BARBARA CUBED - I. DEFINITIONS

About: barbara cubed - the manual of pure logic

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Seth says
This page has certainly influenced my understanding of logic. New students coming to the study of logic would be well advised to start here. This definition clearly lays out the limits of logic. Logic is not concerned with arriving at "The Truth"... it is strictly limited ... "it deals only with antecedents & consequents; something is given & something necessarily follows". Logic just gives us rules of a game. Nothing more, nothing less. A good student of Logic knows this; but casually people will say, "This is logical", and think, therefore it is True.

Seth says

seth 2006-04-21 10:11:40 3345

M 2006-04-21 08:55:33 3345

I.E. Garbage In ==> Garbage Out !

Not exactly. Even if what is input to the process is not garbage, what is output of the process is still not "Truth". Any way you hack it, what has happened is nothing more than a game.

Let me make a small adjustment to my assertion. Even if what is input to the process is not garbage, what is output of the process is still not Truth. Any way you hack it, what has happened is nothing more than a game.

The only thing i changed was to take "Truth" out of quotes ... because in fact what might be output of the process might be the string "Truth".

Mark de LA says

seth 2006-04-21 10:11:40 3345

M 2006-04-21 08:55:33 3345

I.E. Garbage In ==> Garbage Out !

Not exactly. Even if what is input to the process is not garbage, what is output of the process is still not "Truth". Any way you hack it, what has happened is nothing more than a game.

I knew we would get back into this. Primarily, logic treats "truth" differently than you do! George Boole spoke of the "truth" values of "0" and "1" (the basis of computer circuits etc.). I really don't know what your version of what the meaning of the word truth is. My impression so far is that it is a sort of democratic group effort that determines the truth for the members of that group.

Seth says

M 2006-04-21 10:21:09 3345

seth 2006-04-21 10:11:40 3345

M 2006-04-21 08:55:33 3345

I.E. Garbage In ==> Garbage Out !

Primarily, logic treats "truth" differently than you do! George Boole spoke of the "truth" values of "0" and "1" (the basis of computer circuits etc.). I really don't know what your version of what the meaning of the word truth is.

Actually my version agrees with GW, above, and also agrees with what is written in academic books used to teach logic at universities.

source: M 2006-04-21 10:21:09 3345
My impression so far is that it is a sort of democratic group effort that determines the truth for the members of that group.

Well that is a very rough paraphrase of something that i might believe. Note, however, you are not talking about logic the process as defined by GW above. You are talking about truth. And as GW says: "Formal logic is not concerned with Epistemolical problems". That is my point. You, apparently, are still bound by the consusion that my message here is trying to clarify.

Seth says

M 2006-04-21 11:01:27 3345

My confusion probably was prompted by the meaning of your statement:

source: ... Not exactly. Even if what is input to the process is not garbage, what is output of the process is still not "Truth". Any way you hack it, what has happened is nothing more than a game.

...to me if you have premises which are true then the conclusions are true i.e. Truth in ==> Truth out. The ultimate qualities & properties of truth is an eternal argument.

Well what we are arguing about here is what is Truth. But it is a misnomer to think that you can just define Truth to be what you think Truth is, and then that, whatever it is, it is input the to calculations that we call logic. All that is input to the calcuolations that we call logic are labels affixed to statements. In this regard these labels are not unlike the labels that we affix to items here at fastblogit. So what we have input to our logical process is labels, and what we have output from the logical process is labels. At no time are we ever talking about Truth. That thing called Truth is the output of a social process and really has nothing to do with the formal logical processes which are the topic of Barbara Cubed.

Mark de LA says
The logical engine is fine whether it manipulates 1's & 0's or words. If you feed it garbage, ie a bunch of words that is incomplete, needs more explanation, is dependent on many contexts, is not agreed upon by the participants in an argument etc. then you will get garbage out. Humans have an natural tendency to quibble when an outcome goes against them. Bill Clinton quibbled about the meaning of the word "IS" when caught. My Zen master once said "There is nothing outside of the way you hold it" ! i.e. context is required to give meaning to anything - a distinction. You hold something in a context.

I haggled a bit with Aha! now I know how to find "nothing" !

Seth says

M 2006-04-21 15:22:37 3345

Truth in the sense of logic (or maybe I should say truth in the context of logic) is boolean algebra. There is no passion or feelings to confuse YOU in the processing of it. Otherwise your computer may someday rise up and slay you !

But truth is not just 0s and 1s and their algebraic manipulations.   You are right, there is no passion or feelings to confuse you there.

Let us put it this way: if a true statement be one which is actually the case, then all I am saying is that situation cannot be reduced to 0 or 1. There is too much more information involved ... what does the statement mean ... to whom ... what are the facts of the matter ... again, to whom ... how is the logic being applied ... is the right logical machine for the task at hand being used, etc. When you talk about truth, then you must talk of all of those other things. And here is my major thesis ... all of those other things are what matters when it comes to useful truth ... they are what produces a useful result, but the logical machine is too strong for them, it requires absolute certainty which can never be achieved by humans ... so in fact classical logic is pretty much a farce ... it is a hammer where what is needed is a sponge ... at best it can be used as a mechinism to record and transmit results that have been already determined by other processess.

Any professor of logic would tell me that i am talking of google epistemological truth, and i am. What i am ranting against is those people who use logic to lend crediance and legitimacy to epistemological truth. Well, at best that are kidding themselves, at worst they are misleading their audience.

I say

... Don't do it !

Seth says

M 2006-04-21 12:29:03 3345

M 2006-04-21 12:28:03 3345

Why do you insist on making this distinction about truth. This is a book on logic. Truth is generally thought to be when language agrees with fact. Your labels ~ CFR's names (see the names paragraph). See the section on Quality (affirmative or negative) is where the truth could slip away . If one asserts something in the affirmative which in fact is negative then truth in the sense of logic has been lost. AGAIN - GIGO !

Try it the other way around ... If one asserts something in the affirmitive which in fact is the case, then can we rely that logic will preserve that truth" ? I think not. Thing is there is no such thing as "truth in the sense of logic" ... from where i sit that is a non referential phrase ... there is just a machine ... tokens in ... tokens out ... that machine does not preserve or destroy truth any more than this blog preserves my intention for making this comment.

What is more, there are many kinds of logics ... which one is chosen and how it is applied requires human interaction . It is that human interaction that preserves are destroys whatever we humans refer to as the truth. The machine is just a machine and has to do with gears or electronic blips or whatever, but certainly has nothing to do with truth. Truth in the sense of logic is confusion.

Mark de LA says
Saying, basically, "THERE IS NO TRUTH" doesn't make it go away.

Mark de LA says
Has Bozo invented a context in which NO TRUTH EXISTS ? WOW! New contexts are rarely produced or show up! On the other hand, who would want to talk to someone for whom there is no truth ? How could someone speak, at all, from a context where no truth exists?

What's it like there?

Seth says

M 2006-04-22 04:37:47 3345

Has Bozo invented a context in which NO TRUTH EXISTS ? WOW! New contexts are rarely produced or show up! On the other hand, who would want to talk to someone for whom there is no truth ? How could someone speak, at all, from a context where no truth exists?

What's it like there?

There is usually some relationship between the world of thoughts and discourse and what actually happens. That relationship is reminicent of what is usually called "truth". My contention is simply that binary logic, especially with the law of the excluded middle, is a very shoddy model of that relationship.

Logic is an invention. It is a habit of analyzing thoughts that has evolved in the last several millineum. It is just a pattern ... and like all patterns of behavior it can be changed ... one can learn to think differently. I rarely think "is X true?". Instead i'm more concerned with "Why did A say X to B ?", "X is gonna kill me", "i don't like where X is going", "What does X mean to A?", "How can i change X for A ?" , "Can A use X for Y?", and my favorite one "That works for me".

Imagine how it would be if the word "truth" and all the behavior of using it suddenly dissapeard from our culture ...

Mark de LA says

Logic is an invention. It is a habit of analyzing thoughts that has evolved in the last several millineum. It is just a pattern ... and like all patterns of behavior it can be changed ... one can learn to think differently. I rarely think "is X true?". Instead i'm more concerned with "Why did A say X to B ?", "X is gonna kill me", "i don't like where X is going", "What does X mean to A?", "How can i change X for A ?" , "Can A use X for Y?", and my favorite one "That works for me".
Imagine how it would be if the word "truth" and all the behavior of using it suddenly dissapeard from our culture ...

For a wold which has no "truth" I would say that "Logic is an invention." would definitely be part of it. "Logic is an invention." is almost like saying words are an invention or Logos is an invention. "In the beginning was the Word (Logos)" probably doesn't live in that world of yours.
Maybe you should browse around in the Ethos-Pathos-Logos pdf on the fundamental in discourse (particularly Logos).
On the other hand what I am getting from your

source: ... Instead i'm more concerned with ...

... is a more thinking from the "medulla oblongata than the cerebrum" kind of world ... mostly survival .. when encountering something strange you must ask "Do I run or feed it a dog biscuit ? "

Seth says

Well i got a

from " For a wold which has no 'truth' I would say that 'Logic is an invention.' would definitely be part of it." ... but the rest of your comment was pretty much a jumble of scriptural confusion to me.

Mark de LA says
It was derivation of , & useage of the word Logos "word" etc. Sorry, I should have known that scripture pushes your buttons! That's the foundation of the meaning of the word LOGIC. You'll probably hate the following: (except for legolatry)

logic

1362, "branch of philosophy that treats of forms of thinking," from O.Fr. logique, from L. (ars) logica, from Gk. logike (techne) "reasoning (art)," from fem. of logikos "pertaining to speaking or reasoning," from logos "reason, idea, word" (see logos). Meaning "logical argumentation" is from 1601. Logical attested 1500 as "pertaining to logic;" 1588 as "conformable to laws of reasoning;" 1860 as "following as a reasonable consequence."

logos

1587, "second person of the Christian Trinity," from Gk. logos "word, speech, discourse," also "reason," from PIE base *leg- "to collect" (with derivatives meaning "to speak," on notion of "to pick out words"); used by Neo-Platonists in various metaphysical and theological senses and picked up by N.T. writers. Other Eng. formations from logos include logolatry "worship of words, unreasonable regard for words or verbal truth" (1810 in Coleridge); logomachy "fighting about words" (1569); logomania (1870); logophobia (1923); and logorrhea (1902).My acessment of your reasoning being primarily in your "animal brain" rather than anything higher up still applies !

Mark de LA says
At this point I think we have a fine example of logorrhea !

I have flushed this item into (by tagging) the [tagroom: tag truth] as it seems no longer to be in the context of the group the great work nor much about the [book tag barbara cubed]. I don't mind conversing about it under the group philosophy should that be desirable.

Mark de LA says

seth 2006-04-22 09:10:15 3345

M 2006-04-22 08:46:02 3345

At this point I think we have a fine example of logorrhea !

i'm not sure what you are saying here. Fact is, this item is in this context and is in the context of all of the tag rooms in which it has been put.

Well you can look up the word logorrhea . (May need a sense of humor)

. I, myself, just put the "truth" tag on it. Having created the group & published most of the content in this group I can tell when content moves from the original intent. It is now more philosophy than initiation & enlightment stuff. I will no longer respond to this item here. I will continue [here: item 3361] . But, of course the

can continue to piss in this sandbox if he desires

. I respect that the

may actually have something here, but IMHO it is muddled & not teased out into clarity yet. Maybe George Santayana said "Those who ignore the past are condemned to repeat it's mistakes." I say that the past is mostly a low fidelity record. The present is gone before we record it & the future is at best a wish or a hallucination. Thus I share somewhat your present based philosophy since it is also shared by zen people.

Seth says
... yep, been there, done that, hated it

. But sure i like scripture too, and am fascinated with the evolution of things ... the Davinci Code was my favorite book ... can't wait for the movie. But trying to extract useful "How to" knowledge from ancient texts is like trying to piece together a space shuttle from a garbage dump. Better to go with things that work in the here and now jettisoning the baggage of the ages. Ask yourself ... Does this work in the context of the modern world in which we find ourselves? Thinking in ancient symbols is for archaeologists who want to discover how is was way back then ... not that there is anything wrong with that ... it is an honorable profession indeed.

Seth says

M 2006-04-22 08:46:02 3345

At this point I think we have a fine example of logorrhea !

i'm not sure what you are saying here. Fact is, this item is in this context and is in the context of all of the tag rooms in which it has been put.

Seth says
Well i really don't have the time to run much more of this logorrhea either. I'm not on any crusade. But there is nothing wrong, imho, with this being in the context of group the great work. After all, i am totally agreeing with what GW said above, and that is why i wanted to get that published explicitidly here. My study of that page was where these thoughts first entered my mind. I still think that you have not totally digested what GW said above. Me thinks that you still think that "logos" (as you put it) is something other than just a pattern of behavior that has evolved in the last 3 millineum ... and, me thinks, you cannot imagine that it can be done differently.

BARBARA CUBED - I. DEFINITIONS

About: barbara cubed - the manual of pure logic

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