I’m pretty sure this has been proposed before but I want to know if anyone can falsify this cause i beleive there is a problem with this statement but i am not sure what:
Sentence: There is no Absolute Truth
This statement is inherently not true because if it were true it would be false.
Repeated in a different way the statement would be absolutely true in that there is no absolute truth but that is obviously false.
Therefore there is absolute truth…or at least 1 absolute truth
This statement is inherently not true because if it were true it would be false.
Huh ? "this statement is inherently not true "…(i.e.false)…“because if it were true it would be false”
Again, the problem is not language itself, but those who speak it without understanding what they are saying . How does saying, to paraphrase this illogical,illiterate arguement, "it is false because if it were true it would be false " make any sense? It is tantamount to saying… it is X because if it were Y it would be X.
This violates the axiomatic law of identity ,which must be acknowledged before any formulation of an arguement can begin. I am not attemptng to disprove absolute truth, but rather the attempt to prove it through illogical means.
Absolutes (e.g. existence) require no proof. Absolutes,by their nature, are self-evident.
“There is no absolute truth” is not an absolute statement, it just a statement about what happens to be the case. There is no contradiction.
The absolute form would be “absolute truth cannot be”. This would be contradictory.
Solutions to Russell’s set problem (not to mention the round square thing) might provide you with a way of expressing “absolute truth cannot be” without being logically contradictory, but i havent tried.
someoneisatthedoorf: Absolutes are by their nature self-evident and therefore require no discussion. Why bother to try to prove what is self-evident?"
K: And again what would be an absolute?
What in this universe is an absolute?
Instead of playing word games, tell me what would
be considered by everyone as absolute, because it is as you
say “self-evident” if something is absolute.
So what is undeniably absolute?
This is exactly right. In mathematics you can prove a theory by disproving its opposite~My roomate.
I’m not quite sure that an absolute truth is self evident… I think they would require absolute proof!
In Response to Oreso
Right… I would have prefered the sentence to say “absolute truths do not exits”…seems to be more cogent.
The point you bring up about the “round square” doesn’t seem to hold as it is impossible for a round square to exist. The physical characteristics of somthing that is round differ from somthing that is square… obviously logically incoherent (apples and oranges). The funny thing with this statement is that we are dealing with one thing i.e. square and not square. “Absolute Truths do not exist” is the negation of “Absolute Truths exist”
So with round square statement: p q
with absolute truth statement: p -p
I still find this statement confusing… I would like to challenge someone to define this using propositional logic… I think it can be defined using material implication but i do not have time!
That was precisely my point, Kropotkin, that as soon as one says ‘X is absolute’ one violates logic. Once again: Absolutes are by their nature self-evident and so it is pointless to put them into language in which NOTHING is self-evident. Are you familiar with the Jewish notion of never speaking of God because to do so is immodest as language isn’t appropriate to the task?
Had you read Rorty’s essay on why rationalism fails (the problem of presenting an aspatiotemporal subject in a spatiotemporal medium) then you’d know what I was on about. I’ll see if I can find the essay online, but previous searches didn’t reveal it so I don’t hold out much hope…
someoneisatthedoorf: Absolutes are by their nature self-evident and therefore require no discussion. Why bother to try to prove what is self-evident?"
K: And again what would be an absolute?
What in this universe is an absolute?
Instead of playing word games, tell me what would
be considered by everyone as absolute, because it is as you
say “self-evident” if something is absolute.
So what is undeniably absolute?
S: That was precisely my point, Kropotkin, that as soon as one says ‘X is absolute’ one violates logic. Once again: Absolutes are by their nature self-evident and so it is pointless to put them into language in which NOTHING is self-evident. Are you familiar with the Jewish notion of never speaking of God because to do so is immodest as language isn’t appropriate to the task?
K: I am aiming for something here.
You are placing logic ahead of simple common
sense. I am not interested in the logic of the situation.
I am interested in what is absolute/universal.
What is an universal/absolute truth?
I say there is no such animal
and to pretend otherwise is silly.
S: Had you read Rorty’s essay on why rationalism fails (the problem of presenting an aspatiotemporal subject in a spatiotemporal medium) then you’d know what I was on about. I’ll see if I can find the essay online, but previous searches didn’t reveal it so I don’t hold out much hope…
And wouldnt an absolute statement say that it is impossible for something to exist, not that it happens to not exist? (the “world” and “absolute truth” are the apples and oranges).
If you dont mean this, then i wouldnt take it to be an absolute statement, just a remark about the current state of affairs (something that could have been different) thus there is no problem.
The round square problem was a problem because the statement seems to be suggesting that such a thing as a round square could have existed, it just happens to not. What the actual statement means however is: “no one thing can simultanously be square and round” as you pretty much stated.
PL wouldnt help you out all that much, but QL should demonstrate it nicely:
A should be upside down (the ‘take any you like’ symbol)
E should be backwards (the ‘there exists that’ symbol)
R is “x is round”
S is “x is square”
x is a thing (variable)
The rest is standard PL stuff.
“Take any thing you like, and it cannot be both round and square”
Ax ~(Rx & Sx)
The absolute truth problem (if it is indeed an absolute and true statement and thus a problem) is different, but thats why i suggested it might be solved by a similar solution to Russell’s other great problem: “the set of all sets that do not include themselves”. I dont accept the statement though, so im not gonna try (for example, I take logical tautologies to be absolutely true).
And I’m saying that all absolutes are self-evident and therefore need not be put into language which will only complicate matters. I can’t describe an absolute, I can describe a description of the absolute. Language is always deferred as soon as one opens ones mouth.
No offence but that comment didn’t contain a question. I know that you haven’t read Rorty…
Awww, with a little charity, I think what Szpak means is: This statement is paradoxical because if it were true, then it would be false. I think his intention is important here. So, law of identity is out of the question. The statement “There is no absolute truth” is a paradoxical statement. The issue is, how to resolve this paradox.
So, how to resolve:
Szpak, one way to look at a paradox like this is through epistemology. Reformulation of the statement, which oreso has already pointed out, could be made in order to point out that what’s being expressed is one’s belief without commitment to its being absolute, or to its being a claim to knowledge. It would lead to unstable statement, but not self-contradictory nonetheless.
So arendt the statement is a paradox? The people I am debating with insist that it is proof that absolute truth exists. I don’t want to reitterate the statement. I didn’t think it violated any laws of identity.
Oreso I am quite interested in logic… and I’m not quite sure I understand what logic you were trying to use… I have not studied it as of yet… could you mabe reccomend some texts i could look at?
Good post Szpak these types of questions are always fun. I have three topics:
Why is it important for people to believe in an absolute or universal value?
Someoneisatthedoor made an interesting statement, “You’ll get nothing but contradictions and an apt demonstration of the limits of language from those who consider themselves absolute relativists.†Often when engaging in discussions with those who believe in some sort of logocentric system I find they become increasingly ill-tempered the more one picks at precepts of their center. The end result, a stalemate, a universal based on a leap of faith for logic. So what I am getting at, is belief in universals similar to if not indistinguishable from belief in a type of God?
I am particularly weak in logic but it seems pretty clear to me that the statement “There is no Absolute Truth,†is not a proof that proves that absolute truth exists. I can see where a first year logic student could get confused. In classical logic when you state A— this asserts that A is true, which is fine as long as it is applied within the proposition. However A— does not reveal any truths beyond that because A doesn’t mean anything outside of the context of the proposition. This same idea should be applied to logic as a whole, that is where Intuitionistic logic becomes important. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intuitionistic_logic
On another note, someoneisatthedoor, I would love to read Rorty’s essay on why rationalism fails. If you could get a hold of that or at least let us know where you found the published work that would be great.
I can’t wait to be corrected on this stuff! -thanks
So, Szpak, what do you mean by truth?
Does this distinction help to clarify things a little?
…By the way, I don’t know if this logical rule holds for transcendentals like truth, but acc. Aristotle, to deny A is to say that not-A is true, not necessarily A’s opposite. In this case, such might mean that truth is misunderstood and is neither true nor not-true properly speaking. (But I will probably come out for absolute truth in this forum, however.)
QL is just the PL you are used to but with quantifiers and names and things. For a general text on logic I recommend the interestingly titled “Logic” by Paul Tomassi.
K: UMMM. We are now getting somewhere.
First point. Reality. OK, Is there a reality?
I can’t really be sure about that.
Does reality mean my reality or your reality,
because we obviously see/understand reality different.
I am not even sure you can prove reality exist.
our knowledge of reality.
Are you saying, cogito, ergo sum, I think therefore I am,
or are you saying something else?
Our expression of our knowledge.
I don’t know what this means.
Our expression? Of our knowledge?
NOPE, don’t get what this means.
Our senses aren’t reliable when it comes to a set basis that we can agree on. We do all see things differently. We can’t decided on one truth so we have to separate ourselves according to our own.