, Robert C Solomon. I have no problem with this quote, but experiences can never give us "objects"

Edited April 1, 2019 by mfbukowski

[clarkgoble]

2 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

Ok good points, but let me be pedantic here, it's "mirror" of nature - the singular is important because it indicates science as a unified erroneous way of seeing.

Yes, and I agree up to a point. I just think that Rorty there pushes it further than is justified. It's where I raise Peirce and suggest that thinking through the potential differences is useful even if we can't yet distinguish them empirically. That thinking through the differences is where Peirce breaks so strongly with the positivists too, and why he allows metaphysics in his philosophy. As we think through the differences we come to have either belief or doubt - which are results of inquiry and not necessarily grounded by argument the way justification is in the epistemological tradition. Those beliefs and doubts then become their own evidence to a degree.

You'd asked about how I see all of this relative to the Book of Mormon and it's precisely there. As we inquire, if we're doing our epistemic duty, then the result is either belief or doubt. And that belief or doubt through continued inquiry is epistemological evidence for justification. So I carefully read the critics arguments against the Book of Mormon, carefully read the defenders, and then conduct my own investigations. At the end I believe and I can't force myself to not believe. That belief is itself justification for there being justification for the Book of Mormon. But it is doing that epistemic duty through inquiry that I think is key.

2 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

It is indicating a semantic distinction without a difference in experience.

In religious terminology I would see that as a change in" substance" with or without a change in what us experienced, the "appearances" or also the two "natures " of Christ.

Both of these are examples of semantic distinctions with no difference in what we experience, and therefore are irrelevant to pragmatists.

Right, but the whole argument would be that belief or doubt is a difference in experience. That's why we can have ethics. (Famously meaningless in a more positivist approach)

35 minutes ago, mfbukowski said:

This is straight Kant.

Synthetic a priori. Not the same as an "interpretation"

Right, but pragmatism starts with a rethinking through Kant and his categories. Sticking with Peirce for a moment, one way to read Peirce is as a Kantian who takes a continued inquiry in the structures. The a priori structures become the tricotomy of Peirce. That then moves Peirce in a more Hegelian direction even if he doesn't think much of Hegel overall. 

Put an other way, the Ideas in the Kantian sense, become themselves developed. This is a point where pretty much all the pragmatists including the neo-pragmatists agree. Peirce just looks at how they develop in a fairly rigorous logical fashion. Effectively all the pragmatists adopt a rejection of the two dogmas of empiricism through this consideration of Kant well before Quine popularizes that notion. In terms of the logic, Peirce's notion of abduction is wholly wrapped up in this point.

As Solomon notes, this becomes a big deal in phenomenology as well. Interestingly Derrida synthesizes the two traditions particularly in his critique of the Idea in the Kantian sense. So you're point about the synthetic a prior isn't an interpretation ends up rejected in both traditions. It's a special kind of interpretation.

An other way to put this is that even the cognitive "machinery" is under evolution.

Edited April 1, 2019 by clarkgoble

[mfbukowski]

11 hours ago, clarkgoble said:

Yes, and I agree up to a point. I just think that Rorty there pushes it further than is justified. It's where I raise Peirce and suggest that thinking through the potential differences is useful even if we can't yet distinguish them empirically. That thinking through the differences is where Peirce breaks so strongly with the positivists too, and why he allows metaphysics in his philosophy. As we think through the differences we come to have either belief or doubt - which are results of inquiry and not necessarily grounded by argument the way justification is in the epistemological tradition. Those beliefs and doubts then become their own evidence to a degree.

You'd asked about how I see all of this relative to the Book of Mormon and it's precisely there. As we inquire, if we're doing our epistemic duty, then the result is either belief or doubt. And that belief or doubt through continued inquiry is epistemological evidence for justification. So I carefully read the critics arguments against the Book of Mormon, carefully read the defenders, and then conduct my own investigations. At the end I believe and I can't force myself to not believe. That belief is itself justification for there being justification for the Book of Mormon. But it is doing that epistemic duty through inquiry that I think is key.

Right, but the whole argument would be that belief or doubt is a difference in experience. That's why we can have ethics. (Famously meaningless in a more positivist approach)

Right, but pragmatism starts with a rethinking through Kant and his categories. Sticking with Peirce for a moment, one way to read Peirce is as a Kantian who takes a continued inquiry in the structures. The a priori structures become the tricotomy of Peirce. That then moves Peirce in a more Hegelian direction even if he doesn't think much of Hegel overall. 

Put an other way, the Ideas in the Kantian sense, become themselves developed. This is a point where pretty much all the pragmatists including the neo-pragmatists agree. Peirce just looks at how they develop in a fairly rigorous logical fashion. Effectively all the pragmatists adopt a rejection of the two dogmas of empiricism through this consideration of Kant well before Quine popularizes that notion. In terms of the logic, Peirce's notion of abduction is wholly wrapped up in this point.

As Solomon notes, this becomes a big deal in phenomenology as well. Interestingly Derrida synthesizes the two traditions particularly in his critique of the Idea in the Kantian sense. So you're point about the synthetic a prior isn't an interpretation ends up rejected in both traditions. It's a special kind of interpretation.

An other way to put this is that even the cognitive "machinery" is under evolution.

Well the difference might be semantic, but "interpretation" seems to be the wrong word. I agree that sometimes it might be an "interpretation" as in discovering that a perception of water turns out to be a mirage. On the other hand as in while reading, it is a kind of instant synthesis of the word from a bunch of squiggles on the page. Or in some cases a paragraph. That's how I got thru school.

In situations of surprise I think it is that is a wordless synthesis, which is not unlike religious experience. We know our wife' voice instantly when she picks up the phone and there's really no need for "interpretation" that it is her. After thousands of perceptions of her voice the synthesis is instantaneous.

And so I would argue we know the Lord's "voice' as well.

But it is still a synthesis.

In the example quoted by Solomon, one need not "interpret" that one is passing houses while driving down the street at 30 mph. Nor are we venturing Beyond experience into some metaphysical realm to verify that our perceptions correspond to the reality through investigation.

The experience IS the reality. Instantly.

And I think your qualification of calling it a special kind of interpretation makes the qualification right there, that there IS a difference

But we are definitely pretty close in our understanding of these issues.

The biggest difference is of course that I am an anti realist and that Peirce ultimately as you admit has to invoke some kind of metaphysics to make his view work.

And with the Book of Mormon as usual I would insist that no further discussion is necessary after the Moroni10 experience.

Either the instant wordless synthesis happens or it doesn't. Yes it might take time it might take many perceptions of it until one synthesizes that conclusion. Or interprets. In that context I think the word works. But like knowing my wife's voice  finally the synthesis is instantaneous. Each of those minor perceptions / experiences becomes a pool of experience that lead to instant recognition.

If everything is an interpretation then I see that the death of man folks possibly have it right. Contingency of language wins and we are simply robots programmed by our environment and culture. God is dead and humans are robots, and the universe is a total accident. That is where Nietzsche leads, and where Rorty goes wrong, and arguably later sees that 

The way that Chantal Bax gets out of this conundrum is that our environments for each single individual in the world are unique due to factors like our culture the nature of our parents genetic differences etc etc., And so it becomes possible to be able to construct our unique worlds and thereby save agency.

So though I personally have my doubts about that position I think I see it as a parachute or an alternative way of saying it to still preserve our individual uniqueness who the face of cultural conditioning.

So for me there is no need of a unifying metaphysics. That becomes Bax's major point.

She saves the idea of the individual while granting that the Word, ie text - is what is universal to humanity with no need for any underlying metaphysics to explain it. 

So reality as humans know it is a pool of all of our individual experiences expressed first verbally, and then in text, and in the causes of human experience including culture and its relations and our relations to culture.

In this I see an affirmation of the possibility of spiritual experience as being as valid as any other repeatable and" peer-reviewed "experience.

And this is why it is perfectly reasonable to say the church is true or the Book of Mormon is true within their contexts. 

Our community of peers has judged that this utterance not only makes sense but is also "true," by the same means that any other sentence is made true by the agreement of peers within its context.

Here is a good explanation of some of the issues I have just stated:

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/foucault/#LangMan

 

Edited April 2, 2019 by mfbukowski

[clarkgoble]

4 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

Well the difference might be semantic, but "interpretation" seems to be the wrong word. I agree that sometimes it might be an "interpretation" as in discovering that a perception of water turns out to be a mirage. On the other hand as in while reading, it is a kind of instant synthesis of the word from a bunch of squiggles on the page. Or in some cases a paragraph. That's how I got thru school.

I don't mind using a different word. I choose "interpretation" just because that's the term in the phenomenological and hermeneutic tradition. i.e. Derrida and Gadamer  For Peirce there's an interpretant but he sees the emphasis as being on the object that determines the interpretant rather than a person necessarily interpreting the interpretant. A common issue in semiotics is figuring out the relationship between explicit interpretation and implicit interpretation. If I'm following you correctly you're making a similar distinction but saying only one should be called interpretation. As I said I'm fine with any terminology so long as we're clear on what we're saying.

4 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

But it is still a synthesis.

In the example quoted by Solomon, one need not "interpret" that one is passing houses while driving down the street at 30 mph. Nor are we venturing Beyond experience into some metaphysical realm to verify that our perceptions correspond to the reality through investigation.

The experience IS the reality. Instantly.

Well I don't like using reality there and I agree we don't talk about metaphysics or correspondence. Rather we just encounter the things. The synthesis is always happening. But how it happens is transforming. Inquiry (which is essentially a social process of many people) is constantly transforming that synthesis. Our world is not the world of a thousand years ago. 

4 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

The biggest difference is of course that I am an anti realist and that Peirce ultimately as you admit has to invoke some kind of metaphysics to make his view work.

Most of what Peirce does is logic. His metaphysics is quite a bit more complicated and controversial. I'm not sure I buy parts of it - his more platonic and Hegelian musings. Peirce's point is more that we can't escape doing metaphysics and those who try end up merely doing unexamined metaphysics (and often incoherent metaphysics). Since you like postmodernism this is like the old saying that postmodernism is the recognition one can't escape modernism but knowing the flaws of modernism. 

4 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

And with the Book of Mormon as usual I would insist that no further discussion is necessary after the Moroni10 experience.

I'd say that the very process of re-membering things distorts them so that an experience can be transformed. Unless the experience is re-experienced as a kind of new origin then it can be decentered and lost. It's why someone who once had a testimony can loose it. 

More to the point though, knowing the book is true is of no help unless one knows what it means.

[mfbukowski]

11 hours ago, clarkgoble said:

I don't mind using a different word. I choose "interpretation" just because that's the term in the phenomenological and hermeneutic tradition. i.e. Derrida and Gadamer  For Peirce there's an interpretant but he sees the emphasis as being on the object that determines the interpretant rather than a person necessarily interpreting the interpretant. A common issue in semiotics is figuring out the relationship between explicit interpretation and implicit interpretation. If I'm following you correctly you're making a similar distinction but saying only one should be called interpretation. As I said I'm fine with any terminology so long as we're clear on what we're saying.

Well I don't like using reality there and I agree we don't talk about metaphysics or correspondence. Rather we just encounter the things. The synthesis is always happening. But how it happens is transforming. Inquiry (which is essentially a social process of many people) is constantly transforming that synthesis. Our world is not the world of a thousand years ago. 

Most of what Peirce does is logic. His metaphysics is quite a bit more complicated and controversial. I'm not sure I buy parts of it - his more platonic and Hegelian musings. Peirce's point is more that we can't escape doing metaphysics and those who try end up merely doing unexamined metaphysics (and often incoherent metaphysics). Since you like postmodernism this is like the old saying that postmodernism is the recognition one can't escape modernism but knowing the flaws of modernism. 

I'd say that the very process of re-membering things distorts them so that an experience can be transformed. Unless the experience is re-experienced as a kind of new origin then it can be decentered and lost. It's why someone who once had a testimony can loose it. 

More to the point though, knowing the book is true is of no help unless one knows what it means.

In Gadamer "interpretation" is always about text, not about interpreting experience or perceptions.

I made a late edit to that post- I think we would understand each other better and the problem I am discussing if you checked out this piece of a Stanford article- the link I provided above and will tack on to the end of this post- 

One of the important points is more absorbing the attitude of the writer of the article in this link- the notion that the idea of "representation" is over and we are now beyond that into a text-only reality.

I think that is far beyond where Peirce was over a hundred years ago.

Hermeneutics is about seeing text as reality- the only reality we can discuss- which seems to me to be prima facie true and I have trouble even understanding any world outside of our communal understanding of it as created by text.  So interpretation is about text- exactly what we are doing here.  We are not, nor could we, be discussing anything about a "reality" beyond text.

This to me has direct relevance to the BOM.

There is no need for a link to  "actual history" which is imaginary and does not exist beyond the text of history.   We may say the BOM does not correspond to routinely agreed upon texts from its times etc- but to do so would be to misunderstand that the BOM has a different CONTEXT than historical texts- it is about spiritual matters!

It is a manual for praxis in spiritual growth- not a text about a history that never "actually happened" because what "actually happened is unknowable, and every person who experienced what "actually happened" would have their own accounts anyway

The job of the historian is to interpret texts about what is alleged to have "actually happened" and CREATE "history"- not observe it and allegedly report it "objectively"

So for me this "death of man" issue is a serious one and a problem I think Bax has solved.

And Foucault was just carrying on the tradition started by Neitzsche- so there were as many denying that "subjectivity" could even be considered seriously- as Foucault 

But I see Peirce as a brilliant philosopher who is - as we all are- a product of his times and times have changed.

He and Nietzsche were contemporaries and I don't think Peirce could have possibly understood the legacy of Nietzsche or where this all would lead- the death of metaphysics along with God and Man

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/foucault/#LangMan

Quote

 

3.2.3 Language and “Man”

At this point, The Order of Things introduces the two central features of thought after Kant: the return of language and the “birth of man”. Our discussion above readily explains why Foucault talks of a return of language: it now has an independent and essential role that it did not have in the Classical view. But the return is not a monolithic phenomenon. Language is related to knowledge in diverse ways, each of which corresponds a distinctive sort of “return”. So, for example, the history of natural languages has introduced confusions and distortions that we can try to eliminate through techniques of formalization. On the other hand, this same history may have deposited fundamental truths in our languages that we can unearth only by the methods of hermeneutic interpretation. (So these two apparently opposed approaches—underlying the division of analytic and continental philosophy—are in fact, according to Foucault, complementary projects of modern thought.) But there is yet another possibility: freed from its subordination to ideas, language can function (as in the Renaissance) as an autonomous reality—indeed as even more deeply autonomous than Renaissance language, since there is no system of resemblances binding it to the world. Even more, Foucault suggests, language is a truth unto itself, speaking nothing other than its own meaning. This is the realm of “pure literature”, evoked by Mallarmé when he answered Nietzsche’s (genealogical) question, “Who is speaking?” with, “Language itself”. In contrast to the Renaissance, however, there is no divine Word underlying and giving unique truth to the words of language. Literature is literally nothing but language—or rather many languages, speaking for and of themselves.

Even more important than language is the figure of man. The most important point about “man” is that it is an epistemological concept. Man, Foucault says, did not exist during the Classical age (or before). This is not because there was no idea of human beings as a species or of human nature as a psychological, moral, or political reality. Rather, “there was no epistemological consciousness of man as such” (The Order of Things, [1973: 309]). But even “epistemological” needs construal. There is no doubt that even in the Classical age human beings were conceived as the locus of knowledge (since humans possess the ideas that represent the world). The notion of man, on the other hand, is epistemological in the Kantian sense of a transcendental subject that is also an empirical object. For the Classical age, human beings are the locus of representations but not, as for Kant, their source. There is, in Classical thought, no room for the modern notion of “constitution”.

Foucault illustrates his point through a striking discussion of Descartes’ cogito, showing why it is an indubitable certitude within the classical episteme, but not within the modern episteme. There are two ways of questioning the force of the cogito. One is to suggest that the subject (the thinking self, the I) that Descartes concludes necessarily exists in the act of thinking is something more than just the act of representing objects; so we can’t go from representation to a thinker. But for the Classical Age this makes no sense, since thinking is representation. A second criticism would be that the self as representer may not be “really real” but merely the “product of” (constituted by) a mind that is real in a fuller sense. But this objection has weight only if we can think of this “more real” mind as having the self as an object in some sense other than representing it. (Otherwise, there is no basis for saying that the self as representer is “less real”.) But, once again, this is precisely what cannot be thought in Classical terms.

3.2.4 The Analytic of Finitude

At the very heart of man is his finitude: the fact that, as described by the modern empirical sciences, he is limited by the various historical forces (organic, economic, linguistic) operating on him. This finitude is a philosophical problem because man as a historically limited empirical being must somehow also be the source of the representations whereby we know the empirical world, including ourselves as empirical beings. I (my consciousness) must, as Kant put it, be both an empirical object of representation and the transcendental source of representations. How is this possible? Foucault’s view is that, in the end, it isn’t—and that the impossibility (historically realized) means the collapse of the modern episteme. What Foucault calls the “analytic of finitude” sketches the historical case for this conclusion, examining the major efforts (together making up the heart of modern philosophy) to understand man as “empirico-transcendental”.

The question—and the basic strategy for answering it—go back, of course, to Kant, who put forward the following crucial idea: that the very factors that make us finite (our subjection to space, time, causality, etc.) are also conditions necessary for the possibility of empirical knowledge. Our finitude is, therefore, simultaneously founded and founding (positive and fundamental, as Foucault puts it). The project of modern (Kantian and post-Kantian) philosophy—the analytic of finitude—is to show how this is possible.

Some modern philosophy tries to resolve the problem of man by, in effect, reducing the transcendental to the empirical. For example, naturalism attempts to explain knowledge in terms of natural science (physics, biology), while Marxism appeals to historical social sciences. (The difference is that the first grounds knowledge in the past—e.g., an evolutionary history—whereas the second grounds it in a revolutionary future that will transcend the limitations of ideology.) Either approach simply ignores the terms of the problem: that man must be regarded as irreducibly both empirical and transcendental.

It might seem that Husserl’s phenomenology has carried out the Kantian project of synthesizing man as object and man as subject by radicalizing the Cartesian project; that is, by grounding our knowledge of empirical truths in the transcendental subject. The problem, however, is that, as Foucault sees it, the modern notion of man excludes Descartes’ idea of the cogito as a “sovereign transparency” of pure consciousness. Thought is no longer pure representation and therefore cannot be separated from an “unthought” (i.e., the given empirical and historical truths about who we are). I can no longer go from “I think” to “I am” because the content of my reality (what I am) is always more than the content of any merely thinking self (I am, e.g., living, working, and speaking—and all these take me beyond the realm of mere thought). Or, conversely, if we use “I” to denote me simply as a conscious being, then I “am not” much of what I (as a self in the world) am. As a result, to the extent that Husserl has grounded everything in the transcendental subject, this is not the subject (cogito) of Descartes but the modern cogito, which includes the (empirical) unthought. Phenomenology, like all modern thought, must accept the unthought as the ineliminable “other” of man. Nor are the existential phenomenologists (Sartre and Merleau-Ponty) able to solve the problem. Unlike Husserl, they avoid positing a transcendental ego and instead focus on the concrete reality of man-in-the world. But this, Foucault claims, is just a more subtle way of reducing the transcendental to the empirical.

Finally, some philosophers (Hegel and Marx in one way, Nietzsche and Heidegger in another) have tried to resolve the problem of man’s dual status by treating him as a historical reality. But this move encounters the difficulty that man has to be both a product of historical processes and the origin of history. If we treat man as a product, we find ourselves reducing his reality to something non-human (this is what Foucault calls the “retreat” from man’s origin). But if we insist on a “return” to man as his own proper origin, then we can no longer make sense of his place in the empirical world. This paradox may explain the endless modern obsession with origins, but there is never any way out of the contradiction between man as originator and man as originated. Nonetheless, Foucault thinks that the modern pursuit of the question of origins has provided us with a deeper sense of the ontological significance of time, particularly in the thought of Nietzsche and Heidegger, who reject Hegel’s and Marx’s view of the return to our origin as a redemptive fullness of being, and instead see it as a confrontation with the nothingness of our existence.

 

So we must understand the BOM for what it IS- a text within a context, the purpose of which is to illustrate spiritual lessons in praxis. 

"History" conceived as an account of "what actually happened" never actually happened!

 

Edited April 2, 2019 by mfbukowski

[mfbukowski]

1 hour ago, mfbukowski said:

In Gadamer "interpretation" is always about text, not about interpreting experience or perceptions.

I made a late edit to that post- I think we would understand each other better and the problem I am discussing if you checked out this piece of a Stanford article- the link I provided above and will tack on to the end of this post- 

One of the important points is more absorbing the attitude of the writer of the article in this link- the notion that the idea of "representation" is over and we are now beyond that into a text-only reality.

I think that is far beyond where Peirce was over a hundred years ago.

Hermeneutics is about seeing text as reality- the only reality we can discuss- which seems to me to be prima facie true and I have trouble even understanding any world outside of our communal understanding of it as created by text.  So interpretation is about text- exactly what we are doing here.  We are not, nor could we, be discussing anything about a "reality" beyond text.

This to me has direct relevance to the BOM.

There is no need for a link to  "actual history" which is imaginary and does not exist beyond the text of history.   We may say the BOM does not correspond to routinely agreed upon texts from its times etc- but to do so would be to misunderstand that the BOM has a different CONTEXT than historical texts- it is about spiritual matters!

It is a manual for praxis in spiritual growth- not a text about a history that never "actually happened" because what "actually happened is unknowable, and every person who experienced what "actually happened" would have their own accounts anyway

The job of the historian is to interpret texts about what is alleged to have "actually happened" and CREATE "history"- not observe it and allegedly report it "objectively"

So for me this "death of man" issue is a serious one and a problem I think Bax has solved.

And Foucault was just carrying on the tradition started by Neitzsche- so there were as many denying that "subjectivity" could even be considered seriously- as Foucault 

But I see Peirce as a brilliant philosopher who is - as we all are- a product of his times and times have changed.

He and Nietzsche were contemporaries and I don't think Peirce could have possibly understood the legacy of Nietzsche or where this all would lead- the death of metaphysics along with God and Man

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/foucault/#LangMan

So we must understand the BOM for what it IS- a text within a context, the purpose of which is to illustrate spiritual lessons in praxis. 

"History" conceived as an account of "what actually happened" never actually happened!

 

On further research on Foucault and Peirce, I see that was wrong about their relationship.

I am not a historian of philosophy.

The point I was making was about the nature of the Book of Mormon and the relationship between these two philosophers was a side issue.

[clarkgoble]

1 hour ago, mfbukowski said:

In Gadamer "interpretation" is always about text, not about interpreting experience or perceptions.

Text is used expansively though - by Derrida too. So he'll talk, for instance, of interpreting art. My Gadamer is unfortunately packed up right now but Derrida uses text more or less the way Peirce uses signs.

Quote

 

One of the important points is more absorbing the attitude of the writer of the article in this link- the notion that the idea of "representation" is over and we are now beyond that into a text-only reality.

I think that is far beyond where Peirce was over a hundred years ago.

 

It's more that Peirce anticipated this move. The idea, particularly for Gadamer following Heidegger, is that we encounter the things themselves not just a representation or copy. Derrida picks up on this too. But Peirce pretty well has all this in his analysis of the sign. Particularly in his mature work at the end of his life. There are representations but representations also show us the thing itself. So in any sign relation the object and not merely its representation is key. That's more or less the idea of externalism where meaning isn't just in terms of representations in the mind but the things themselves and the full chain of mediation. 
 

Quote

 

There is no need for a link to  "actual history" which is imaginary and does not exist beyond the text of history. 

 

I'd instead say it's all the text of history including the objects themselves. 

[Wade Englund]

On 3/29/2019 at 12:27 PM, mfbukowski said:

Wade I have been thinking about this for a few days now and I would like to try a new approach to the problem that avoids metaphysics and makes the issue more practical I think-  I just hope I can get it into words.

We all have beliefs that frame the way we see the world which are based on the way we see the world.

Often those beliefs are not based on hard "facts" about the nature of the world, but are half inherited, half thought through and half not thought through so much.

We build our lives on such ideas, we set our goals and cornerstone beliefs on such rocks.

But some of them may or may not be "facts" and some of them may not be necessary to be facts.

Do we need it to be true that Moses actually hiked up that mountain and saw a burning bush to agree that it is wrong to murder people?

What if there was never such a person as Moses?  Is murder therefore OK?

The bottom line is "does it matter"?

Why does it matter or not matter?  That is a question we all must answer for ourselves.  

Is it easier to believe that we should not murder BECAUSE Moses was a "real man" who "really saw God in the burning bush" and received tablets written by God's own hand containing the 10 commandments?

Is it really necessary to believe that Jesus died literally for our sins in order to know that after all we have done to repent, our sins are forgiven after all we can do to fix them?   That we should forgive ourselves because we have done all we can to "erase" their effects?

Are the lessons in the Book of Mormon any less powerful in our lives if the people who experienced them never existed?

Is the parable of the prodigal son any less "true" because we do not have a photograph of the father in the story or his historical signature on parchment certifying that the story is "true"?

But wait!

Is it possible all these things "really did" happen???

Is it impossible that the did happen?

Inconclusive!   We cannot really know that they did or did not happen the way they appear in scripture!  Impossible!

So do we need to worry about whether or not they happened? 

Is our belief stronger by believing they did?   What is wrong with that in believing that they were "REAL" when such cannot be proven or disproven?

On the other hand even if Moses did not exist do we need that to know murder is wrong?

My point is that OUR personal point of view about historicity is not relevant to our beliefs- either way- about the principles we learn to build the foundations for our lives.  

So yes, if you want to believe they really happened- we don't know for sure anyway

If you want to not believe they really happened- we don't know anyway

If you don't care either way and yet affirm the principles taught, fine- we don't know for sure anyway!

Were the principles "inspired" by a "God"?  If you want to believe that, or not believe it, fine- we don't know for sure anyway!

The important thing is to understand the principles taught- not where the principles came from, and build our lives on these true principles which mankind has understood in their hearts forever.

If Jesus never uttered the words should we stop treating others as we want to be treated?

That is putting "facts" over principles mankind has learned over thousands of years for a peaceful and happy life.

I will support those principles regardless of historical facts every day

And the bottom line is that we already know "in our hearts" that murder is wrong and we should treat others the way we want to be treated- and these cannot be deduced from the way the world "really is"- we do not see these principles in action much in this world in which we live.

That is all the proof I need- they are already true in my heart, and were before I joined the church.

I spent some time reconsidering what you said, and I have come to agree.  We can't know those things, and it is a good thing that we don't--not just for reasons of maintaining the primacy of principles, but also to allow growth in faith.  Strength can come through struggling with the issue of historicity or no, and this regardless where one comes down on the issue at one time or another.  Gratefully, each are yet able to progress--which is the essential point. [thumbs up]

Thanks, -Wade Englund-

[mfbukowski]

11 hours ago, Wade Englund said:

I spent some time reconsidering what you said, and I have come to agree.  We can't know those things, and it is a good thing that we don't--not just for reasons of maintaining the primacy of principles, but also to allow growth in faith.  Strength can come through struggling with the issue of historicity or no, and this regardless where one comes down on the issue at one time or another.  Gratefully, each are yet able to progress--which is the essential point. [thumbs up]

Thanks, -Wade Englund-

Thanks so much for letting me know- and this kind of approach is the one I will use in creating a blog for my Stake for some youth who are not understanding these principles.  I have been commissioned by my SP to do so, and so I am glad this approach worked.

We all base our morality on principles which cannot be proven factually.  

The entire basis for "political correctness" is based on not being offensive, and yet what empirical fact proves it as a principle? 

Morality for atheists is no less based on moral feelings and not objective "truth" any more than it is for us- and yet ironically if someone says that one must need a belief in God to be "moral"- you will immediately be attacked by atheists showing how ridiculous that assertion is!

And in the next sentence they will attack you for believing in God without empirical proof!!

They can't prove their moral ("spiritual") beliefs with empirical principles, while attacking us for having no empirical evidence for ours!

Go figure.

As Hume showed 300 years ago, you cannot conclude what "ought to be" from what is!

Edit: Thought of another example, cut a puppy up and go to jail for "cruelty" but to kill a human fetus in the last stages of gestation, or even after birth is the mother's "right", since a fetus is part of her body 

Where is the empirical evidence for positions on either side of these issues? 

And still athiests argue against a belief in God because there is "no evidence."

 

Edited April 4, 2019 by mfbukowski

[USU78]

When I was struggling with "No Man  ..." back in my grad school days ('78-80), I was poring over the BoA facsimiles and the explanations, trying to figure out just what the heck was going on  ...  and I had not yet then heard or read the term ithyphallic, I was breaking my head over the squiggly-lined rendering of Min and, without recognizing why (it took years to do that), it popped into my head "Oh, it's about the Temple!"  No explanation by my subconscious, the Spirit, or whatever it was that cut through everything for me.  Just "It's about the Temple!"

I learned math the same way.  I'd hear the explanation of how to go about solving the equation or story problem, look at the problem presented, and the answer would pop into my brain.  I had no conscious sense of going through the steps.  The steps, in any case, were boring if you already know the answer.  Steps are laborious and often counter-productive.  Knowing the answer immediately without boring old thought was a thrill:  going through the steps just tedium.  This is why I got Cs in Geometry, and minored in math in college.

Indeed, there's more going on than squares and compasses with our ritual hand gestures (since the conversation has devolved around Min).  Consider the most basic one:  raising the right hand.  Since most folks are right-handed, the open right hand, palm forward, is a sign that there is no weapon present.  Verbally, we might say shalom or pax.  And traditionally we would say "pax" when those empty right hands meet and clasp, concluding a commercial transaction.  And thus the simple hand clasp is a sign of a covenant between the owners of those empty right hands.  And when I am a child and I present you with an open right hand, palm up, and you have a bag of m&ms, I am asking for a treat.  That a treat for a four-year-old is the equivalent of a blessing for a forty-year-old is not much of a leap.

It's all about the Temple.

[mfbukowski]

2 hours ago, USU78 said:

When I was struggling with "No Man  ..." back in my grad school days ('78-80), I was poring over the BoA facsimiles and the explanations, trying to figure out just what the heck was going on  ...  and I had not yet then heard or read the term ithyphallic, I was breaking my head over the squiggly-lined rendering of Min and, without recognizing why (it took years to do that), it popped into my head "Oh, it's about the Temple!"  No explanation by my subconscious, the Spirit, or whatever it was that cut through everything for me.  Just "It's about the Temple!"

I learned math the same way.  I'd hear the explanation of how to go about solving the equation or story problem, look at the problem presented, and the answer would pop into my brain.  I had no conscious sense of going through the steps.  The steps, in any case, were boring if you already know the answer.  Steps are laborious and often counter-productive.  Knowing the answer immediately without boring old thought was a thrill:  going through the steps just tedium.  This is why I got Cs in Geometry, and minored in math in college.

Indeed, there's more going on than squares and compasses with our ritual hand gestures (since the conversation has devolved around Min).  Consider the most basic one:  raising the right hand.  Since most folks are right-handed, the open right hand, palm forward, is a sign that there is no weapon present.  Verbally, we might say shalom or pax.  And traditionally we would say "pax" when those empty right hands meet and clasp, concluding a commercial transaction.  And thus the simple hand clasp is a sign of a covenant between the owners of those empty right hands.  And when I am a child and I present you with an open right hand, palm up, and you have a bag of m&ms, I am asking for a treat.  That a treat for a four-year-old is the equivalent of a blessing for a forty-year-old is not much of a leap.

It's all about the Temple.

That's worth at least a dozen rep points!

When you put together the elements it becomes sign language. If a hand in a certain position can be a definable symbol with the meanings defined right in front of you....

 

[mfbukowski]

Error

 

Edited April 4, 2019 by mfbukowski