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More Faulty Assumptions By You

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Posted by Harvey on November 5, 2002 18:18:00 UTC

Dick,

I can always tell when my points are sticking with you. You make more demeaning comments, become more emotional, and you avoid key responses to my previous posts. The last straw usually results in a final insult and with you leaving the conversation. I hope you resist that temptation. In any case, I can't let you off the hook so easily since I am close to showing how you change definitions to obfuscate the issues.

***Harv: You must understand what properties a thing has before you can refer to that thing. Dick: That is a completely asinine statement. You have referred to "Ultimate Reality" a number of times. You are thus, in essence, saying that you understand the properties of "Ultimate Reality". I think you have just stepped off the deep end. Furthermore, if you believe that you understand the properties of everything you have ever referred to, you are suggesting that you have never thought anything which you did not understand. That is certainly an unreasonable position.***

This is not an asinine comment. You are mistaking the use of properties as a means to identify an object with knowing the actual (ontological) properties of a thing. In addition, I am not even referring to an object, I am referring to a concept. The concept is identifiable, but the objects that actually exist are not. Concepts also have properties, and we must have some understanding of those general properties before we can even refer to a concept. For example, if I asked you to tell me what the concept 'lieto' means, you might have no idea what I was referring to if you spoke only English. However, if you spoke Italian you would probably know this word refers to 'happy'. This doesn't mean we have fully defined 'happy', but we have a working concept by which we can have some idea what we are talking about. Similarly, we referred to 'Ultimate Reality' as actually 'existing', and therefore this gives us an understanding of the general properties of what we mean by 'Ultimate Reality'.

Dick, this is a common example of how you twist the meaning of a word and then insult your way into what you see as a superior position. As I illustrated here, you cannot defend your position here, but you would state that we must accept your faulty assumptions. But, there are more which you avoided. I will restate them again:

***"I have no problem applying one label because that is certainly [something that can be done by Dick]; however, (...) you seem to believe that there is no other [something that can be done by Dick]. If one is to take the position that what they believe to be true is the only [something that can be done by Dick] then there is no point to thinking at all."***

Ah, notice how your response utterly fails to handle the objection once we substitued what you mean by 'probability' back into the text? If this labelling of components of 'Ultimate Reality' is something that 'can be' done by you, then do it. How is that done Dick? How do you know how to label more than 'Ultimate Reality' other than what we've already defined it as 'all that exists' or '24'? This is not something that 'can be' done by you. You must either re-define what you mean by 'probability' (or 'probable') or you must accept that one label (e.g., '24') is all that 'can be' done by you.

***D: I am not seeking to quantify 'Ultimate Reality' at all. That is a complete figment in your imagination. What I am doing is proposing a totally unconstrained method of quantifying descriptions of 'Ultimate Reality'. H: What are the primitives of your method? What are your axioms? Whatever they are, they may (A) or may not be (B) true of the properties of '24'. If they are true (A), well, then all is good and well. If not true (B) of '24' (or not applicable to '24'), then your method doesn't work at all. D: Harv, I assure you that my method is as valid for '24' as it is for any other description of 'Ultimate Reality'.***

How can you assure me that your method is valid? To assure me it is valid you have to convince me that 'Ultimate Reality' works based on the laws of human classical logic? However, even many logicians are not convinced that classical logic work beyond practical matters.

***With regard to that issue, suppose I wished to talk about that part of 'Ultimate Reality' which is green? Are you trying to tell me there is no part of 'Ultimate Reality' which has the characteristic "green"? Or are you contending that the color "green" plays no part in 'Ultimate Reality'? Maybe you should go talk to Aurino about that!***

Green might be something that works for humans. When we analyze the issue, we find that 'green' varies based on human interpretations. For example, is the color 'frosty lime' green, or is it another color? What 'icy blue', is it part of green, part of blue, part of white? Is color something that even exists? That is, doesn't the photon have different wave frequencies and aren't some people color blind, etc? In the end, these issues throw serious doubt on the view that 'green' is part of 'Ultimate Reality'. If (7) is based on this kind of thinking, then you need to re-think your approach.

***What I am doing is proposing a totally unconstrained method of quantifying descriptions of 'Ultimate Reality'.***

If (B) [your axioms are not true for 'Ultimate Reality'], then you haven't quantified anything about 'Ultimate Reality'. Since we cannot know if (A) [axioms are true for 'Ultimate Reality'] is true or (B) is true, there is no way to assume (7) as true since it requires (A) to be true. If (A) is false, then so is (7).

Warm regards, Harv

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