We already had the “understanding” discussion (look it up in the thread: “Is knowledge also a belief?”). All understanding has to do with information, but not all information has to do with understanding. A stone that gives information to a geologist does not need to understand the information that it gives.
Also, nobody said that bellief and knowledge are exactly the same, but they have the same evolutionary root.
Eliminating belief does not epistemologically help. Knowledge did not occur out of the nothingness and also not without help. If you believe that knowledge is absolutely independent, then you are more a believer than those who say that knowledge is not absolutely independent.
Replace the word “acquired” in the above with “believed”, and you have the mainstream philosophical position. I don’t really don’t see how you can describe people ‘acquiring’ or ‘having’ information or facts without referencing belief formation- to acquire a fact means to become aware of it, to think that it is true. That’s what a belief is.
No sorry, the mainstream philosophical definition of belief is not “understanding facts, information or skills acquired by a person”. "
Contemporary analytic philosophers of mind generally use the term “belief” to refer to the attitude we have, roughly, whenever we take something to be the case or regard it as true. To believe something, in this sense, needn’t involve actively reflecting on it: Of the vast number of things ordinary adults believe, only a few can be at the fore of the mind at any single time. Nor does the term “belief”, in standard philosophical usage, imply any uncertainty or any extended reflection about the matter in question (as it sometimes does in ordinary English usage).
Now this digresses here from that in so much as it states “Many of the things we believe, in the relevant sense, are quite mundane: that we have heads, that it’s the 21st century, that a coffee mug is on the desk. Forming beliefs is thus one of the most basic and important features of the mind, and the concept of belief plays a crucial role in both philosophy of mind and epistemology. The “mind-body problem”, for example, so central to philosophy of mind, is in part the question of whether and how a purely physical organism can have beliefs. Much of epistemology revolves around questions about when and how our beliefs are justified or qualify as knowledge.”
This digression is what is currently the matter of contention.
I didn’t say it was. Read the quote again and it should be clear that I’m talking about the mainstream philosophical position of what knowledge is, not belief. What’s also clear, judging by your reply, is that you thought I was speaking of the philosophical definition of belief. This would be an example of you having a belief, as you define it.
A mistaken belief based on incautious reading, but you had it long enough at least to write your post.
A yes, I misread what you stated. In that case I wouldn’t have responded.
This is an example of me erring. I never held a belief that I knew what you meant. I didn’t even remember what you wrote until you responded here and I read it again. So to understand how it wasn’t a belief, you just need to understand
…with language I never would claim to know what someone else is meaning. Words can very easily be misunderstood on both ends. Both a communicator can not understand what they are meaning, or a communicator can understand what they are meaning and not utilize proper wording to convey their meaning. This goes for the receiver also, in that a receiver may not understand what the communicator is meaning, or the receiver can misunderstand what the communicator is meaning and not have good knowledge of the proper wording that the communicator used. In all instances, errors can occur as well. Misreading something that isn’t really there is fairly common. Mistyping something is also fairly common.
With my understanding of language and meaning - it is very difficult to say I know or believe what a communicator is stating to me. I would never " believe, or believe I understand" what the meaning of someone’s communication is, in the sense that I think what the meaning being conveyed and interpreted by myself is true, because I know better - in so much that things are usually often lost in translation, error, improper understandings… because the meaning is something that is solely in possession of the communicator. I don’t accept that I think the words I read are perceived correctly, communicated effectively, in so much as to hold an interpretation of meaning as “true”, as would be the case in belief. I would claim to know how I interpreted the communication that I received however, that is very straight forward knowledge there. On the communicating end, I would never claim to know that I communicated this effectively so that the receiver had to understand me, or had no choice but to understand what I meant. I am a man full of doubt and wary of misunderstandings with communication. I don’t even know or believe that you will understand this. I may have misunderstood what you meant again. I have no belief on the matter. I can only hope we are communicating in a way that conveys meaning from me to you, and you to me, in a reasonable way that causes us to have effective communication
Now - you might find this hard to believe and will attempt to denigrate my stance. But keep in mind this is a disciplined way of thinking that requires years. I have no investment in thinking things are true unjustly and I certainly know it is unjust to think anything we communicate is truly interpreted by me, or you, or communicated by me, or you. I would’ve fallen into pitfalls decades ago, back when I believed, was naive, was cautious in my thoughts and accepting of things to be true. I am a skeptic, I am full of doubt. You don’t want to accept that. You think its impossible. I don’t know why though. Perhaps you just haven’t trained your mind well enough? IN any case, my thread here is transcendence beyond normal ways of thinking. I agree it is not normal, it does require a useful working knowledge of communication, perception, psychology. It is not just some philosophy that is only based on philosophy, it is grounded in discipline and knowledge.
So you understand the stance, there was nothing more I wanted to do after realizing that I don’t believe in God anymore, was to stop believing things. Uccisore, have you ever believed God existed - and had it integrated in a full way of life? I was engulfed by belief years ago - over a decade ago actually. It’s pretty interesting, to say the least, to go from believing in a religion - to not, to seeing through it, through its methods that captured people, societies, cultures, for lifetimes, generations, centuries. It was eye opening Uccisore and I only wanted more, and i only want more for the rest of us, because we as humans deserve to think better than we currently do, in my opinion. Because I value humans, because we aren’t that far off from where we were thousands of years ago, if it weren’t for the efforts of a minority population, perhaps we wouldn’t even be utilizing electricity today. Of course, I don’t know that, I just know what ceasing belief has done for me, I hope it can do the same for others.
In any case, I welcome you to find other examples of what you think I must believe. I think it only allows opportunity for me to present my state of mind so you can understand. The more examples you supply that differ - the more you will see how my frame of reference is based in knowledge or doubt. Of course, by knowledge, you should know what I mean by now in this thread, that it isn’t a matter of belief, it is a matter of knowing - and by belief - how I mean and contend that it isn’t a cause for knowledge nor anyway a similar state of mind as knowledge.
You answer people’s questions without believing you know what they mean by the words they say?
If you never held a belief that you knew what I meant, what was your error?
All this shows is that you’ll say absolutely anything to preserve your weird ‘I don’t have any beliefs’ stance, no matter how obviously false it is.
Of course you didn’t know, you merely believed it. Those are completely different things to you, remember?
Of course I will, because we both know it’s extremely disingenuous mental gymnastics. Trying to convince me that you don’t form beliefs about the meaning of words you hear and read just reeks of desperation. Look, you already showed how far you’ll go to avoid admitting when you’re wrong in the Guns and God thread, so I’m under no illusions that I’m going to get you to admit that you have beliefs. But you’ve clearly demonstrated that you do, regardless of your willingness to fess up to it, and that’s sufficient for me.
I am replying to your responses above in so much that I have omitted parts that I didn’t see as reasonable to respond to, that being you only asserted things - which added nothing to the argument. What I kept is the meat and crux of your position as I understand it - and would hope that you agree as well, for the sake of brevity and for the sake of what I am actually finding worthy to respond to. This is not in retort to how you have edited and taken my quotes out of context in the past as I would not want to stoop to that level intentionally.
Now I find this fairly interesting specifically “You’re performing an amazing verbal acrobatic display in which you try to make a case that thinking you understand what people are saying to you doesn’t count as a belief”
Well, why must I believe that I understand what other people are meaning? I know that I do misread and misinterpret - so I don’t necessarily even know what other people are “saying” - t in so much as I have read their words in a manner that can be devoid of any conceptualization of context - but meaning is completely different and that is only known by the communicator. It is only my job as the receiver - and your job as the receiver to attempt to decipher it. Yes, often this is fairly simple. But if you start thinking its fairly simple, then you start believing everything you think the other person means, then you start thinking you believe you know what everyone is meaning. I mean, where does it stop? Why not have a reasonable level of doubt in communication that takes into account unknown interpretation errors, misunderstandings, misreadings, etc. Language and meaning can be very difficult to convey particularly in philosophy, or should I say, especially in philosophy?
But nonetheless, I am well aware of the flaws of communication. Why should I believe that I have interpreted you correctly? Particularly when so often in philosophical discourse, I don’t - or the receiver of my communication doesn’t, or I failed to communicate effectively and it is my fault, not the receivers, or vice versa. Why should I think I believe I understand someone when there’s so much room for error, or even deceit, or ignorance?
I shouldn’t. If you consider it belief, that’s fine. You probably do believe you are understanding this effectively enough to come back with a denigrating retort, because it seems you’re in such a belief filled state of mind that you don’t want to think about how you could possibly be wrong about understanding what I say, or that I simply can’t put together a reasonable argument for my stance, or that I’m lying, or attempting to deceive you, because you can’t possibly fathom how this would be possible. I mean, really? Is that it? You are arguing from your basis of subjective limited ignorance of how I think, to assume and provide a deductive argument that I must believe - without any reasonable evidence? Without able to refute what I state by only supplying speculation?
But yes Uccisore, you too “can SAY whatever the hell you want. You can SAY”… I believe and believe what you are saying. You can certainly say that I form beliefs about what words mean when I read them, that I couldn’t possible be a mind that has doubt about so many things. But you are simply saying something isn’t great evidence for it, especially that you’d rather insult me than admit that you lost an argument. This isn’t about an argument for me Uccisore - this is about a philosophy being tested amongst fellow thinkers in ILP, reddit, and elsewhere, and so far I only have reason to procede with this epistemic frame and conveying it in a useful manner that hopefully others can benefit from.
I agree that there isn’t much evidence as well for my situation, just as much as there is for yours. I hope you would agree with that as well, but you seem like you might be the type of person that wouldn’t admit that, but I could be wrong.
Remember, this is philosophy Uccisore- not hard science - not a hard science of the psychology of the mind.
You state “It’s easily proven that when you read a word, you come to some conclusion about what the other person meant by that word, and answer them as if that conclusion is true”
No, its not. A conclusion is pretty much considered set in stone. I already explained quite a bit many reasons why I don’t consider communication like this set in stone. It’s not conclusive. I have no knowledge or belief that you understand what I am meaning, or vice versa, particularly due to so much disagreement we have in a lot of areas already… but there’s much more than that as I already explained as to why anything you state, or anybody else states, that it isn’t a “conclusion” or that I know or believe what the other person meant. It’s left open. Its called being open minded to some extent, because language is very problematic for many, especially in philosophy and matters such as this that aren’t accustomed to normal every day colloquiality.
You are literally arguing with me right now about whether or not you understand what I mean by the words I’m saying to you. You are taking the position that you don’t know what my words mean, as a rebuttal to what you think my words mean.
All because you’re desperate to deny that you believe things.
I think phyllo’s facial expression summed it up best. This is a fucking joke now.
Uh, no I’m not arguing about whether I understand what you mean. I am arguing about believing that I have belief of understanding what you mean.
I only hope I have understanding of what you mean, for the sake of language. Only you know what you mean, it is up to us to interpret it to the best of our ability.
Its also very possible that you may be meaning to trick me, through utilizing similar senses of words that mean something that isn’t in the sense of the context we are discussing. In fact, by now, I had already forgotten what you said exactly, let alone what I think you might mean. I’d have to read it again to even find out what it is you said, as my response is my focus, and I do not remember what you said, or what I thought you meant. It is inconclusive. This is what happens in normal discussions; a belief is usually accepted as true and remembered. You just think I have to accept everything you communicate as true to your meaning, because perhaps that’s what you think you do when you communicate. But it it requires actual critical thinking here ucissore to understand how what I mean could be true, as opposed to what you assume is true. But then again, perhaps you don’t even know what I mean. Perhaps you just believe you do, that’s why you’re so adamant in never admitting fault and pointing fingers at everyone but yourself.
Interesting how you interpreted Phyllos smiley face as a taking what I said as a joke, it was a pretty straight face… But what do I know, or believe, about the meaning of that. I suspect your meaning here is just anger because you’re so full of your assumptions and beliefs, you can’t see it any other way. Then this is not for you, it’s for those who are capable. Until you get there…
“The stupid are cocksure and the intelligent are full of doubt”… I said it before and will say it again. But, You don’t get it.
It seems you’re conflating with colloquial rhetoric and / or your thought processes with my thought processes. That being - people often say and think that “I understand what you mean” is true. But I see that as just rhetoric- I don’t know why they understand and I don’t know how they understand what I mean - or any other interlocutors for that matter. I don’t believe people necessarily understand what they say they understand, or believe what they say they believe, or think how they think they think. I don’t know really - so I leave it open. I don’t start believing things though. I don’t believe people use their words right all the time, I don’t believe people communicate effectively all the time, I don’t believe I my words right all the time, I don’t believe I communicate effectively all the time. Now - as such, that is the prevalence in my frame of reference, not belief. You, however, can think and believe whatever you want. Just don’t try to force your beliefs on me. :-"
The smiley represented my shock. It’s incredible that you would be reduced to posting nonsensical babble just to avoid using the word ‘belief’ to describe some of your thoughts.
If you have to become that convoluted and contradictory, then there has to be something fundamentally wrong with your concepts.
Ok in order to make sense out of it, you have to leave your frame of reference, vicariously take on the words as I have already provided definitions on, perceive and think critically on a very deep level. You have to get to the crux of the language I am using - to understand the meaning on am attempting to express and how it is logical and at least possible for one to eliminate belief from their frame of reference. Post reason why you don’t understand it there, instead of just making vacuous claims. You’re saying its convoluted and contradictory, but not pointing out how. I see how its contradictory to what you think like, certainly. But what you think like, what I think like, isn’t the same.
When you respond to a post, what are you responding to? You must have some idea what the poster had written and therefore you have either a knowledge about what the poster had written or you have a belief about what the poster had written.
“Keeping your options open” or “doubts” would not cause you to respond.
I am responding to an interpretation of symbols that you utilized to express meaning. Having an idea doesn’t mean I believe I have interpreted your expression of meaning. Consider all the problems I laid out. I don’t need to believe this in order to act on good faith. Doubt, doubt, doubt… Not believe believe believe. I can doubt and still respond. I am not “caused” to do anything by my doubts, other than to keep an open mind. I am not “caused” by your words here to say what I said, I chose to say what I said. You are not forcing me to say anything. I am. It is all based on my understanding that anything you have said may have been misconveyed or misinterpreted on my end. The efficacy of effective communication is usually understood better upon further review and even peer review, at times. It is best to consider the efficacy of this communication not during this communication, but afterwards, I have found. Even then, there is much room for error. Our stream of consciousness in responding and conceptualizing words to write out, or type out, isn’t induced by belief in what you just said. Its based on something else, which I’ve attempted to communicate how that “something else” is different and more precisely, what it is.
And then there is that word ‘understand’ which you never explain but which you seem to use frequently when presented with a difficult argument.