Curt Doolittle

Category: Epistemology and Method

  • Johannes noticed that I repeat ideas. “Over and over.” Why? Because it works: Re

    Johannes noticed that I repeat ideas. “Over and over.”

    Why? Because it works:

    Repetition is necessary for understanding.

    Because you must always improve ideas like stanzas.

    Because sets of complex ideas must be woven together into poems.

    Any talk show host or public intellectual, marketing or brand specialist, or political strategist will tell you the same thing:

    Stay on message.

    People who write help and tutorial documentation will tell you similar things: repeat until the audience feels that they are smart, and that what was not clear is intuitively obvious.

    Source date (UTC): 2014-11-22 09:33:00 UTC

  • In math the difference between exploration (theorizing) by operations, and proof

    In math the difference between exploration (theorizing) by operations, and proof, is narrow. But in argument the difference between exploration using operations on meaning (models) which we call ‘reason’, and operations in reality (those that are existentially possible) ‘actions’, can diverge greatly. For the same reasons that mathematicians call functions numbers – aggregates of operations are easier to work with than many discreet operations….

    Source date (UTC): 2014-11-22 06:43:00 UTC

  • PROPERTY, EXCHANGE, CONSTRUCTION, GRAMMAR, RHETORIC, TESIMONY, PROMISE. The skil

    PROPERTY, EXCHANGE, CONSTRUCTION, GRAMMAR, RHETORIC, TESIMONY, PROMISE.

    The skills. It is these skills that defeat the lies and liars.

    Source date (UTC): 2014-11-22 06:37:00 UTC

  • DAMMIT: TRUTH ITSELF IS A THEORY OF ARBITRARY PRECISION. argh

    DAMMIT: TRUTH ITSELF IS A THEORY OF ARBITRARY PRECISION.

    argh…

    Source date (UTC): 2014-11-22 06:35:00 UTC

  • So one of terminological the changes I think I must make is in the use of operat

    So one of terminological the changes I think I must make is in the use of operationalism and constructivism as proofs. This simplifies the debate a bit. Then again, truth is promise – an action. Facts are facts, events were events. And we may seek to make statements increasingly truthful (statements devoid of imaginary information, error, and deception). So we construct proofs operationally in constructive and intuitionistic mathematics, and a praxeological proof in economics. These are proofs that something is existentially possible. the added virtue in human operations is that we are able to visible demonstrate when some one of our arguments, staements, or concepts of aribtrary precision fail us.

    Source date (UTC): 2014-11-22 06:34:00 UTC

  • OF TRUTH Quick search and I find this very accurate, brief summary, that is more

    http://cseweb.ucsd.edu/~goguen/images/HISTORY OF TRUTH

    Quick search and I find this very accurate, brief summary, that is more insightful than I assume the author knows.

    Source date (UTC): 2014-11-22 06:27:00 UTC

  • Truth is not found in words, but in actions. We do not need language to demonstr

    Truth is not found in words, but in actions. We do not need language to demonstrate truths. In fact, it is hard to imagine that language has any positive meaning other than to provide us with inexpensive models to problem solve with. Unfortunately, while providing us with discount modeling, it also serves as an outstanding means of also obtaining discounts by means of deception.

    Source date (UTC): 2014-11-22 03:51:00 UTC

  • THE SIMPLE TRUTH It’s pretty simple. Ultimate truth is a problem for priests and

    THE SIMPLE TRUTH

    It’s pretty simple. Ultimate truth is a problem for priests and gods. But men must act using the available level of precision that their tools allow them to act at. Any statement at the available level of precision that allows actions to produce promised outcomes is a true statement. That does not mean that we cannot increase precision. So newton’s theories are true, as are Einstein’s, as will be whatever subatomic theory we construct that will replace Einstein’s. Because at each level of precision these theories produce promised outcomes.

    Source date (UTC): 2014-11-22 03:01:00 UTC

  • Truth is not found in your means of discovery, but once found, in your reconstru

    Truth is not found in your means of discovery, but once found, in your reconstruction of the discovery from necessary consequences of available operations.

    Source date (UTC): 2014-11-22 02:08:00 UTC

  • The Search For Precision and Parsimony

    [P]opper would have been better off saying that he was advising us on the search for precision and parsimony, by making truthful statements along the way, rather than coopting the word ‘truth’ from his spiritual background. We are not investigating the mind of god. Nothing is obscured from us. Nature doesn’t try to lie to us, nor is nature mistaken.

    The question is not ‘is that true’ but ‘can I testify to and warranty this?”

    Linguistic blame avoidance caused a lot of ripple effects in philosophy.

    But popper’s culture was not one of truth telling (as his own rhetorical attacks on competitors evidences.) Cosmopolitans are pragmatists not truth tellers. They do not warranty their speech as do westerners.

    Meaning in cosmopolitanism is utilitarian and escapable, not truthful and warrantied.

    Popper relies upon cosmopolitan truth (the unknowable mind of god), and cosmopolitan truthfulness (non-warrantied speech).

    This is why he could advance science but that was the limit of his solution.